Sunday, September 7, 2025

Dear Talmadge Hill Family,

This Sunday marks the beginning of our interim journey together, and I am deeply grateful to be serving as your Interim Pastor.

When I first encountered the Talmadge Hill Community Church’s profile a year ago, I wasn't in a position to apply for your installed pastor search. Yet something about Talmadge Hill lingered with me: how you describe yourselves as a community that creates sacred space through wholehearted engagement, courageously meeting people in those tender places we often hesitate to acknowledge.

Earlier this year, as my ministry in Saratoga Springs was drawing to a close, I was seeking a new position. When I learned that Talmadge Hill had shifted its search from an installed pastor to an interim pastor position, I felt a deep sense of possibility. Here was an opportunity to serve a community that had already resonated deeply within me and captured my imagination. Through my conversations with Lisa, Patrice, and Russ, I began to glimpse the remarkable spirit of this simple sanctuary nestled in the wooded beauty between Darien and New Canaan, where its simplicity holds such profound beauty.

What deeply moves me is witnessing a church where vulnerability becomes a wellspring of strength rather than weakness, where authenticity nurtures safety rather than judgment. You have cultivated a community that values spiritual connection over rigid doctrines, understanding that transformation flourishes when we dare to be our most authentic selves and walk alongside one another on life's sacred journey.

Your mission to "Know the Love of God and Share It" is rooted in extravagant hospitality and a willingness to embrace life's paradoxes. Here, belonging to community and serving one another and the world around us becomes a joyful response to God's love. You understand that simplicity, both physical and spiritual, cuts through life's distractions to focus on authentic relationships with God and one another.

I am looking forward to meeting you in person this Sunday. As we cultivate relationships, please know that it will take me a little while to learn all your names and make all the connections. With that in mind, please don't hesitate to introduce yourselves and even reintroduce yourselves so that I can connect with you and hear your unique stories. And if I ask your name more than once, please don't be offended!

As we begin this new chapter, it feels significant that our first Sunday together is Homecoming Sunday. In many ways, I am coming home to a spiritual family. Together, we will hold the present moment while honoring the past and embracing the future with hope and courage. I invite you to join us in worship on Sunday, whether you've been part of Talmadge Hill for years, haven't been here for some time, or are considering visiting for the very first time.

With gratitude and excitement! 

Mooi Loop,

Dries

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Sunday, August 31, 2025

Praying

It doesn’t have to be

the blue iris, it could be

weeds in a vacant lot, or a few

small stones; just

pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don’t try

to make them elaborate, this isn’t

a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which

another voice may speak.

Mary Oliver

First, thank you so much for this time we’ve shared. In only four months, I’ve grown to love THCC. It has truly been sacred, and I am forever appreciative of the ways I have witnessed the Divine in you. Your hospitality, generosity, kindness and faithfulness are wonderful expressions of “God-Among-Us.” Thank you particularly to Rob, Juliana and Dorothy who guided me on the day-to-day. Cheryl and Carter who have created and maintained wonderful foundations. Patrice Murphy who followed her heart and, alongside the Unified Board, brought me here. To every Bible Study participant, Book Group member, Sunday Morning attendee, and on and on. What a wild and wonderful time we’ve had!

As this part of our journey together ends, I want to ask a favor and make a promise in return.

The favor is: will you pray for me?

The promise is: I will pray for you.

I guess the best part about this request and this promise is that, like the grace and love of God, the praying will happen despite us. As Mary Oliver’s poem proclaims, “In a vacant lot or while admiring an iris.” I would add, “When I am in the midst of a fantastic Bible study or book, when I watch Little House on the Prairie, when I attend a folk or jazz concert, read a Henri Nouwen or Richard Rohr quote, or anytime I park on the side of the road with my car precariously perched at an impossible side angle….I will think of THCC and a prayer will happen.

So perhaps I’ll amend my request. Let’s all pay attention. Let’s pay attention to those accidental and inadvertent prayers. Then, let’s string together some random thoughts of gratitude.

In my experience, when I do this, the most perfect parts of our time together rise to the top and I experience God in new ways.

So, I promise to pay attention. Will you?

With gratitude,

Mark

Sunday, August 24, 2025

I am, you anxious one.
Don't you sense me, ready to break
into being at your touch?
My murmurings surround you like shadowy wings.
can't you see me standing before you
cloaked in stillness?
Hasn't my longing ripened in you 
from the beginning
as a fruit ripens on a branch?
I am the dream you are dreaming.
When you want to awaken, I am that wanting:
I grow strong in the beauty you behold.
And with the silence of stars I enfold
your cities made by time.
~Ranier Maria Rilke, Book of Hours
Translated by Barrows and Macy

Every Sunday morning, we have a Call to Worship which gathers us together. This is followed by a Prayer of Invocation which invites God into the space as well.  As we know, God is already there, whether we offer invitation or not. Still, the invitation is important somehow.

Rilke expresses this beautifully. "I grow strong in the beauty you behold," reminds me that the more I surround myself with beauty and love and compassion and good things, the easier it is to "see" God. Even when my mind leaves me with doubt, still these "shadowy wings" of God surround me.  Regardless, God is there, no invitation required.

Just as the Call to Worship calls us together, the Prayer of Invocation calls to us as well.  It calls to us to lean into the reality that God is always with us. It calls us to believe that the presence of God is transformative, supportive and loving. It calls us to open ourselves to the goodness of God regardless of our mindset so that we can find our way to better thoughts and actions. Today, call upon God. Offer invitation. Then, breathe. See how this intentional "Invocations" allows you to hold space for that which is already happening: you are surrounded, enfolded and consumed by the love of God. What does that call you to do and be today?

Sunday, August 10, 2025

I Have Learned So Much

"I have learned so much from God that I can no longer call myself a Christian, a Hindu, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jew. The Truth has shared so much of Itself with me that I can no longer call myself a man, a woman, an angel, or even a pure soul. Love has befriended Hafiz so completely it has turned to ash and freed me of every concept and image my mind has ever known." Hafiz, From: ‘The Gift’

What a liberation! What release! What a true acceptance of the Divine, however it is that we name such. I truly wonder if this is the greatest call of Christianity: to live a life so filled with love, to live in ways that are so Christ-like that labeling ourselves as anything other than “The Love of God” will be shortsighted.

Of course, for me, I understand this love most clearly through Jesus and his stories. It is through Judeo-Christian texts that I came to hear about God and Christ. The context of all those stories can be reduced to (or expanded to, depending on our mindset) “The Love of God.” The familiar John 3:16 reminds us that, “God so LOVED the world” that God showed up to be here with us. God’s presence is rooted in love. God showed up to remind us of love and the extent to which God would go to express that love and save us from ourselves.

Perhaps it is time to let go of our labels, identifying those who are in and those who are out, our dichotomies and our limitations and instead come to Hafiz’s realization: The “Love of God” is so boundless and transformative that it transcends any label, meets us right where we are, and awakes within us a love that is boundless and present in all of creation.

Mark

Sunday, July 20, 2025

Dear Friends,

Every summer, media outlets race to crown the “song of the summer.” This year, the winner seems to be up for debate (though a quick Google search suggests the strong contenders might be “Ordinary” by Alex Warren and “Manchild” by Sabrina Carpenter).

Yet when I think of the summer songs that have stayed with me over the years, I’m drawn to a different kind of soundtrack. These are the songs whose lyrics never change, but somehow I do. They take me back to who I once was, even as they ground me in who I am today. They remind me of what remains constant—and of the miracle that everything changes, including me.

There are songs that carried me through heartbreaks that once felt insurmountable, songs that reminded me that joy still existed in lonely seasons, and songs that encouraged me to dance the night away when my body moved with a little more ease than it does today.

Church music has its own kind of earworms. These melodies and messages mark our faith journeys. Some hymns become anchors, resurfacing when we need them most. Perhaps you’ve even encountered a “pop” song in worship that helped you see your spiritual life in a new light…or a hymn that hums in your mind long after the service ends…or a line of music that gave voice to your heart when your words had run dry.

What are your songs of the summer? What are your songs of the soul?

I look forward to seeing you this Sunday as we celebrate the connecting power of music, community, and faith.

Love,

Cheryl