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Tag Archives: Herod
What heals history?
We enter this new year, and this new season after Christmas, with some trepidation, don’t we? We are haunted by the shadows of the past, concerned for the present, warned by the violence that greeted the new year in New Orleans and Nevada and far beyond; our hopes and fears for the future year clash and mingle in the air like smoke.
And yet this is the Feast-day, the celebration of the Epiphany, the manifestation of God’s incarnation to the nations, to us. The bright promise that God is with us, even us. Continue reading
Posted in current events, holy days, lectionary reflection, sermon
Tagged Epiphany, Herod, Incarnation, insurrection, Jesus, love, Matthew 2:1-12, The Revelation of the Magi
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Let Jesus be Jesus
For us, and for the sake of our country, this is not a choice between the bullet and the ballot box. This is a choice between the bullet and our souls. Jesus had a choice: call down legions of angels or go to the cross, subvert the power of political violence by defeating death itself. Defeat hatred with the overpowering love of God. Overwhelm vengeance with the suffocating aroma of mercy. Break open the patterns of this world, and let in the kingdom of heaven. Continue reading
Posted in current events, gun violence, homily, lectionary reflection, sermon
Tagged Herod, Jesus, John the Baptist, mass shooting, political violence, Trump
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Fisher
You flee again to Galilee, another Herod, another threat, kings and prophets always at odds and you, raised with the memory of blood and fire, fishing for another way, the kingdom of God, as it were, silver-scaled and just, within … Continue reading
Forewarned
They left by another way to avoid the falling stars bombarding the night sky, minor apocalypses scoring their trails across the Red Sea. They dreamed of corridors between the waters knowing that God created dry land once. Cradled by sand dunes haunted by Herod’s gaudy and the Child’s humble glory they … Continue reading
Posted in holy days, lectionary reflection, poetry, preparing for Sunday with poetry, sermon preparation
Tagged Epiphany, Gaza, genocide, Herod, magi, red sea, Suez, war
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John, the post-traumatic prophet
My first Advent as a priest was the season of Sandy Hook. That Sunday the Gospel was about John. I realized that he must have grown up in the shadow of that massacre of innocents committed by Herod; although he, like his cousin, escaped, it would leave its mark on his parents and his small self.
I find myself this Advent once again, for obvious reasons, contemplating post-traumatic John the Baptist, his infant self and all that imprinted itself upon him through the coming of the Christ child and the world’s unwillingness to accept the angels’ proclamation of peace upon the earth.
#preparingforSundaywithpoetry Continue reading
The flight to Egypt (through Gaza)
I can only imagine that you went that way, searching the skies by night for a sign of Herod’s madness overtaking, or a message from the Magi flashed through the heavens; at twilight I scan for the satellites that bring news and war to stream down like … Continue reading
Posted in current events, poetry, prayer
Tagged Gaza, Herod, holy family, Holy Innocents, magi, Matthew 2, war
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Word and witness
It is only the creative order of the Word, of God, that makes sense of the world, that sheds light on the life of the world. It is in Jesus, in the humility of birth and Incarnation, even in the confusion of the Cross, in the victory of Resurrection, the transcendence of Ascension that we find light in the darkness. It is in the light of the Word that life makes sense, with all of its joy and all of its promise, even its pain; with forgiveness and with justice, in the Word it becomes a story we can live with. Continue reading
Posted in holy days, lectionary reflection, sermon
Tagged Herod, Isaac Asimov, John 1:1-18, R.S. Thomas, Word of God
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Gilroy, guns, and White anger
Red Letter Christians published a piece I wrote reflecting on the uncivil war simmering in the soul of America, one that breaks out all too often in acts of violence like last weekend’s tragedy in Gilroy, California. Continue reading
Posted in current events, gun violence, lectionary reflection
Tagged #Gilroystrong, gun violence, Herod, Jeremiah 31:15, Matthew 2:18, racism, White supremacism
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Epiphany: we need another way
What I didn’t write in the parish newsletter This Sunday, we celebrate the arrival of the Wise Men at the manger; the completion of many a Christmas tableau. On Christmas Eve, we pondered a moment how the birth of a … Continue reading
Posted in holy days
Tagged Epiphany, gun violence, Herod, Holy Innocents, immigration, migration, refugees
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If compassion were king
Never think that there is nothing to be done. Never imagine that your smallest gesture of compassion, your insufficient word of kindness, your little piece of love in action is wasted. Continue reading
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