From Jenn: From a dear friend: “I am also rereading Tattoos on the Heart by Gregory Boyle. He is Jesuit priest who works with gangs in Los Angeles. I have underlined a lot and have thought you might like some of what he says about God, us, how much we are loved, how little God cares about our mistakes. You are welcome to borrow if you want.” Little did she know I had already borrowed it from the library. (Don’t worry @thebrentwoodlibrary, instead of underlining, I took pics of my favorite parts. Lots and lots of pics.) My friend was right. G (as Gregory Boyle is affectionately known) writes beautifully – filling your heart one moment and breaking it the next. “Sometimes resilience arrives in the moment you discover your own unshakeable goodness. Poet Galway Kinnell writes, ‘Sometimes it’s necessary to reteach a thing its loveliness.’ And when that happens, we begin to foster tenderness for our own human predicament. A spacious and undefended heart finds room for everything you are and carves space for everybody else.” That’s what G does. He reteaches, reminds, and rejoices in the loveliness of every single person. He carves room for a bigger God, not the one we’ve made tiny, and a bigger love.

From Jenn http://ift.tt/2D10Khq

From Jenn: The book I gave my 16 year old for Christmas and then promptly stole and devoured all 444 pages in 4 days. It’s about 16 year old Starr who saw her childhood best friend Khalil fatally shot by the police. He was unarmed. It’s about risk-taking and using your weapon – your voice: “We let people say stuff, and they say it so much that it becomes okay for them and normal for us. What’s the point of having a voice if you’re gonna be silent in those moments you shouldn’t be?” It’s about relationships: “At an early age I learned that people make mistakes, and you have to decide if their mistakes are bigger than your love for them.” It’s about resilience: “Sometimes you can do everything right and things will still go wrong. The key is to never stop doing right.”

From Jenn http://ift.tt/2CqHDgz