by Scott Buresh | May 9, 2023 | Contemplative Life, Spiritual Direction
We are desiring beings. We bear God’s image in longing for connection and beauty, for shalom/wholeness in its fullest sense; where God’s unfailing steadfast love is embraced and shared by all. Where justice in its purest sense of love being realized in all our...
by Scott Buresh | Apr 27, 2023 | Contemplative Life
In this “Space for God: Beauty” devotional, Scott Buresh (Coracle Community Minister) guides us into an encounter with an artistic interpretation of Psalm 23 by African-American painter Henry Ossawa Tanner. Scott first offers space for imaginative prayer with both...
by Scott Buresh | Feb 15, 2023 | Coracle News
The past year has been one of convergence and discovery for Coracle in Baltimore. In Spring 2022, as we were drawing to the close of our first Coracle Fellowship Program cohort in Baltimore, Wanda Bickers (Baltimore Administrator) and I (Community Minister for...
by Scott Buresh | Feb 2, 2023 | Contemplative Life
In this “Space for God,” Scott Buresh (Coracle’s Community Minister to Baltimore) guides us through the practice of Immanuel Journaling, a process developed by Life Model Works, a team working to draw together the best of neuroscience and Christian spirituality....
by Scott Buresh | Jul 26, 2022 | Contemplative Life, Pilgrimage
Pilgrimage is a centuries-old gift that Coracle embraces and fosters. One of the gifts of ministering with Coracle is the freedom I have to partner with others in pursuing God in the company of others. In 2019 I experienced the richness of the Virginia Slavery...
by Scott Buresh | Mar 21, 2022 | Contemplative Life, Liturgical Seasons
What little I know of sheep, other than that they are incredibly cute and wooly, is that they are not very bright and easily wander into trouble and danger. Thankfully, we also know God loves sheep, and He loves shepherds. Psalms 95:7 and 100:3 proclaim He is our...
by Scott Buresh | Dec 7, 2021 | Contemplative Life, Liturgical Seasons
I carry many magical childhood memories of anticipating Christmas. As I’ve grown older, married, had children of my own, and now grandchildren, my wonder has only increased. I resonate with Mary’s pondering what is impossible for her to comprehend, that she would be...
by Scott Buresh | Aug 5, 2021 | Contemplative Life
In this “Space for God” devotional, Dr. Scott Buresh (Coracle’s Baltimore Community Minister) guides us through a short visio divina exercise using a painting of the Celtic Saint Brendan the Navigator. He also weaves in the biblical story of Jesus...
by Scott Buresh | Apr 2, 2019 | Contemplative Life, Creation
“Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the heavens; praise Him in the heights! Praise Him, all His angels, praise Him all His hosts! Praise Him, sun and moon; praise Him, all you shining stars! Praise Him, you highest heavens, and you waters above the heavens. Let...
by Scott Buresh | Mar 6, 2019 | Contemplative Life
By: Scott Buresh, Coracle Spiritual Director Lent is a sweet anticipated season for me. Each year, I remember the image of coming home to the warm embrace of the Prodigal Father, eagerly awaiting my return. Dallas Willard describes repentance, central to the season...
by Scott Buresh | Nov 15, 2018 | Liturgical Seasons
As I look out my window at the multi-colored display of foliage, I find myself thanking God again for the gift of seasons, each with its own distinctive mood and beauty. Each leaf is a declaration of the mind and heart of God who envisioned creating a world full of...
by Scott Buresh | Apr 17, 2018 | Contemplative Life
I am eternally grateful to Dallas Willard for gently and patiently opening my eyes to the reality of the kingdom of God in and around me right here, right now. Like many Christians I had come to experience relating to God as someone who loved me dearly, dearly enough...
by Scott Buresh | Mar 31, 2018 | Contemplative Life, For the World
What a sweet and tender Lenten season for many of us here in Baltimore who have been journeying together with George Hopkins and the Repentance Project. We have encountered great darkness and brokenness in our past with tentacles that reach into the present. We opened...
by Scott Buresh | Jan 30, 2018 | Contemplative Life, Pilgrimage, Spiritual Direction
Recently I returned with Heather Strube from Southeast Asia having done a strange mission trip with Coracle: offering spiritual direction and formation in a far off land with those bringing Jesus in even farther off lands! That doesn’t happen without some context....
by Scott Buresh | Jan 24, 2018 | For the World, Justice and Mercy, Liturgical Seasons
One of the greatest gifts God has given me through Coracle is an invitation to respond meaningfully to the ongoing process of healing the lasting legacy of racial injustice in the United States. As much as I would wish that we were a city and country where love and...
by Scott Buresh | Mar 17, 2017 | Contemplative Life
Fifteen years ago my wife Peggy and I had the incredible opportunity of spending two weeks with Dallas Willard and a community of brothers and sisters at the Mater Dolorosa Passionist Retreat Center in Sierra Madre, California. As that week progressed we were given...
by Scott Buresh | Feb 23, 2017 | Contemplative Life, Liturgical Seasons
This coming Wednesday, March 1, marks the beginning of the Lenten season this year. I used to think of Lent primarily as a somber time of suffering, self-denial, repentance. In other words a time for me to feel great sorrow which for me also meant guilt and shame over...
by Scott Buresh | Nov 30, 2016 | Contemplative Life, Liturgical Seasons
On my journey with Christ I have considered myself many things: a redeemed, rescued, forgiven, beloved child of God; Jesus’s friend; Jesus’s co-laborer in the world; God’s handiwork created in His image. But rarely have I identified with being a “contemplative,” one...
by Scott Buresh | Aug 18, 2016 | Contemplative Life
The Cambridge School is a Classical Christian school in Baltimore, MD, where Coracle’s Community Minister for Baltimore, Scott Buresh, teaches eighth graders. From [the Cambridge School]’s inception we had an intuitive sense of the power of images. Dallas Willard in...
by Scott Buresh | Aug 12, 2016 | Contemplative Life, Spiritual Direction
Friends of Coracle in Baltimore: Thank you all who joined us on August 11, 2016 to launch Coracle in Baltimore and thank you all who expressed your desire to be with us. What a beautiful evening of prayer, vision, and worship through the eucharist. I never grow...
