Another week with John the Baptist. I think we can all agree that for us, citizens of the Western world in the 21st century, he is a strange and uncomprehensible figure. With his wild appearance, strange diet and apocalyptic words he is more than a little off-putting to us and our modern sensibilities. We know […]
I had a very good friend who was diagnosed with ovarian cancer several years ago. Now, if you know cancer at all, you know that of all the various kinds of cancer you can be diagnosed with ovarian is one of the most difficult to treat. It was of course a great blow to her, […]
Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” Pilate asked him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I […]
When I woke up on the morning of November 6, the day after the election, the first action I took was to pick up my phone to see the results, I suspect most of you did the same thing. For some, the results brought joy and a sense of relief, a feeling that the world […]
Why do we dedicate a Sunday every year to the commemoration of all the saints who have preceded us? All our other Feast Days focus on Jesus. Why this day that focuses instead on us, his followers? Is it simply to give us a chance to grieve those we love who have died? Is it […]
As most of you know, there is a wide range of thinking within Christianity about how to understand Scripture. Some Christians argue that every word is to be understood literally and followed to the letter. Other Christians argue that Scripture was inspired by God but written by humans and is therefore filtered through human culture […]
Our Gospel passage for today is hard, or at least hard for anyone who has a dime more than they need to provide the basic essentials of life. As Jesus was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit […]
It is the late 12th century in central Italy, Assisi to be exact. Italy itself is not a united country but is made up of city-states of varying sizes and degrees of power, the largest and most powerful of which is the Papal city-state. Traditionally these various city-states had been controlled and ruled by members […]
Our Old Testament reading for this morning comes from the Book of Esther. This is the only Sunday in our entire three-year lectionary cycle that we hear from this book, so I am willing to bet that most of you do not know the story that this book tells. For that reason, I am going […]
Last week I spoke about wisdom and that an aspect of having wisdom is the ability to imagine a world that is different from the world in which we currently live and move and have our being. I think a lot of what Jesus preached, taught and did were his attempts to help his followers […]