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Category Archives: sermon
A new creation
As the Ark drifted on the surface of creation for months, by biblical account, not for forty days, but forty days followed by one hundred and fifty days followed by a season of gradual abatement of the waters first from the uninhabitable mountain tops and only slowly to a level where a man and his family and somewhere between two and fourteen of every kind of animal in the world might have room to disembark – as life on the Ark stretched from month to month, its inhabitants must have found some sort of routine, some rhythm, some method of accounting for the days and their demands, but God knows, it cannot have felt anything like normal. And what followed, after the tide ebbed, after they all emerged, after Noah built an altar and made his sacrifice to God; what followed was a new creation, the sign of the rainbow in the sky. Continue reading
Posted in current events, sermon, story
Tagged 1 Peter 3:13-22, Acts 17:22-31, COVID-19, new creation, new normal, Noah, Noah's Ark, Presiding Bishop Michael Curry, quarantine, rainbow
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Living stones
Have you ever wandered through an old graveyard, reading the tombstones, wondering about the stories that they tell? Most give little away. Many speak names, dates, perhaps a close relationship or two. … Stones have little space for ambiguity or nuance. They are hard-nosed, they get straight to the point. They do not give up extra flourishes easily. “Well loved” is the kind of distillation of a life they can support. Names, dates, and one salient detail to sum up the measure of a man, or a mother. Continue reading
Mother
Rizpah marked mother’s day as any other, sitting on her sackcloth in grim imitation of a picnic blanket, strewn about with the bones of her sons, watching hope deteriorate, refusing to let it be picked clean in the face of … Continue reading
Posted in current events, lectionary reflection, poetry
Tagged 1 Samuel 21, Ahmaud Arbery, COVID-19, mothers of the movement
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Known and unknowns
We may feel as though we are in famine from our Holy Communion. But if Christ is known to us in the breaking of the Bread, that Bread is his Body. We have seen him broken on the Cross. But even he himself told the devil, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God’” (Matthew 4:4); and he is the very Word of God. Continue reading
Posted in lectionary reflection, sermon
Tagged 1 Peter 1:17-25, COVID-19, Diocese of Ohio, Easter 3, Emmaus, Luke 24:13-35, pastoral letter, public worship
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Easter 2: What Thomas saw
A sermon for the Second Sunday of Easter in 2020, preached from home. Continue reading
Posted in current events, holy days, lectionary reflection, sermon, story
Tagged COVID-19, doubting Thomas, Easter 2, mission
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Friday 2020
The loneliness of death frightens us … we are rightly afraid, I am afraid that I will be unequal to my promises, the promise of Peter, though all become deserters, to stay with you, to stay near you, come what may.
I am unequal to my promises, but Jesus is not. If nothing else, he proved that on the Cross. Continue reading
Thursday 2020: Betrayal
“One of you,” he said, “will betray me,” and each of them immediately beset his soul with cross-examination, face afire with a thousand slights, deft denials and sleight of conscience, self-deception well practised since the first temptation in the Garden … Continue reading
Posted in holy days, lectionary reflection, poetry, prayer
Tagged confession, Holy Week, Mark 14:12-25, Maundy Thursday
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Wednesday 2020: Cornerstone
Look for the cornerstone, smutted and mossed, every so often sandblasted clean, surprising anew; not the one five blocks up with date and name, but below, at ground level, hefting the weight of the world, unnoticed for the most part, … Continue reading
Posted in current events, holy days, lectionary reflection, story
Tagged COVID-19, Holy Week, Mark 12:1-11
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Tuesday 2020: By whose authority?
One asks, Is it politic? One asks, Will it profit a man? One asks, Is it legal? One asks, Is it ethical? One asks, Is it even practical? One asks, Is it possible? One asks, Is it blasphemy; if so, … Continue reading
Posted in current events, holy days, lectionary reflection, poetry
Tagged COVID-19, Holy Week, Mark 11:27-33
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Monday 2020: Cleansing the temple
Monday morning: disinfecting doorknobs, disaffecting traders, tilting tables to wipe them down, zealously sanitizing sacred space, swiping between compassion and contempt; mask slipping, brow sweating, having tested positive for mortality Also from Monday’s Daily Office readings: How lonely sits the … Continue reading
Posted in current events, holy days, lectionary reflection, poetry
Tagged cleansing the temple, COVID19, Holy Week
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over the water 