Two thoughts on health
Since we began focusing on the women's health initiative, I've been ever so much more aware of health relating to all I do. So it's not surprising that the following two thoughts about health came to me last month while at the ELCA's Churchwide Assembly.

Eight pounds lighter
I use a laptop computer that weighs about eight pounds. Some days during the assembly I would carry that computer from my hotel room to the plenary hall. Some days I did not. It was a V-8 moment (for those who remember those TV ads) when I realized my steps were lighter when I was not carrying those extra eight pounds. Conversely, my steps were that more labored when I carried those extra eight pounds. This made me think about those 10 pounds I lost last year, and how my steps had been that much more labored when I was 10 pounds heavier.

Try losing a couple of pounds in the coming months and see what I mean. (Or, you could carry around an 8-pound laptop for awhile and then not carry it around. You'd get the same effect, but you'd be healthier by losing a few pounds, if you have pounds to spare.)

Such peace
As I had breakfast one morning, the waitress asked if I was with the assembly. "Yes," I replied.

"You all are different than many who come here," she said.

"Oh?" I inquired.

"You all seem to have such peace, little anger. You are different."

Her observation came the morning after the assembly had wrestled long and hard with the recommendations coming from the Task Force for ELCA Studies on Sexuality — or, as The Daily Lutheran described it, after "a seven-hour day of difficult and often impassioned debate." Yet, our Christian witness to at least one woman in Orlando was one of peace.

Despite the challenges faced in debating and deciding difficult issues, Lutherans in Orlando last month remained healthy and whole. Are you at peace? Then you must be healthy and whole too.