I heard it once said that the great theologian Soren Kierkegaard noted that many great minds of his century had given themselves to making people’s lives easier — inventing labor-saving machines and devices. Kierkegaard said that he would dedicate himself to making peoples lives more difficult. He would become a preacher.[1] I’m sure it might … Continue reading God’s Offense

Simon Peter owed Jesus. Before this fishing expedition, Jesus had gone to Simon’s house where his mother-in-law had a high fever. Jesus stood over her and healed her. I’ve been to Peter’s house in Capernaum.  It’s a small house in a small village.  There’s one synagogue in town, a little smaller than the footprint of our assembly … Continue reading Caught!

The morning of our current President’s inauguration, the chosen preacher for the day – a Baptist pastor of a church in Dallas, stepped into the pulpit of St. John’s Episcopal Church and opened the Bible to the book of Nehemiah. The chosen text was a transparently political choice – Nehemiah, the “self glorifying entrepreneur,”[1]as one biblical … Continue reading Power of the Pulpit

Today is Epiphany–the day that the Christian tradition celebrates the arrival of the Magi at the home of Mary and Joseph.  Some Spanish-speaking countries celebrate La Dia De Los Reyes, or Three Kings Day. In some churches, today is the real day to celebrate because it is the day the Magi present their gifts to … Continue reading Dreams, Stars, and Prophecies

Mary has a complex relationship with power. She says yes to the calling on her life against all the socioeconomic odds against her. She is an undereducated, unwed, unimportant colonized girl from Nazareth, a small town in Galilee. She is betrothed to marry an older man named Joseph from a respectable working class family. Mary … Continue reading Make Way

Zechariah doesn’t trust the angel so the angel strikes him dumb.  Shuts him up.  Which is totally unfair.  Zechariah’s done nothing out of the ordinary for a religious leader.  He’s just walking through the annual liturgy doing exactly what his seminary taught him to do.  Speaking the prescribed words.  Doing the prescribed rituals.  Offering the … Continue reading What (Not) to Say to an Angel Bearing Truth

Find Me In the Field: a poem by Rev. Michele Ward   Here, in the borderlands they come to me They reach out and say Lord have mercy All ten of them, in the light of day not hiding in a cave or shelter All ten of them   Here in the in-between they come … Continue reading Find Me In the Field

An increasing amount of people in this country are turning away from consumer-driven culture and are streamlining their lives through something called the tiny house movement. You may have watched or heard about the reality shows Tiny House Hunters or Tiny House, Big Living. You might even know someone who lives in a tiny house. … Continue reading The Root of Generosity

The truth is decaying according a report released by the Rand Corporation at the beginning of this year: a blurring of the line between opinion and fact;  a rapid expansion of the sheer volume of personal experience, delivered to our person on demand now eclipses the volume of fact; and a collapse of trust in … Continue reading Story-Telling Truth

Not too long ago, a friend who is a Republican, immediately captured my imagination when he told me that his parents refused to support Ronald Reagan as President.  “That’s odd,” I told him.  “Reagan was very popular with most Republicans.”  “Yes,” he told me, “but my parents were tithing Christians.  And when Reagan’s tax returns … Continue reading Complete Joy