Tag Archives: Jesus

Simon Peter Says

Think positive Put on a brave face Put your best foot forward Do not waver Do not speak of death and it will not happen Do not look upon the cross and it will not crush you Look on the … Continue reading

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Christmas Eve: love you to Bethlehem and back

There is a tradition that the night between Christmas Eve and Christmas Day is a time for miracles. Beatrix Potter, who wrote the Peter Rabbit books, said that, it is in the old story that all the beasts can talk, … Continue reading

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Year A Proper 28: the rewrite

At first glance, it’s an easy one. The master distributes wealth, gifts, talents. The recipients either put them to work and harvest their reward, or bury them, ignore them, and finally hand them back covered with dirt and none the … Continue reading

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Parabolic

It is often said, but bears repeating, that we have a tendency to tame Jesus’ parables. Familiarity breeds, if not contempt, at least complacency. When we stop hearing them as stories, and instead hear only the interpretation and allegorization and reenactment … Continue reading

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Year A Proper 22: parables and other stories

There is a kind of through the looking glass feel to this parable. If you think of the classic fairy tale structure, where a king sends three messengers on a quest to redeem his belongings, in this case the wine … Continue reading

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Year A Proper 21: By whose authority?

Rarely does Jesus give a straight answer to a straight question; but rarely, too, is he quite as direct about his indirection as he is here. Leading to the following reflection: Can you imagine being Jesus’ mother? I don’t mean … Continue reading

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Year A Proper 20: Jonah and anti-Jonah

Poor, petulant Jonah. If he couldn’t give the Ninevites hell, he wanted to at least give them purgatory. I’ve done all of this work, he said, endured all of this drama: the running away the wailing and gnashing of teeth, … Continue reading

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Who do you say that I am?

One with the patience to measure the countless millimetres between here and eternity; his father taught him to measure twice, cut once. He would joke around the workshop that he had come to bring not peace, but a saw; brandishing, … Continue reading

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When is a door not a door?

Jesus is posing his listeners a riddle when he talks of himself in the language of the sheep pen. We only get part of the passage today; we don’t hear Jesus, today, call himself the Good Shepherd. That comes immediately … Continue reading

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Year A Easter 2: Thus and so

“But God raised him up, having freed him from death, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power.” So says Peter to the masses of the Jewish people gathered in Jerusalem in the aftermath of the … Continue reading

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