Several people have asked about the story behind the picture on this website's header -- Feet and a cross. Here's the story:

The feet belong to a statue of Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. The statue sits just outside the chapel at Episcopal Divinity School. Years ago, I was a student at Episcopal Divinity School with a 2 year old son. The news broke a story of a young man named Matthew Shepherd who had been brutally beaten and killed because he was gay.

It affected me deeply. My son was only 2, so no idea of his sexual orientation, but what if it had been my child? Killed for the "crime" of who he was? With an aching heart, I wanted to form some sort of tribute to Matthew Shepherd.

My son and his best buddy (another toddler whose parent was in the ordination process) and I found sticks. We wound yarn around the sticks to form a cross. We placed the cross on Jesus' feet and knelt for prayer. Then I took this picture.

Oddly enough, my son still remembers the day we did this. For me, it became not only a symbol of solidarity with LGBT youth, but with all children who are "different." Because it is a meaningful memory for my son, it is a symbol to our family that "Different" also stands with Jesus.

How does one experience a call? Sometimes its just that God won't let you alone. Years before I even thought of having children, I became friends with another churchgoer whose young son never spoke.

I had no idea what autism meant, nor how it effected families.

When my own son was born, it never entered my head that he too might be on the Autism Spectrum. He was a preemie (born at 32 weeks - 3 pounds!) and was unusually bright. He talked in complete sentences early, could identify shapes early.

I believe we are shaped by those whom we admire. Here are my personal heroes. I guess the common theme for me is admiration for those whose faith informed all that they did (or didn't do) 

The Right Reverend Barbara C. Harris, 1st woman consecrated as Bishop in the Anglican Communion. Bishop Barbara ordained me to the priesthood. As far as I know, I am the only woman in the Anglican Communion to be ordained by Bishop Barbara. She is also one of the warmest (and funniest!) Bishops I know.

MC Hammer (Stanley Kirk Burrell) -- loved his music, but love even more that he holds both his faith and his fascination with technology in creative tension. He took a situation which might have broken (or at least discouraged!) many -- losing most of his money and reputation as a recording artist-- and turned his life to God. 

The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr was one of my first heroes. As a child born in the South, racial tension was always a background force. His story is universal, but one of my favorite stories is this one:

Jan. 27, 1956. King, at 26, was on his way to national celebrity as the leader of the Montgomery bus boycott. But the telephoned death threats had weakened his resolve. Unable to sleep, he sat at the kitchen table and reflected on the fact that he had inherited the ministerial profession from his father and had mastered the philosophy of religion at seminary and graduate school, yet he himself had no sustaining faith. Then King heard an ''inner voice'' that he identified as that of Jesus Christ. ''I heard the voice of Jesus saying still to fight on. He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone. No never alone. No never alone. He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone.'' 

Holly Robinson Peete - all mothers of autistic children are heroes to me, but Holly Robinson Peete and her daughter took their experience and turned it into a book: "My Brother Charlie." The book made an enormous difference to my daughter's understanding of her Aspie brother, and inspired us to wrote our own book (still in process) I LOVE (hate) my brother.