Happy New Year! Today is Advent 1 and the first day of Year A in the Revised Common Lectionary. Always we begin again ...as someone wisely said. But what are we beginning you might say? Just a new and different way to welcome the Christ Child? What's all this talk about the Second Coming? And you can only decorate your hearth and your home so much. The Collect and our readings today give us a clue about what we are called to do in this season of Advent - a season of arrival,

Dearly Beloved, Grace and Peace to you. Give thanks Give thanks. Give thanks for the whole thing, this whole Milky Way-cradled world, this sun-held, moon-adored earth, this land and water throbbing with life, and all the swarming life therein. For the breadth of life, for plains and forests, for herds and flocks and pods and schools, for colonies and webs of living things—give thanks. For generations threaded back through centuries, for all who have borne us to this day, who

There was also an inscription over him, ‘This is the King of the Jews.’ Luke 23. 35-43 Christmas stuff was out before Halloween, Thanksgiving is right around the corner, and yet in our gospel reading for today we have to face the gruesome story of the Crucifixion of Jesus. Luke's telling of the horrible event provokes great pain for the readers...cruelty, mockery, humiliation and torture of the Prince of Peace. It is hardly what we want to think about while we are hearing sl

You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, by relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death. You will be hated by all because of my name. But not a hair of your head will perish. By your endurance you will gain your souls. Luke 21. 5 - 19 In today's gospel according to Luke, Jesus foretells the destruction of the temple, the endtime signs and the persecution of the disciples. He warns the people of false prophets who will lead them astray and "parent

Recently Eliza Griswold was a guest speaker at Christ Church Ponte Vedra in the Diocese of Florida. Though I could not attend her talk, I did have the pleasure of reviewing her newest book Circle of Hope. I offer it to you here. Below is a picture of Eliza with my dear friend, the Rev. Laura Magevney at Christ Church.   In 2003, Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold consecrated the first openly gay bishop of the Episcopal Church, dividing the church in a modern schism caused by

"In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be?" Luke 20. 27-38 The Sadducees were a group within Judaism with their own unique beliefs, including that scripture only included the Pentateuch and that no teaching was authoritative unless found in those five books of Moses in which there is no mention of resurrection (by that term). A group of Sadducees came to Jesus with a trick question, the crux of which was if a woman marries seven times, all seven husband

He shall live as long as the sun and moon endure, * from one generation to another. Psalm 72 I once received a Christmas card from a dear friend, and this line from Psalm 72 was the inscription. Thus each time it pops up in the Daily Office readings I am reminded of my friend, her family and our friendship. The memory endures just as the sun and moon endure "from one generation to another." In this time of brutal bickering and political bantering, it is refreshing to be rem

So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. Matthew 13. 24-30 The elevator speech description of the Enneagram is it's an ancient personality typing system that helps people understand who they are and what makes them tick. I am sure you have heard the term tossed about in various settings, and many of you know what it is and how it works. When I read the gospel for today, it occurred to me that studying the Enneagram is a way to recognize th

"It seems to me the victory over death is when somebody, because of the good he’s done for others, becomes part of future humanity, which will be resurrected. Even though your death is obscure and nobody remembers it, you stay alive in the consciousness of humanity. And what the disciples saw in that little moment is the glory of that future humanity.” Richard Rohr "Connecting with out Ancestors" Much of the language we use in our Christian journey seems difficult for t

O Lord, do not forsake me; *be not far from me, O my God. Psalm 38.21 On this day in 1962, four children sat in front of a black and white television while their pregnant mother cried and prayed in the background as they all watched the world totter on the brink of nuclear war between the two superpowers. The children's father was a naval aviator/fighter pilot attached to the USS Essex which had been ordered to patrol the waters between Key West and Cuba because it had been