My early morning trip, with lights sparkling on the horizon in the wintry cold of dawn, reminded me that seekers are the torchlight that feeds the flame – illuminating and healing “the least of these brothers and sisters of mine” while spreading peace and joy.

By James E. Copple As Kenya Airways made its descent into Nairobi, the rising sun colored the eastern sky bright orange. Enveloped in morning fog, the beauty of sun-on-clouds painted an endless, boundless horizon — it’s a continent so rich in diversity and history, and I am thankful this place has been part of my […]

By James E. Copple In a summer of disaster, there’s hope and holy pride in the poignant, modestly magnanimous efforts of African refugee camps to lift our fellow man in need. The summer of 2017 has had more than its share of natural disasters: Hurricanes Harvey and Irma; earthquakes in Mexico; fires in the Western […]

By James E. Copple As a policy guy working to change environment for the greatest good to the whole, the realities of numbers or data run deep when I see, first-hand, a child playing in the waste of a slum community; parents struggling to educate their child; a family mourning the loss of a child, […]

By James E. Copple The Church is a relationship to something bigger and greater than an individual and a people, and that’s true across denominations and even for the un-churched. For me, it is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, one that has taken me to the White House and 30 governor’s mansions. It has […]

By James E. Copple There are at least 2.3 million compelling stories to be told in the self-perpetuating vicious cycle of institutional incarceration, narratives that attempt to answer: “Why? What happened?” But maybe the better question would ask: “What didn’t happen? What’s missing?” John and Cecelia have a story, and it’s one that traces the […]

By James E. Copple John F. Kennedy and the new frontier defined my view of politics and why we should be concerned for the poor. I was 14 when Kennedy was assassinated and completely drawn by media coverage of his funeral. Watching endless commentary about his life and listening to his recorded speeches, I was […]

By James E. Copple I am taken with the idea of language, especially metaphor. It fascinates me, our dynamic linguistic toolbox and its ability to, at once, simply communicate the complex; create nuanced compositions of description, insight and perspective; illuminate and elevate the basic; to build bridges of understanding. In the world of extreme poverty, […]

By James E. Copple Efforts to combat the Ebola virus are in full-throttle, with the regrettable but predictable picking-up-the-pieces in a crisis that is preventable but difficult to sell until worst-case scenarios lead the news. The CDC projects nearly 1.4 million people could contract the disease by the first of the year. Ebola, which is […]