Category Archives: sermon preparation

the light of the world

Posted on February 7, 2014 by Rosalind C Hughes

When you hide your face, the sky falls. Stars burn cold; the sun slumps, refusing to rise to the occasion; the moon gapes like a dumb rock. When you look away, ashen shadows coat everything with their fingerless touch. Turn … Continue reading →

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The dove

Posted on January 11, 2014 by Rosalind C Hughes

Back in the days of Noah, the heavens were opened and it rained for forty days and nights, and there was a flood. As you may remember, Noah and his family survived the deluge aboard an ark, onto which they … Continue reading →

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The Eve of the Epiphany

Posted on January 4, 2014 by Rosalind C Hughes

A side note to tomorrow’s sermon: It is not unimportant that the wise men came from the East. Why not from the West, from Rome or Greece or Gaul? Maybe in part to undermine the wisdom of the empire, but … Continue reading →

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Christmas 1

Posted on December 28, 2013 by Rosalind C Hughes

Tomorrow is children’s day at Epiphany – the children are leading us, as in “a little child” etc. For me, poetry is timeless and ageless. The Prologue of St John might be a little obscure to the 6-year-old mind, but … Continue reading →

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Year A Advent 1: starting in the middle

Posted on November 30, 2013 by Rosalind C Hughes

In the middle of the story, in the middle of the day, when two women are in the middle of a studied silence over the millstone. They are not speaking. One of them is not speaking so hard, she disappears. … Continue reading →

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Christ the King

Posted on November 23, 2013 by Rosalind C Hughes

The honest thief Don’t tell me you are saving me while we hang here side by side in searing pain under a searing sun; don’t talk to me of gardens of ease where mercy falls down like a river when … Continue reading →

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Anything but straightforward

Posted on November 16, 2013 by Rosalind C Hughes

“Those who will not work will not eat:”  There are several nuances to the seemingly harsh sentence that we miss when we reduce it to a slogan. … …  there is the description of work itself. We use the word work … Continue reading →

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Responding to a Sadducee

Posted on November 9, 2013 by Rosalind C Hughes

Resurrection is not “a conjuring trick with bones,”* nor is the resurrection a reality-tv show about the life of seven brothers and their unnamed widow-sister-wife Resurrection is not undone by the cynicism of the resurrected one blinking, bewildered in the … Continue reading →

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Prayers, overheard

Posted on October 26, 2013 by Rosalind C Hughes

Each stood away from the other, his face turned anyway but there, no meeting of eyes for these two, let alone hearts, minds. One looked up to heaven, his prayer belying his blindness to the other, “Thank God I am … Continue reading →

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The widow’s might

Posted on October 16, 2013 by Rosalind C Hughes

I might be tempted call her a nag, or a scold, or a hag, or worse. A woman I knew said, “My husband says I am an advocate for our child; but I know that’s not the word that the … Continue reading →

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