Grace Cathedral, San Francisco, 2C32

13 Pentecost (Proper 18C) 8:30 a.m. and 11:00 a.m. Eucharist

Sunday 4 September 2022

Jeremiah 18:1-11

Psalm 139:1-5, 13-17

Philemon 1-21

Luke 14:25-33

We have a stained glass window with a larger than life image of the astronaut John Glenn in his spacesuit. Like him, this morning we will travel a great distance in a short time through three little sermons each based on a different reading.

1. The first sermon is called, “Hating Your Life.” The world’s Anglican bishops met together at this summer’s Lambeth Conference in England. A group of bishops issued a press release condemning same sex marriage. It demands, “repentance by the revisionist provinces,” and goes on to state that we cannot all be in communion if we have two different opinions about marriage and sexuality.[i]

We experience this kind of Christianity frequently here in North America. All of us encounter Christians who seem to have absolute confidence in knowing precisely who God is and that they are doing exactly what God wants them to do. Often they seem to believe that God hates people whose faith is different than their own. Let me point out that lacking this kind of confidence is not the same thing as lacking faith.