Conference

Listen to “And In The End” by Fred Smith   My opening talk at the annual conference in September 2001 was the first for me. That night was only two weeks after the attack on the [...]

Listen to “Over and Over Again” By Fred Smith   A favorite illustration was debunked last week. For years, I have used the image of the grain of sand in the oyster being the [...]

Listen to “I Stand Relieved” By Fred Smith   Almost ten years ago, the Board of The Gathering and I started thinking about succession. Clearly, we did not consider it an [...]

Listen to “What Is In Your Hand?” by Fred Smith   Since childhood, I have read the story of Moses at the burning bush and his reluctance in returning to Egypt and bringing the [...]

Every year I make an opening talk at the conference and today’s blog is an excerpt. “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting [...]

Thirty years ago we convened a group of friends from around the country and they became the “Dream Team” charged with thinking about the possibility of what would eventually become The Gathering. [...]

I believe there has been a good deal of misinformation floating around for years about the idea of ministering to donors. I am not arguing with the overall concept of caring for people – [...]

Earlier this summer I was hurrying to a meeting with our chief of police and was pulled over and given a ticket for going too fast through a reduced speed zone. Yes, I did think about mentioning [...]

Part of the appeal of Rod Dreher’s book, The Benedict Option, is his invitation to a time before the modern world conspired to eliminate the continuity of more tight-knit communities with shared [...]