These times are difficult. There’s no way around that fact. The COVID-19 virus has upended many lives and has been the cause of much fear and distress. It also presents a real quandary – we need community and connection and support right now, but we must curtail our face to face interactions dramatically in order to protect our community. At Woodmont, we are developing new ways to connect, to worship, and to reach out to each other. We don’t know how long these weeks of quarantine will last and social distancing can......

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Considerable research has gone into providing charts, graphs, and diagrams of how we can “flatten the curve,” keep hospitals from being overloaded and prevent a health care catastrophe in our community. All of this has been very necessary, valuable, and appreciated. Social distancing seems to be working well. In multiple cities and communities, there is a “breaking point” in the health care system that we have been trying desperately to avoid. It is directly tied to available hospital beds, physicians, ventilators, ad protective gear. However, I would argue that there is another......

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#1 RAISE YOUR ANTENNAE. Many kids have internal antennae that are more sensitive than we think. If a notable amount of anxiety is in their environment, they will know. They will sense it, feel it, and sometimes absorb it. So, the first thing to do is to raise your own antennae and be mindful of the environment. Can the news be heard throughout the house? Do they overhear your worried conversation with your sister? Can they see dad fretting about the market? While not sticking your head in the sand, which is......

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There is a tendency in our culture to skip directly from the celebration of Palm Sunday to the celebration of Easter. Actually, let’s be completely honest: there is a tendency on the part of many to simply celebrate Christmas and Easter and that’s all. High Holy days are wonderful but there is so much more to the Christian faith. According to John’s Gospel, so much happened in Jerusalem the days between Palm Sunday and Easter that should not be overlooked. Phillip Reif, a psychologist at the University of Chicago, once said, “Any......

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