By Wesley Morris
Category: Theological Animation
Jesus and the Easter Bunny
By Joyce Hollyday
During an overly pious phase in my childhood, my favorite holiday was Maundy Thursday. I had nothing against the traditional favorites of Christmas, Easter, and Halloween. I did, after all, grow up in Hershey, Pennsylvania—raised in the First United Methodist Church on Chocolate Avenue, where the domes on the street lights resemble Hershey’s kisses and the fragrance of chocolate hung often in the air. I had no complaint against holidays that brought bonanzas of candy and gifts. Continue reading “Jesus and the Easter Bunny”
Sermon: That’s Just Love Sneakin’ Up On You
Rev. Rebecca Stelle, Becoming Church
Guest Preacher at New Community Church,
Washington, DC
Sunday April 30, 2017
Luke 24: 13-25
When the anticipation of celebration is upended by grief, people are traumatized. Think of November 9 of last year- Do you remember the emotion which has now largely subsided? On November 8, millions of people were poised to celebrate a win, and the next day, millions were outraged, terrified, offended, bewildered and humiliated. Even if you weren’t one of them, can you viscerally recall the intensity of that expectation gone wrong? Continue reading “Sermon: That’s Just Love Sneakin’ Up On You”
Morally Coherent & Socially Irresistible
Excerpted from Michael Eric-Dyson’s “Abraham, Isaac and Us,” reposted from OnBeing.org:
The only meaningful interpretation of transcendence we might propose is to strip the term of its philosophical and theological orthodoxy and offer instead a more forceful definition. Truth can be described as transcendent if it illumines the time and place of its emergence as well as other places and periods. Truth’s transcendence is not pegged to its authoritative reflection of an unchanging reality that everyone would agree on if they had access to it. Truth happens when we recognize the expression of a compelling and irrefutable description of reality. Truth is not irrefutable because it appeals to ideals that escape the fingerprints of time and reason. Truth is irrefutable because it is morally coherent and socially irresistible. Continue reading “Morally Coherent & Socially Irresistible”
Place-Based Resurrection
By Dr. James Perkinson (right), a sermon on Luke 24:13-35
I want to begin with a word of prayer before we jump into the gospel for today, but to facilitate that, first—a story about prayer and some necessary preliminaries. I have a half-Filipino poet friend in Detroit who tells of his first experiences of the Lord’s prayer, while growing up. Whenever he heard “Our Father who art in Heaven,” his five-year-old vernacular ears could not compute “art” as anything other than what happened when you put paint on paper, so his five year-old mind supplied a little slurred “n” in there, and what he actually thought he heard was “Our Father, who aren’t in heaven.” And it rattled him; he couldn’t figure it out; he says he kept thinking, “Well, where is he then?” If not there, then where? But he gradually came to hear it as a positive affirmation: a God who “aren’t” in heaven, because that God’s “place” is really right here, with us. A deep intuition, I would say, for all—what I would call place-based confession. Continue reading “Place-Based Resurrection”
Wild Lectionary: Good Shepherd
Good Shepherd Sunday
Acts 2:42-47 • Psalm 23 • 1 Peter 2:19-25 • John 10:1-10
By Noel Moules
A shepherd is a wilderness figure. Distinctive, as they move across the horizon line, while at the same time blending and flowing with and within their surrounding landscape. Always an outsider in terms of mainstream society, yet across the story of human cultures their mystique has left an imprint out of all proportion to their actual power and influence.
Biblically, the concept of the ‘shepherd’ presents a multitude of possible perspectives we might explore, even within the confines of our chosen lectionary passages. However, as a Christian animist I want to focus on a theme of central importance to me, that of ‘relationship’. Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Good Shepherd”
Sermon: Sacred Stones
Katerina Friesen, Rooted and Grounded Conference,Chapel Message, April 21, 2017
At one time, the confluence of two powerful rivers churned with such energy that they created smooth, spherical stones. The Lakota people named one of these rivers the “Stone-Make-For-Themselves River,” (‘Íŋyaŋwakağapi Wakpá) because of the round stones the river formed, which they call Iŋyaŋ Wakháŋagapi Othí. Sacred Stones. These stones are used in prayer and ceremony, and are seen as enspirited, part of all our relations, like the river, plants and animals. Continue reading “Sermon: Sacred Stones”
Wild Lectionary: Homeless, Unrecognized on the Road
Third Sunday of Easter
Luke 24:13-35
By Ched Myers
The gospel story begins with Jesus’ family fleeing violence as political refugees, pushed around Palestine by the imperial forces of Caesar and Herod (Matt 1–2; Luke 1–2). Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Homeless, Unrecognized on the Road”
Sermon: Touch and Know
By Lydia Wylie-Kellermann, Homily given at the Day House Mass, the Detroit Catholic Worker House, April 23, 2017
John 20:19-31
The vigil continued behind us with honks, signs and a host of elders calling for love and welcome of immigrants and refugees. We had migrated into the trees and grass of the park delighting in the spring sunshine. My sister sat against a tree nursing my nephew and my kids ran in circles around the old oak. Continue reading “Sermon: Touch and Know”
St. Thomas Didymus
By Denise Levertov
In the hot street at noon I saw him
a small man
gray but vivid, standing forth
beyond the crowd’s buzzing
holding in desperate grip his shaking
teethgnashing son,
and thought him my brother. Continue reading “St. Thomas Didymus”
Radical Discipleship 