Faith Works 5-15-2026

Faith Works 5-15-2026
Jeff Gill

When sacred space is somewhere nearby
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Sacred space is usually thought of as a church, a place for gathering with intentions beyond the purely personal.

Sacred spaces can be very different in appearance, some with stained glass and ornamentation, others very simple in architecture, with a minimum of ornamentation. You may have pointed window frames calling back to the Gothic era, or just plain double-hung windows and plain glass looking out into nature.

We have our local elements of the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks, the Octagon and Great Circle units of the Newark Earthworks, places for gathering some two thousand years ago. No ceilings for the most part, but enclosures with designated entrances, and room for many to come inside.

St. Francis de Sales Catholic Church has high ceilings and expansive seating with a history back into the 1840s; More Life Church east of Newark is in a much adapted school building, revised to house a worship space and educational rooms. Small frame buildings dotted across the Licking County landscape, Methodist and Baptist and Presbyterian and more, give shelter to a Sunday service, no matter how small; large non-denominational structures have been built in the last few decades, without windows to support audio-visual resources once rare in worship life, now much more common.

Sacred spaces can be very different; we all know this on some level or another. And for some, church buildings carry some anxiety, even some anger, from past experiences with established communities, and even a congregation different from the one you had issues with can push some buttons for you. That’s why a few point to natural spots, groves of trees, and yes, golf courses, and say “that’s my sacred space.” And I think it true that any place where you can find God’s presence made more immediate in your life can be a sacred space. Black Hand Gorge comes up often in this guide, and places like the Japanese Garden at The Dawes Arboretum, too.

Sacred spaces sometimes come to an end. My home church, the sanctuary where I was baptized, had to be demolished; my ordination was under a tent next door to it before that final step came. There’s a parking lot there now. (Cue Joni Mitchell.)

Other sacred spaces get repurposed; I could do a chapel tour at Denison of all the places and spaces the original Baptist institution used before Swasey Chapel was built a century ago. The oldest church building in the county houses the United Way today; in between it was a muffler shop, a Hudson dealership, a bank office. All along, the 1834 tower shows the original purpose, sticking up in the midst of all the change.

Then there’s Ross’ Granville Market. It is no more. Lucky's Market will open there May 22nd, and I wish the new owners well. You might say there’s really no change here, still a grocery store, and not a sacred space. But I would disagree. Not only is there planned a major internal renovation, but it marks the end of an era. It feels like a church closing, even as a new congregation has bought the building and most of the furnishings.

Ross’ Market has been a place I’ve been familiar with through a couple of renovations even under the same management. The Ross family, which will justly be the grand marshals of the Fourth of July parade in Granville, has been a familiar and welcoming presence as long as many of us can recall; I could ask Greg about an item and see it on the shelves the next week, and that happened many times.

But it’s the “liminal space” aspect of Ross Market that I will be watching in that same building, to see how it returns. And it will. A place between home, and elsewhere, a spot where you might intend to meet people, but more often you met people you weren’t expecting. And conversations I had in the produce department have ended up being repeated in memorial services.

Sacred space, indeed.


Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he likes to go shopping for produce. Tell him where your sacred spaces are at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on X.

Notes from my Knapsack 5-14-2026

Notes from my Knapsack 5-14-2026
Jeff Gill

And the beat goes on…
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Summer is here.

You may want to call this spring still, but once the dogwood blossoms drop, it’s summer in my book.

There’s a pattern to summers here in Our Fayre Village: Denison commencement this Saturday, Granville High School graduation on Sunday the 24th. Then Monday the 25th, Memorial Day, with the parade down Broadway to Pearl and ending in Maple Grove, ceremonies ending at noon, and the half-staff flag raised back to full.

Ecumenical Vacation Bible School starts around the four corners June 1st through the 5th, then Cub Scouts and others have their day camps and overnight weeks, church camps and 4-H, all through the summer but increasingly jammed in before August when school sports and marching bands begin…

All of this punctuated by the legendary Granville Fourth of July Street Fair from July 1 to the Glorious 4th (sponsored and managed by your friendly neighborhood Granville Kiwanis club), fireworks on July 2nd and of course our beloved Mile Long Parade on the 4th. Yes, I plan to bring up the rear as usual, but make sure to cheer hometown heroes the Ross family, our grand marshals this year. They have earned this honor!

Take a deep breath, enjoy the heart of the summer, where we’ll hear so much about America 250 both before and after July 4, 2026; did I mention I’m helping with some events in June around our national semi-quincentennial? I’ll save that for my next column. But then the Great Granville Picnic comes along on August 15, 2026, intended to help accentuate the 250th birthday of our country; the table space is entirely sold out along Broadway, but there will fun to be had aplenty, walking around from 4 pm to 8:30 pm or later… Granville schools start on Wednesday the 19th, so better start working on those bedtimes, parents.

All of that and I haven’t even mentioned the Granville Recreation District’s concert series, celebrating 50 years of music and community, mostly at the Bryn Du Mansion, but during the picnic back to the old home on the Denison Fine Arts Quad along Broadway. The whole series runs from the evening of Memorial Day to the evening of Labor Day, Sept. 7, at which time summer is officially done.

It can wear you out just reading about it, you know? Mark events in your calendar, because it is amazing how quickly it goes by. And I can assure you that people are already working on planning for events this fall and through the Christmas season, because that's how planning works. The reason I can tell you about all these summertime events in Granville is a mix of firmly established tradition, and the reality that people have had meetings, shared text messages, and forwarded emails for many weeks and months before this May, just to see to it you can’t get bored this summer. Youth baseball is already in full flourish, and soccer coaches are starting to mend their goal nets and pump up the practice balls.

So when there’s a clear evening, and as the sun is setting, look to the southeast in a clear patch of sky, see Scorpius with red Antares rising, with a crescent Moon pulling together Venus and Jupiter in the west. Just enjoy the stars and the sky, and take a few deep breaths. It’s going to be a wonderful summer.


Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; yep, he’s thinking ahead to Advent and Christmas these days. Tell him how far you plan ahead at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on X.

Faith Works 5-8-2026

Faith Works 5-8-2026
Jeff Gill

Understanding your own faith, and others
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This Saturday, May 9th, there are some worthwhile opportunities in downtown Newark to learn from.

Newark Homeless Outreach is on courthouse square at 10 am with a memory walk, and their “Steps of Change” display of empty shoes, representing the invisible homeless around us. The walk is meant as a fundraiser, and you can find them online or social media whether you go on the walk or not. They will be feeding the hungry at noon a few blocks east as they do every Saturday, rain or shine, summer or winter, all year ‘round.

From 11 am to 8 pm a block and a half south of the courthouse, at the Canal Market District, there’s a Food Truck Festival, hosted by the Licking County Coalition for Housing. Some thirty trucks with food for every taste will be set up, and this, too, is a fundraiser, along with some information displays for their work all through the year, entering their thirty-fifth year in 2026.

Housing and homelessness weave through the Christian Bible, and in other sacred texts. Faith is a perspective that knows a tangible home is often elusive, and the solidity of feeling at home in the world is what people hunger for. How to find such a place while being a pilgrim people: that’s a tie that binds us all in faith, and in service.

Many different religious perspectives find helping and serving people who are for a season without housing a central tenet. My own tradition’s gospel according to Matthew includes Jesus saying “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” That same book, in the 25th chapter, talks about how serving the hungry and dispossessed is the same as serving Jesus himself. That’s created a deep history of ministry in those areas.

There’s a pillar, as it’s called, of Islam called the practice of “Zakat,” sharing from your income with those in need. In Judaism, “Tzedakah” is part of how faithful believers participate in the “repair of the world,” or “tikkun olam.” This work of justice is not just an ethical suggestion, but usually called a “Mitzvah,” or a “commandment.”

When I have worked with youth groups, I’ve found going to experience different Christian traditions, and having interfaith religious experiences as well, have been crucial in helping them (and their parents) understand their own practices. You see your own church more clearly when you come back from viewing things differently. Service experiences often do double duty in helping people develop their faith through actual practice, directly helping others, but in so doing usually encounter perspectives other than their own.

It’s also Mother’s Day weekend, speaking of common, shared experiences of humanity. My mother was always very supportive of ecumenical and interfaith experiences, sometimes when other parents were not so excited (or so I would learn later). To be blunt, her mother had some major issues with different faiths; then Mom went to college, and had both Catholic and Orthodox roommates. What she gained from those experiences, she wanted her kids to have, too.

This is also why, almost every year, I try to put in a column an exhortation leading into the summer inviting readers to visit worship services while on vacation, and even better, of traditions different than their own. Although, even if you just visit a church “like” your own, I guarantee you’ll see things differently there.

And if you do, I hope you’ll write and tell me what you learned from the experience. Even if it’s just “I’m glad to get home and worship the way we do here!” But I bet it will be a bit more than that.


Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he’s looking forward to some time on the road this summer. Tell him about your worship along the way at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on X.