For my internship year during seminary, I was placed at Trinity Church, Sigourny Street, in Hartford. Some of you may note a familiar ring. This is where our previous Director of Ministry, Dante was placed last year and continues to work for as their social media specialist. In the mid eighties the west end of…
The State of the Saints Report
On the morning of December 16th, the church doors were opened at nine a.m. to welcome the parents and other family members of our thirty plus pre-school students. For just over an hour, all were regaled with the songs and poems of our three and four year olds as the Christmas story was brought to…
Are You Ready to Follow?
In this week’s Gospel, we hear Matthew’s version of Jesus calling the disciples, Peter, Andrew, John and James. All are fishermen, all of whom, I assume, had known Jesus prior to his arrival on the shores of Galilee. I have to admit though, I get a little confused with the writer’s geography, because at one…
What Are You Looking For?
I find this morning’s passage from John’s Gospel a bit odd. As we all heard, our passage began with John the Baptist seeing Jesus soon after Jesus’ baptism and then proclaiming to all who could hear him that Jesus is the Lamb of God. He then witnesses to what he experienced at the River Jordan….
With God There Is No Partiality
How many of us romanticize the early years of the church? Somehow believing that everyone who belonged was of one mind and the only conflict the church had to endure was from without and not from within. I know the way the lectionary works, it can certainly seems that way. But truth be told, as…
The Perfect within the Imperfect
Thirty years ago I was given Barbara Robinson’s tale of the “Best Christmas Pageant Ever.” Her story takes place in what could be any church, in any town across America in which the Christmas story is told through the innocence of Children. Just like our pageant which took place last week, this pageant was shrouded…
Mary the Revolutionary?
So often we are called to serve justice. At Baptism, we vow to strive for justice and peace among all people and to respect dignity of every human being. In the Bible, justice is mentioned 194 times. In Psalm 72, the writer asks ‘Give the king your justice, O God, and your righteousness to a king’s son.”…
Prepare the Way
For twelve years I traveled the 170 mile stretch of the New York Throughway between Syracuse and Lee, Massachusetts at least fifty times. And it seems, every time I traveled this stretch of highway some part was under construction. More often than not, there were two or three sections of construction. All of this construction…
Through the Storm
Precious Lord, take my hand, Lead me on, let me stand: I am tired, I am weak, I am worn; Through the storm, through the night, lead me on to the light; Take my hand, precious Lord, Lead me home. There is something about these lyrics when accompanied by its slow soulful music which resonates…
A Time to Transcend
For the past decade there has been an interest in what comes after death. On television, several shows have focused on this issue. The CW has carried the Vampire Diaries as part of its evening lineup. NBC ran the series Dracula. Dracula followed NBC’s long standing Friday evening drama Grimm, which included a myriad of…
We Are All God’s Children
In the midst of the third and final presidential debate on October 19th Donald Trump captured the tenor of this whole election season when he responded to Secretary Clinton with “ I’m not the puppet, you are!” The exchange summed up how juvenile and petty the campaign has become on both sides. It also demonstrated…
Be thou our Vision
This week I read a language analysis of the third presidential debate from the Bloomberg report. In it, the author examined how each of the candidates expresses his or herself to the American people. The writer noted that Mr. Trump’s tendency is to express the issues we face in the negative often using words like…
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