Pages Called Holy: Poems

Seeking to live a Christian life in this American society can often evoke a wide range of emotions, and the precipitation sometimes looks like poetry. Times of great joy as well as times of disappointment and great sorrow are excellent catalysts for a kind of poetry that speaks in real ways to real people. This project contains both joy and sorrow, in an attempt to express different aspects of the changing atmosphere of the religious experience in the twenty-first century. I believe poetry can speak simply to deeper theological ideas in a way that is both deeply beautiful and deeply true. At times theology can be a very inaccessible subject for the average layperson, but it can also have a certain simple beauty that anyone can appreciate. As I have read and learned about theology, I’ve always found that the most profound ideas can be written out logically in essays and books, or they can be stated in succinct but imaginative phrases. I write with the latter category in mind. Pages Called Holy has been written over the past three years as I live, work, and learn in a local church. Most of these poems have their inspiration in the struggles of church life and the disparity between what I see happening and what I see God calling the Church to be. It is this tension that brings life to the poetry I write, and it is my hope that these poems would speak to an audience of the countless numbers of believers across all generations who feel that same tension between what is and what could be.