Monthly Archives: February 2022

This weeks Vicksburg Post Volunteer of the Week volunteers with the Purks-Golding YMCAs Rock Steady Program, Joel Horton. Rock Steady is an exercise program that helps those fighting Parkinsons disease improve their mobility, balance, strength and quality of life.

Horton was born in Grenada, Miss. and has lived in Vicksburg since 1983. He married Leslie Bell and raised two children. Horton also retired as a banker.

What was the inspiration to start the Rock Steady Program?

My wife, Leslie, was diagnosed with Parkinsons disease in 2012. I heard about Rock Steady and visited a class in Nashville with Leslie. I talked to some of the participants and heard how the program had helped them. I came back to Vicksburg and started to campaign to start a program at the YMCA.

What is your favorite memory while volunteering with Rock Steady?

Seeing some of the boxers improving and the smile on their faces while they are exercising.

What would you tell someone who is thinking about volunteering?

For me, its trying to put Jesuss Golden Rule into practice: Whatever you want others to do for you, do for them. I believe you receive a blessing from volunteering.

What kind of activities happen in the Rock Steady Program?

There are classes on Tuesday and Thursday. The program focuses on stretching, increasing strength and improving balance and coordination. There are some great instructors who keep the classes fresh with a lot of variety and fun activities.

What have you learned from volunteering with this organization?

The participants are such an inspiration because they have movement problems. Some come to class in wheelchairs but always with great attitudes. In addition to improving their physical condition, the camaraderie between the participants is obvious.

How has this changed you?

The participants have inspired me to be more grateful for my physical well-being.

Any additional comments?

Vicksburg is blessed to have the YMCA. The Rock Steady program couldnt function without the dedication of the Y instructors and the volunteers. I encourage anyone who has Parkinsons disease to come and check out the program.

If there is a volunteer who should be featured, please submit their name and contact information to volunteer@vicksburgpost.com.

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VOLUNTEER OF THE WEEK: Joel Horton helps fight Parkinson's disease - The Vicksburg Post - Vicksburg Post

February. The month of shattered dreams and ambitions. The trainers are gathering dust and chocolate bars have replaced protein bars. The gusto with which we attacked our new year resolutions is a vague memory.

If your motivation to stick to your resolution to exercise more this year is waning, youre not alone. Its suggested around 80% of people will have given up on their new year resolutions by February.

But the reason your motivation wanes might actually be because you chose the wrong motives and goals to begin with. And research shows us that choosing the right type of goal is the key to keeping us motivated over the long term.

Lower the effort

Many of us believe that we need to grimace, contort, sweat and pant our way to a healthier life. So at the beginning of January, we put in a load of effort to help us reach our goals.

Unfortunately, our brain encourages us to avoid physical effort. This is why the excessive effort we use when exercising will work against us in the long run leading us to feel less motivated to exercise by the end of January. Our brain is constantly monitoring our body for any changes from our resting state, which could mean danger to our health. The more physical effort we use, the more a signal is activated and our brain tells us that the activity just isnt worth the effort and potential risk.

This is why minimising the effort we need to put into exercise may actually better help us stick to our resolutions in the long-term. For example, if youre dreading even a fifteen minute jog, do five minutes instead. Or if you hate running but enjoy zumba, do that instead. The golden rule is that the activity youre trying to motivate yourself to do needs to be pleasurable. And research shows were much more likely to do something if it requires less effort especially when were starting new exercise regimes.

The same principle applies to reducing the psychological effort required to exercise, as our brains also encourage us to avoid it to such an extent that, when given the choice, we often prefer physical pain instead. It does this because it wants to save psychological effort for times of emergency.

When it comes to starting a new exercise regime in the new year, things like fitting workouts into our schedule or getting out of bed an hour earlier all require psychological effort. To reduce psychological effort, it may help to minimise needless decision-making. When its time to exercise, remove decisions like whether to walk or drive to exercise class, or put your trainers in the same place so you dont have to look for them.

Although these sound like small decisions to make, they can all add up to us feeling less motivated to exercise when were required to make them. Research even shows that when we think our goals require little effort to achieve, were more likely to achieve them.

Choose short-term goals

Another basic motivational mistake many of us made in January was to set our goals too far in the future. Many people start exercising with the aim to lose a few pounds perhaps in order to fit into their favourite jeans again. But when the outcome is far in the future, our brains dont associate the motivation (fitting into our jeans) with exercising so were less inclined to exercise.

By choosing a goal that has a more immediate outcome, our brains will associate the outcome positively with exercise because they occur simultaneously. For example, the mood-boosting benefits of exercise occur more quickly than physical health changes so this may be a better motivator for you to keep exercising well past January. In short, make the reason for exercise an immediate one you can achieve and the long-term benefits will follow.

Focus on being instead of having

The final motivational fix is switching the type of goal you have. So-called have goals serve little purpose for our motivational brain, which focuses on more important things such as being effective at what we do and making social bonds. An example of a have goal would be exercising so that you can have a better body. This type of goal is viewed as less important by our brain because it does not help us meet essential goals that help us thrive.

On the other hand, the types of goals that are more likely to keep us motivated are be goals. An example of a be goal would be exercising to be healthy, or to be more athletic. Be goals are superior because humans tend to want to bond with other like-minded people based on our identities. This motivation is thought to have developed in our ancestral past, as forming bonds helped us to survive. So someone may find exercise easier to stick with if theyre doing it as a way to demonstrate their athleticism, for example. As a result, people do a better job of sticking to be goals, compared to other types of goals.

Even if you have fallen off the wagon slightly by the end of January, that doesnt mean you have to give up on your goals entirely. But making some tweaks to them and your approach to exercise may help you better stick to your goals for the rest of the year.

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Three tips to help you stay motivated to keep exercising all year long - The Indian Express

Can you really save money at the gas pump just by filling up on a certain day? A recent study by GasBuddy, which tracks gas prices across the country, determined the best and worst days of the week to fill your tank and save the most money.That study found that Monday is the best day of the week to buy gasoline in 17 states, which is on par with the company's previous studies in 2017, 2018 and 2019.A new finding, however, is that Friday was one of the best days to buy gas in 2021."This trend refutes 2019s results, which placed Friday as one of the most expensive days of the week at the pump, and can perhaps be attributed to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the emerging prominence of work from home lifestyles," a news release from GasBuddy says.The study determined that Thursday was the worst day of the week to buy gas in 28 states. "In 2021, the middle of the week became far more expensive to fill up than on Mondays or Fridays," the release says. "While the weekend previously held the title for the most expensive prices, Wednesday now follows Thursday as the most expensive day to fill up." When it comes to saving money at the pump, Monday becomes more than the dreaded end of the weekend. GasBuddy analyzed gas price data and found that the first day of the workweek offers the lowest average gas price in 17 states, making it yet again the best day to fill-up, said Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy. Though there is variation in daily gas prices across different states, the consensus is that filling up at the beginning or end of the workweek, on Monday or Friday, is the best way to save money."If you can't make it to a gas station on Monday, De Hann said Sunday is the next cheapest day to fill up."But even if you cant always time your fill-ups, the golden rule is to always shop around before filling up," De Haan said. Analysis of gas prices in individual states can be found here.

Can you really save money at the gas pump just by filling up on a certain day?

A recent study by GasBuddy, which tracks gas prices across the country, determined the best and worst days of the week to fill your tank and save the most money.

That study found that Monday is the best day of the week to buy gasoline in 17 states, which is on par with the company's previous studies in 2017, 2018 and 2019.

A new finding, however, is that Friday was one of the best days to buy gas in 2021.

"This trend refutes 2019s results, which placed Friday as one of the most expensive days of the week at the pump, and can perhaps be attributed to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the emerging prominence of work from home lifestyles," a news release from GasBuddy says.

The study determined that Thursday was the worst day of the week to buy gas in 28 states.

"In 2021, the middle of the week became far more expensive to fill up than on Mondays or Fridays," the release says. "While the weekend previously held the title for the most expensive prices, Wednesday now follows Thursday as the most expensive day to fill up."

When it comes to saving money at the pump, Monday becomes more than the dreaded end of the weekend. GasBuddy analyzed gas price data and found that the first day of the workweek offers the lowest average gas price in 17 states, making it yet again the best day to fill-up, said Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy. Though there is variation in daily gas prices across different states, the consensus is that filling up at the beginning or end of the workweek, on Monday or Friday, is the best way to save money."

If you can't make it to a gas station on Monday, De Hann said Sunday is the next cheapest day to fill up.

"But even if you cant always time your fill-ups, the golden rule is to always shop around before filling up," De Haan said.

Analysis of gas prices in individual states can be found here.

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Is there a best or worst day to find gas? This study may have found the answer - WAPT Jackson

Scuba divers are much like children, I imagine, to dive-resort owners: They are almost always wonderful to have, but at night, its best if they are safely in their beds.

This thought popped into my head at the end of a night dive, off the southern shore of the Honduran island of Roatn in December. As the sun set, four of us had waded into the dark waters that lay only yards from the Reef House Resort, and swam down the side of a steep underwater cliff, holding flashlights to illuminate trumpet fish, lobsters, brain coral, sea fans and the other marine life that call this part of the nearly 700-mile Mesoamerican Reef home. Night dives were new to me: The inky darkness was exhilarating, mysterious, alive and more than a little frightening.

After 45 minutes of underwater wonderment, I safely ascended and surfaced while Aaren, my travel partner, and our new scuba buddies, Will and Kris, stayed just below, taking one last photograph. But instead of emerging to silence and milky white stars, I saw a figure with a flashlight standing on the nearby jetty, shouting.

Follow my light! Do you hear my voice? Swim to me, called Davey Byrne, a co-owner of the Reef House, our home for three nights over the Christmas holiday.

Surprised, I responded by blurting out the first thing in my head: Its OK! We were just looking at two cuttle fish!

Davey laughed and said no problem, he simply wanted to make sure we were all right. The bar, and dinner, were waiting whenever we got out of the water.

About 35 miles off the northern coast of mainland Honduras, Roatn is the largest of the Bay Islands, an archipelago encircled by some of the prettiest and most accessible coral reefs anywhere in the world. Deciding not to cancel this international trip our first since the pandemic began was a gut buster, as it was for many who had holiday travel plans this year. As a travel editor, the virus and its impact on travel has been on the forefront of my mind for nearly two years, and now in late December, half of the Greater New York area seemed to be sick from Omicron and the other half awaiting test results. What if I brought the virus to the island? What if I tested positive and fell ill? What if our flights were among the thousands canceled? The questions were endless and the judgment unspoken, spoken and internal brutal.

But neither Aaren nor I had underlying conditions. We were both boosted and tested negative each of the three days before our flight. Other precautions included wearing double K95 masks while flying as well as on our three taxi rides. We brought our own scuba regulators and other gear, and planned to spend our time outside, mainly with each other, or underwater.

The Bay Islands lie along the southern end of the Mesoamerican Reef, one of the largest barrier reefs in the world (Australias Great Barrier Reef comes first in this category) it touches Guatemala, Mexico and Belize, as well as Honduras. Its a vibrant, diverse marine ecosystem, with around 65 coral species, more than 500 types of fish and almost countless other examples of marine life like sea turtles and sponges.

It delivered. We made our base at the rustic 10-room Reef House, on a cay a brief boat ride from the village of Oakridge, and spent our days eating, diving, sleeping, on repeat. Four days, eight dives, one snorkel, countless creatures, breathtaking beauty. None of the dive sites were more than a 10-minute ride from the resort, on the dive boat docked at the Reef House. Swimming down vertical reef walls and through coral canyons, we spotted green moray eels, nurse sharks, toadfish, puffer fish, schools of blue chromis and invasive lionfish. Our dive master, David, skewered many of the last in front of us to our horrified delight. The colors, textures and shapes of the corals and sea fans ranged from the reds and greens of Christmas to a Southwest landscape of cactus-like corals in shades of sand and lavender. Never were there more than four divers on an outing, excluding our dive master, nor another boat at the mooring.

This lack of company was glorious, although not so much to the Reef House or the islands greater economy. The Bay Islands had a prepandemic economy almost entirely based on tourism, an evolution that came after the islands commercial fishing collapsed. Tourism started when the scuba community and the hardy found the archipelago in the 1970s, but with the arrival of major cruise lines in the 2000s, its popularity exploded, with three ships or more arriving each day, three or more days a week in the high season before the pandemic.

In 2005, several local dive operators established the Roatn Marine Park, now a 22-employee nonprofit that aims to conserve the reef with coral restoration efforts, coastline patrolling, research and community engagement and education. Its part of the Bay Islands National Marine Park, a marine sanctuary declared by the government of Honduras in 2010 to protect the coast and marine life around the islands.

From taxi drivers to scuba divers, the reef is important to everyone, said Gabriela Ochoa, a program manager for the Roatn Marine Park, of the local population. I think at least one person in every household relies on the tourism sector. Basically, this island runs on tourism.

In March 2020, the Bay Islands abruptly shut to cruise ships and both international and domestic flights for more than six months (leaving some travelers stranded). For the early part of the pandemic, the local population was under strict curfew. No visiting the beach. Twice-monthly access to food stores. GoFundMe campaigns as well as soup kitchens and food pantries were created to help residents.

Roatn has yet to see tourist numbers bounce back, with flight arrivals between January and September 2021 numbering around 270,000, around two-thirds of that reported for all of 2019, according to the Honduran Institute of Tourism. Cruise ship passenger numbers were even lower: Dropping from 1.4 million in all of 2019 to 180,000 from July to November 2021.

We saw some amazing things here, said Mr. Byrne, playing dominoes one afternoon at the quiet Reef House bar, which overlooks the ocean and the house reef below. But we really wanted some tourists to share it with.

The Reef House, awash in charm and hospitality, is on the quieter eastern side of the island. There are no TVs in the guest rooms and no shampoo in the bathrooms; on two nights including Christmas Eve I fell asleep to the dance music blaring through our rooms walls from a nearby bar. Come for the diving, not the luxury.

The Reef House is far from Roatns more established tourist infrastructure, which you encounter in West Bay. We spent our last two nights there, at the Xbalanque Resort, a boutique hotel about an hours drive from Oakridge and 20 minutes from the islands airport. Built into the verdant hillside, the hotel offered spacious, airy rooms: Our Wind Elemental Loft, just a short walk from the beach, came with a plunge pool. One morning, as I sipped coffee there feet dipped in the water a troop of white-faced capuchin monkeys fed in the trees.

The beach at Xbalanque offered Instagram views of ocean sunsets, and, I imagine, many guests never leave its pool and landscaped grounds. But on our first morning we hit the water again, paddling one of the resorts two-person kayaks a few miles down the shore, checking out the beaches and waterfront restaurants and boisterous vacationers. We passed on kite-surfing and a ride on a glass-bottom boat, but gaped at black iguanas in the coral cliffs at the islands far western edge and the sailboats anchored offshore (One came from Denver. Denver?). We took turns kayaking and snorkeling back to the hotel beach.

Aaren spotted the differences first (he is a marine biologist, of course he did). On the western side of the island, the corals appeared to be smaller, and carried more algae. The underwater scene still delighted when I was in the water, two tuna swam by, a suspicious barracuda checked me out, three remora, sometimes known as suckerfish, may have wanted to stick their heads on my head and that sea turtle grazing on sea grass will never be forgotten but it was clear, even to a nonexpert, that there were fewer fish, fewer corals, less life.

I learned the reasons later, from Ian Drysdale, the Honduras coordinator of the Healthy Reefs for Healthy People Initiative. For the past 14 years, this nonprofit has brought together the governments of Honduras, Belize, Mexico and Guatemala, along with 80 partner organizations, to analyze the health of the Mesoamerican Reef. Every two years, the nonprofit issues a report card that assesses the main indicators of reef health: the percentage of live coral cover and that of macroalgae on the 286 monitored sites, as well as the abundance of herbivorous fish (like parrotfish), and grouper and other commercially important species.

The reef is having a very hard time. For years, this part of the island and its corals took on most of the stress of the tourist population. Then the lack of tourists during the pandemic led to food insecurity among the Bay Islanders and poaching increased by 150 percent, Ms. Ochoa said.

Meanwhile, warming waters brought on by climate change are leading to coral bleaching. But for experts like Mr. Drysdale and Ms. Ochoa, concern now lies with stony coral tissue loss disease, considered by the Heathy Reef Initiative to be the most lethal coral disease known. It can kill off stony corals the major pillar of healthy reefs in a matter of weeks or months. First identified on the Mesoamerican Reef in Mexico in 2018, the disease its cause is unknown has slowly spread along the reef to the Bay Islands. It arrived off Roatns West End in October 2020, said Ms. Ochoa, and in Oakridge, in September 2021.

Unfortunately, we are experiencing one of the largest coral die-offs ever, Mr. Drysdale said. We have lost about 50 percent of corals in the areas where the disease is prevalent.

The community of Roatn, for better or for worse, relies on its reef, and now certified divers can give back: Researchers have determined that a topical application of marine epoxy and antibiotics can hamper the spread of stony coral tissue loss disease among some species of hard corals.

Now they are looking to train certified divers, including environmentally minded tourists, to apply antibiotics, with a large syringe, into pillar, brain and other stony corals. The project in Honduras is spearheaded by the Roatn Marine Park; working with local dive shops, the nonprofit has organized orientation and training sessions for certified divers to help the reefs, either with syringes, collecting data or tagging corals for future evaluation.

You are taught all this time to not touch corals, thats the golden rule, and now we say not only touch it, but use this syringe, Ms. Ochoa said.

The initiative has treated 3,000 corals so far its a small number when you think about the reef itself, Ms. Ochoa warned and the treatment, she said, has been found pretty effective, 60 to 70 percent, for some species. She tries to be optimistic.

These animals have been here for thousands of years, she said. But some corals are more susceptible than others, and some of these will be lost.

During our dives in this beautiful ecosystem, the coronavirus and its related worries were finally far from my mind. The exposure to this marine community, however, led me to ponder how important relationships are, both under the sea and above the water, on the shores of Roatn and beyond.

Symbiotic relationships are common in the natural world. On the worlds coral reefs, parrotfish feed on algae, keeping the plants in check, allowing corals to grow (mutualistic is the term biologists use), while those remora fish prefer to hitch a ride on sharks, not snorkelers (thats a commensalistic relationship).

The pandemic laid bare the relationship that many destinations around the world have with tourists. Its a relationship that is at times both mutualistic and commensalistic, although many would argue that it is, overall, parasitic. Now, with the reflection gained from the pandemic travel lull, we have a chance, perhaps an obligation, to rethink our own relationships with the places we visit and rebuild them stronger. That might mean not only opening our wallets, but turning to smart organizations like the Roatn Marine Park for guidance and education, and even, perhaps, wielding a medical syringe as we explore a coral reef.

So, instead of banning visitors outright to environmentally sensitive places, said Mr. Drysdale of Healthy Reefs, a portion of travel revenue could be devoted to reducing their impact, such as modernizing wastewater treatment plants or improving plastic recycling.

As for Roatn itself, Mr. Drysdale said, he hopes sustainable travelers will come, and become acquainted with the islands beauty, and then he paraphrased some words from the famed ecologist Baba Dioum: You wont protect what you dont know, and you protect what you love.

Link:

Roatn, the Fragile Beauty Off the Coast of Honduras - The New York Times

You remember March of 2020. It was the beginning of the Pandemic the lockdown Lysol wipes, toilet paper, and masks were at a premium. The stock market as measured by the Standard & Poor 500 fell almost 32% from mid-February to mid-March that year. As you know the market, for the most part, has been very kind to us since that time until it wasnt. January 2022 is now in the books, and you likely remember it more clearly than any month in 2020. You know, that recency bias thing. It was the worst month since the beginning of the Pandemic down 11.4% at one point and finishing the month down a little less than 6%. But we dont let a little volatility bother us, do we? It helped to start February on a positive note.

If we were really smart, we would time the market. Cash out at high points and load up at the bottom. However, if we were all that smart it wouldnt work at all. Remember, to have a market there must be a buyer and a seller thus creating a winner and a loser. My dear friend and colleague Rick Wedell, the Chief Investment Officer over in Birmingham has a descriptive word picture of the market timing game. He says its like catching a falling knife. It looks really cool if you can do it but hurts really badly if you get it wrong! Makes sense to me.

Ive also noted a piece of human nature that tends to skew the way all the above appears to most of us. With the exception of a few clever self-deprecating characters I know, most everyone brags about their winning transactions. Somehow, we dont hear about the losers. There is no law in the world of finance and investing that says we have to tell the truth about such things in casual conversation. Of course, the more successful one tends to be, the less he/she tends to talk about it (again with the exception of a few obnoxious braggards). All that to say, if one had a crystal ball granting them the predictive power to successfully time the market, they would likely be very quiet about it. Broadcasting that gift could put a person on the hit list for every nonprofit fund raiser in the community (along with requests for financial support from everyone around them).

One more observation about the really good tips on how to make a windfall: My experience has been the best deals typically are handed out to close associates of the deal maker. Im generally very skeptical when I hear of really good opportunities in an advertisement. If a deal was that good, wouldnt they tend to share it with close friends, associates, and family? Sharing it with the public, though perhaps altruistic, is not the way I historically have seen the really good opportunities offered to prospective investors.

Meanwhile, back on planet earth and off of my human nature soapbox, I did check in via a weekly commentary with Linda Duessel, Senior Equity Strategist at Federated Hermes. She puts it simply: The Golden Rule If theres no recession in sight, stay bullish (optimistic). She cites that signs are mounting that inflation is starting to subside. The supply chain issue is slowly, but steadily improving and inventories are moving back toward normality. There are reports that the Omicron variant is peaking (and decreasing) in the parts of the country where it was first identified. Perhaps we are about to get a long-awaited break from the Pandemic. Also, corporate America is returning a lot of money to shareholders in the form of healthy dividends. Finally, in somewhat of a counterintuitive twist you know markets love gridlock. Replacing retiring Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer with another liberal Justice will eat up scarce Senate time. This further endangers the odds of President Biden getting his scaled down Build Back Better agenda to the finish line. The markets simply love it when government interference is at a minimum.Nothing like one more time-consuming distraction.

The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual. To determine which investment(s) may be appropriate for you, consult your financial advisor prior to investing. The economic forecasts set forth in the presentation may not develop as predicted and there can be no guarantee that strategies promoted will be successful. Performance referenced is historical and is no guarantee of future results. All indices are unmanaged and may not be invested into directly. Investing involves risk including loss of principal.

RFG Advisory and its Investment Advisor Representatives do not provide tax, legal, or accounting advice. This material has been prepared for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide, and should not be relied on for tax, legal, or accounting advice. Please consult your own tax, legal, and accounting professional for guidance on such matters.

Visit us at http://www.planinvestinspire.com. Tommy Williams is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER Professional with Williams Financial Advisors, LLC. Securities offered by Registered Representatives through Private Client Services, member FINRA/SIPC. Advisory products and services offered by Investment Advisory Representatives through RFG Advisory, a Registered Investment Advisor. RFG Advisory, Williams Financial Advisors, LLC and Private Client Services are unaffiliated entities. Branch office is located at 6425 Youree Drive, Suite 180, Shreveport, LA 71105.

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Out with January, on to February - Shreveport Times

It took about 10 minutes for the ultimate frozen chosen to thaw. The royal audience at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle actually laughed a little.

Then there was more laughter. More nodding heads. More knowing smiles.

After Bishop Michael Curry stepped down from the pulpit on that spring day in 2018, many of the people attending and the estimated two billion watching discovered what many of us on this side of the pond already knew: The presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church is one of the best preachers of his generation.

Media reviews cemented the verdict for this son of an Episcopal priest and descendant of slaves.

Stunning.

Amazing.

Brought down the house.

Readers will soon get a chance to sample several of Currys more-recent homilies, courtesy of a new book featuring sermons delivered during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic at the Washington National Cathedral, home of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington and a spiritual beacon for many of Americas faithful.

Reconciliation, Healing, and Hope: Sermons from Washington National Cathedral, due out Feb. 22, includes five of Currys sermons, along with dozens of others delivered by an array of speakers who sought to bring solace to thousands of worshippers who had turned their couches into pews.

The book was inspired by the cascade of cards and letters thanking the cathedral for these sermons, a sentiment reinforced by a survey of new supporters that singled out the importance of this preaching.

Reconciliation, Healing, and Hope begins and ends with sermons delivered by Curry from Pentecost Sunday 2020 to Pentecost Sunday 2021 (Pentecost is the post-Easter holy day thats generally regarded as the birthday of the Christian church).

So how does he do it? Whats the magic formula for weaving the right words together to persuade and inspire hearts and minds in 20 minutes or less?

The 68-year-old prelate, the first African-American to head the Episcopal Church, says he starts with a question: Who is the audience and what do they need?

What is the deep yearning of the human heart that brings us together at the time? he tells me in an interview from Pittsburgh, where he was in town for a funeral service.

Then comes the challenge to make the message relevant to the world outside the walls of the church. For that, he turns to the late theologian Karl Barth, who taught that preachers should hold the Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other.

Consider this excerpt from the first sermon in the book. Like other houses of worship across the country, the National Cathedral had been shuttered by the pandemic and uncertainty prevailed. Then, just days before he was due to preach, George Floyd was killed by a Minneapolis police officer as the world watched.

Curry had a perfectly good sermon already written. He threw it out.

To avoid it is to deny Christmas, he says of that terrible scene and the furor it unleashed. Christmas is about God coming into the world. Not God avoiding it.

And so he turned his attention to two pandemics plaguing this country.

This past week, we have not only had to endure a pandemic occasioned by a virus a viral pandemic but weve had to endure and face a spiritual pandemic: the roots of self-centeredness, where one person can look upon another person and despise and reject them, and not even behold them as a fellow child of God.

We have seen once again the unthinkable become thinkable. Its caused great pain or better said, increased the great pain that was already there ...

There is a part of us that just wants to throw up our hands, and in the words of the Psalmist cry: How long? How long, O Lord? How long? And yet, we are not victims of fate. We are people of faith. We are not doomed and condemned to continue our past into our present and future.

We need not be slaves of fate. We follow in the footsteps of Jesus. This Jesus taught us that love will make a way out of no way. He taught us that sometimes you have to take up the cross and follow in his footsteps and that if you dare to follow his way of love, you will find Gods way of life.

May 31, 2020

Curry is not afraid to put himself in the sermon or his whole body. His hands, his arms and his facial expressions are extensions of his words, punctuating, cajoling, beseeching. His cadence is lyrical at times, repeating phrases and words like a composers rhythmic refrain.

He credits a parish he served early on in his career, where the faces he stared into each Sunday ranged from domestic workers who may or may not have known how to read to well-educated professionals.

They made me learn how to preach and how to use everything I could genuinely, including my very self, to communicate that message to a diverse group of people of different educational levels, different life experiences, he says.

It was one of those domestic workers who became a Sunday morning compass for getting it right.

At the door, if the sermon spoke to her, she would say, Oh Lord, you preached this morning, you preached this morning, he remembers. And if the sermon didnt speak to her, she would say, Thats a nice robe you have on today.

Asked why he often makes the message personal, he quotes Phillips Brooks, an Episcopal priest perhaps best known for his Christmas carol, O Little Town of Bethlehem, who described preaching as the communication of truth through personality.

You dont need too much of the person because the sermon is not about you, Curry cautions. But to be authentic means its got to be the communication of truth through you, through the lived experience.

It may be as simple as personalizing a scholar you are about to quote. Or as intricate as putting a human face on the Golden Rule.

I was probably 16 or 17. I was getting ready to go off to college. I was in the car with my daddy, and he said something to me what he had said to us growing up. He said, When you get to college, you treat every girl the way you want somebody else to treat your sister. I remember thinking, Man, you have just ruined all the dreams I had for college.

But I knew what he meant. He said, Treat every girl the way you want somebody else to treat your own sister because that girl is your sister. Treat every boy the way you want somebody else to treat your brother because he is your brother. Treat every woman like shes your mother, because she is. Treat every man like hes your father, because he is. Treat them like you want your own family to be treated because they are your family.

Show them the same love, honor, care, dignity and respect that you would want for your own. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

This is not rocket science, but it is world changing. He said, If we did that, if we did that, then every child would have access to quality education. If we did that, then there would be justice and equality for everybody in this land and around the world.

May 23, 2021

His attempts to persuade sometimes come with a spoonful of confession. When the mask wars erupted, he admitted it isnt fun to wear the facial covering. But he wears it anyway.

The possible miracle could be that if I wear it to protect you from me, and you wear it to protect me from you, or the virus within, we get protected and we all win.

Its a small sacrifice, he added, that actually may be a symbol of what it means to love.

Sharing your own reluctance can make you vulnerable, he admits, but it also makes you genuine.

Im not talking about pretending to be something else. Im talking about opening up yourself both to God and to God in front of other people.

A Chicago native who was raised in Buffalo, Curry has been an Episcopal priest since 1978, the same year he got his masters degree from Yale University Divinity School. He served churches in North Carolina, Ohio and Maryland before being elected bishop of the Diocese of North Carolina in 2000.

Fifteen years later, he was elected presiding bishop, becoming president and chief executive officer of a mainline Protestant denomination that operates in 17 countries and counts more than 1.7 million members. The Episcopal Church is a member of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

Curry already had distinguished himself as a champion of civil rights, womens ordination and LGBTQ equality along with something youve probably already picked up on: an unwavering conviction that God is love.

That love remains his epicenter.

Im telling you, that is the key to any kind of preaching, Curry declares, with more than a little excitement. You can do that in two minutes or you can do it in 15 minutes. But just do it.

He mentions the biblical story of Lazarus, who was brought back to life from his own tomb by Jesus. When Jesus noticed that Lazarus was still wearing his burial cloth bindings, he called out for someone to unbind him and let him go.

Unbind preachers, Curry says, and let them go to be the vessel, the instrument, for Gods love, to pour through them and communicate to other folk.

Hes getting warmed up now, leaning closer to the Zoom camera as he talks.

Thats when preaching happens. And thats how preaching comes alive. And it is vulnerable. It is risky. It is not acting.

If COVID-19 doesnt cause another postponement, folks here will get a chance to hear from Curry up close and personal later this year, when hell be the featured speaker at a Good News Festival hosted by the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego on Dec. 9-10 at the Town and Country Resort Hotel (Details: thegoodnewsfestival.com).

You can bet hell be bringing up the love word.

I am convinced, he tells me, that the decision to live by the way of sacrificial love is going to be the decision that is going to make or break us.

Let me bring this to a conclusion. A few years ago, I was listening to public radio on a Sunday afternoon, probably in the summer. I suspect I was on vacation. There came a broadcast about a man named Norman Gershman, who had recently published a photographic essay and published a documentary on the Muslims of Albania ...

As Nazi armies advanced toward the small country of Albania, messages were sent by couriers to the Albanian foreign ministry. You are to identify all Jews living in Albania, provide their addresses and any contact information.

It so happened that the foreign minister of Albania was a Muslim, a member of this small community. And in the spirit of Harriet Tubman, he organized an underground railroad, if you will. He sent out word to the small I want you all to hear me to the small Muslim community in Albania.

It said, The Jewish people are to be your people. They must live in your homes. They must sleep in your beds. They must eat at your tables. You are to treat them as members of your own family, for that is who they are. And the Muslim community of Albania saved 2,000 Jews from the Holocaust.

May 23, 2021

Dolbee is the former religion and ethics editor of The San Diego Union-Tribune and a former president of the Religion News Association. Email: sandidolbeecolumns@gmail.com.

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Michael Curry, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, on reconciliation, healing and hope - The San Diego Union-Tribune