Monday Must-Reads June 23

Photo: Linda Nylind for The Guardian

Happy Monday to you all. It's been raining like crazy here in eastern Iowa, but the rain broke long enough for me to officiate a very special wedding. Before my brother passed away (read that story here), he was married to a sparklingly alive woman. This weekend, she married a kind and perfectly matched man who is a perfectly matched stepdad to my lovely niece, and I had the honor of officiating in the muggy air of Ushers Ferry historical park in Cedar Rapids. So, thank you sunshine for spending the day with us!

In the meantime, I've been reading all my favorite blogs via Feedly, which has not been working very well on my Apple devices (anyone experiencing the same thing this week?).  Here are some pieces I wanted to share with you.

Matthew Paul Turner writes about "Why the Church Needs to Talk about Syria": "By the time the U.N. confirmed those reports regarding chemical warfare in December, much of the conversation here in the U.S. had died out. And too, even when we were talking about Syria, most of us weren't really talking about it."

Carrien at She Laughs at the Days had a totally inspiring Father's Day post, "My Dad's Example": "It wasn't until that moment really that I understood how strange my childhood was, you know, compared to other people. My dad built a little temporary room in our basement out of wooden screens so he had a place to offer someone he met who needed a place to sleep for the night. He wasn't indiscriminate, he didn't invite people he thought would be a danger to his family, but our house was open to people in need."

And here's this on Babble for all of my first-time mom friends currently caring for newborns, "8 Horrible Parenting Tips You Should Not Follow": "But man, when kids are little...that unsolicited advice is frequent. Because if parents are good at one thing, it's telling other parents what to do. And a lot of the baby parenting advice I received? It sucked."

Happy reading, y'all.