Sermons

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight,  O Lord, my strength and my redeemer.     Whether or not we personally are very good at it, I imagine that most of us understand that one of the messages that Jesus shared with us was that of forgiveness, reconciliation, or what in today’s idiom might be called restorative justice. And in that vein, as this passage begins, I find myself saying, YUP! That sounds… Jesusy! Talk to someone alone to try to reconcile yourself to them, then bring some friends, then bring the…

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: I can get pretty cranky about the uses of my name. A prime example of what makes me cranky is in Margaret Atwood’s novel, or the recent television series based on it: The Handmaids Tale. In this story, “The Marthas” is a collective title for all women in that society assigned to the role of housekeepers. “Martha” is there used as equivalent to other titles, such as: “wife” or “handmaid” or “aunt,” but somehow “Martha” is the only proper name used to denote a particular role.   And, in fairness…

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: Today’s readings, in conjunction with the current state of our nation and world, brought a quotation immediately to mind. Drawing on another well known phrase, this version comes to us from the great repository of theological wisdom that is the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Trying to drive home the gravity of the situation in final episode of season one, beloved teacher Jenny Calendar announces to the rest of the characters:  “The end… is seriously nigh.”  Reading the gospel, this gospel reading, In these days of climate change, civic…

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Last week, by proxy, I offered three invitations:  To give yourselves the gift of exulting in beginnings for 12 Christmas days.  To let Christmas end in your heart the divisions that separate people.  And to let yourselves trust in the eternal Word, by working as the embodiment of Christ in the world, be the embodiment of Christmas in the world. Well, here we are, on the twelfth and last day of Christmastide. So, what’s next?  The twentieth…

This is about the time of year that people suffer from something we mightcall “post-Christmas letdown.” We may know in our minds that Christmas has in fact only begun a few days ago, but here in America, we start seeing Christmas trees put out for the trash by now.  There are three ways I fight post-Christmas letdown, and our readings today helps us enter each one:  First, Christmas is a beginning. Second, Christmas is an ending. Third, Christmas is perpetual beginning, and it never ends.  Christmas is a beginning. Isaiah writes: “For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and…