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A Family Like Mine: Biblical Stories of Love, Loss, and Longing
https://bookstore.upperroom.org/Products/1921/a-family-like-mine.aspxWhom Shall I Fear: Urgent Questions for Christians in an Age of Violence
https://www.amazon.com/Whom-Shall-Fear-Questions-Christians/dp/0835819671-
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Author Archives: Rosalind C Hughes
Jerusalem, Jerusalem
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!” The chicks scatter, competing instead of complementing one another, straining to grow despite one … Continue reading
Posted in lectionary reflection, sermon preparation
Tagged foxes and hens, holy city, Jerusalem, Jesus, Luke 13:31-35, peace
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Year C Lent 1: Temptations and the time of day
The trouble with the devil is that he seems sometimes to make a lot of sense. “You’re hungry – conjure up some bread,” he suggests. Quite reasonable. And it is not, after all, as though Jesus is not able to … Continue reading
Posted in sermon
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Year C Lent 1: temptation and perfection
Notes for the sermon that won’t be preached tomorrow: Was there never any danger that Jesus would succumb to the temptings and promptings and proddings of the devil? We tend to trap ourselves in our language of perfection and innocence, … Continue reading
Valentine’s Day
A poem from a couple of years ago, when the only time in the day that I saw my husband was as our cars passed on opposite sides of the highway’s central divide. This year, he’s out of state. Oh … Continue reading
Ash Wednesday
There is, on occasion, a disconnect between our words and our actions. We smile through gritted teeth as we make polite conversation with someone we do not like. We have profound and prolonged conversations about liberty and justice as we … Continue reading
Posted in homily, sermon
Tagged 12-17, 16-21, 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10, Ash Wednesday, fast, hope, hypocrisy, Isaiah 58:1-12, Jesus, Joel 2:1-2, Matthew 6:1-6, Psalm 51
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Burning
I’m sitting up tending a pot of palms as they slowly disintegrate into ash. Under the surface red and orange molten lava moves, shifting and sifting through the burnt and unburnt bits and branches, preparing their repentance for their part … Continue reading
Posted in other words
Tagged Ash Wednesday, Lent, liturgy, making ashes from palms, Palm Sunday, the Passion
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Year C, Last Sunday after the Epiphany: Transformative prayer
The season of Sundays following the Epiphany is bookended by that voice from heaven that declares that Jesus is the beloved Son of God. On the Sunday following the Epiphany, at the Baptism of Our Lord, the heavens are opened … Continue reading
Spiritual warfare: a sonnet with apologies to Hamlet
The “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” have nothing on the armour-piercing fury of a bullet tipped with wormwood gall; no arbitrary missile this, but launched from beyond the earth; underworld to surface borne on wings of fire, brimstone burning, … Continue reading
Posted in lectionary reflection, poetry
Tagged demons, hamlet, Mark 9:29, outrageous fortune, prayer, Sonnet, spiritual warfare, wormwood
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Year C Epiphany 4: Early reflections on Luke 4:21-30
Once upon a time, a boy was born, and he grew up in a regular-sized town, and the people who knew people knew him – the teachers and the coaches and the librarians, the grocers and the beat cops, his … Continue reading
over the water 