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The return of Vacation Bible School at St. Paul this week takes me back two years to my first one here. I was only three weeks into my position and hardly knew anyone. Frankly, the hundreds of people – small and large – who swarmed through the variou…
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This week I found myself in a variety of conversations about health with different St. Paul people. In these conversations, I realized something about the way my own approach to healthy living has changed. When I was a kid, I would go to the d…
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Tell us about your family/where you grew up/went to college. I grew up in Bloomington, Minn. with my parents and my younger sister, Emma. I attended Mount Olivet Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, Minn. all my life. I especially loved participating in V…
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We have one place in our house where we let our kids write on the walls. Every 6 months or so, we grab a Sharpie (yes, a permanent marker!) and head to the door to our pantry. There, on the door frame, we write little lines getting increasingly furth…
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High school graduation parties in our community are a big deal. Garage interiors get a spiffy new coat of white paint. Band mementos, sports ribbons, and grade school photos go public for a few hours before landing back in the keepsake box down in th…
It’s a nearly 3,000 mile journey. The voyage of a butterfly is a long, remarkable trek. The first generation of butterflies mate in Texas and go through a month-long maturation process. Only the second-generation females make their way north to lay t…
Tell us about your family. I was born to Eleanor and Frederick Winter and raised in Clinton, Iowa, baptized and confirmed at Zion Lutheran Church, Clinton. I have an older brother, Charles, who lives in Littleton, Colo. with his wife, Priscilla. I at…
At the beginning of March, Unit 171 of the Iowa Army National Guard out of Mount Joy, Iowa were deployed to Fort Hood, Texas for six weeks in preparation for their eventual deployment overseas. Vietnam veteran Lyle Peterson and the St. Paul Veteran’s…
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In a 2015 Ted Talk, radio host Celeste Headlee suggests ten ways to have a better conversation. One stuck out to me, and I’ve been working on it over the last several months since hearing her suggestions: don’t ask yes or no questions. Instead, try t…
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NASA has a fascinating mission underway. Ten days ago, the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft pushed itself away from the asteroid Bennu to begin a 2.4-billion-mile trip back to Earth. OSIRIS-REx, which is about the size of two large commercial refrigerators, has…
It’s a familiar sight at St. Paul but many don’t know the story behind it. The baptismal font. The font holds a special place in many hearts. It is a symbol of joyful celebration, welcoming young and old alike into the Christian community. It is a pl…
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Months ago, my brother and I were talking about the things we were most excited to do on the other side of this pandemic. I remember talking about travels to exotic places and dreaming of long elaborate meals at a crowded table of friends. I imagined…