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Category Archives: current events
Trinity Sunday: we who are many are one
It is the mutuality of the Trinity that we seek. We hear its echoes in our prayers: “though we are many, we are one body” (Romans 12:5). We come closest to it when we experience compassion. Continue reading
Posted in current events, holy days, sermon
Tagged Amos 5:8, COVID, crossroads, gun violence, John 12:32, John 3:17, John Donne, racism, Romans 12:5, Trinity Sunday
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Prayer for an end to mass shootings
My God,can we not go one week,sabbath to sabbath,without a mass shooting? Will you not beatour pistols into ploughshares,our shotguns into shovels,our rifles into rakes,massage some feeling intoour hearts of stone? I sigh, open my eyes;the mirror stares back in … Continue reading
Let justice roll like a river; still waters can wait
There is no way of praying Psalm 23 truthfully, honestly, lovingly, in this time and place that does not acknowledge that there are no still waters, there can be no resting in meadows, when violence threatens to break in at any moment. There is no peace while injustice holds sway anywhere among us. Continue reading
Good Friday: a pieta
He died with the cry crushed from his chest,calling out from the cross to his mother.They crucified him on a stolen hill.They gambled away his clothes.He called out to his mother, shecould not swaddle his naked pain. When he was … Continue reading
Are we there yet?
There is nothing in Christ’s story that would justify our sacrifice of children, women, grocery shoppers, police officers, and passers by to defend our right to reserve weapons of violence to ourselves. On the contrary, the resurrection is God’s ultimate judgement on the violence that nailed Jesus to the cross. The resurrection is God’s utter negation and reversal of all that would kill the beloved. Continue reading
Bronze serpents and steel needles
The people found their way into the snake-infested territory through impatience, selfish grumbling, ingratitude against God, and concern each for their own comfort over the salvation of the whole people from slavery. As long as each person sat in their own poison, death pursued them. But when they looked to the sign that God had given them of hope and of mercy, they were made better, and not only as individuals, but the community recovered, and they were able to move on from that place. Continue reading
Posted in current events, homily, lectionary reflection, sermon
Tagged COVID-19, foetal stem cells, John 3:14-17, Moses, Numbers 21:4-9, vaccinations
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Love, knowledge, authority, and unclean spirits
The unclean spirits knew Jesus, and they named him. Jesus knew the man, and he loved him. Continue reading
Resisting evil
On the Feast of the Epiphany, the day on which we celebrate God’s revelation of the Incarnation of Christ to the nations of the world, images from our nation’s capital were cast about the globe of insurrectionists wrapped in flags, some with the name of the president and symbols of civil war, and some which bore with them the holy name of Jesus. Continue reading
Posted in current events, holy days, sermon
Tagged Acts 19:1-7, Baptism of Our Lord, Epiphany, Trump insurrection
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A prayer for the preacher when words fail
January 9, 2021 Beyond Jordan, the baptizer cried repentance, preaching to snakes, devouring locusts, razing the wilderness with his words, confronting kings and drowning sins. At his neck, the knowledge of his own humility, the prickling of glory about to … Continue reading
Posted in current events, poetry, prayer, sermon preparation
Tagged John the Baptist, preaching, the baptism of Jesus, Word of God
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Mary and Joseph’s no good, terrible, wonderful year
A homily for Christmas Eve, 2020 At the turning of the year, as the days began to push back against the pushiness of night; as the light grew longer and the shadows shorter, the people were going about their business … Continue reading
