Could it actually happen? Is it possible that the Republican Party will participate in the destruction of the rule of law and ignore the plain fact that a President who lost his re-election bid by seven million votes and a decisive margin in the Electoral College is, two years after the fact, still engaged in […]
Maybe We Need a Monarch
September 25, 2022 by 8 Comments
Maybe we need a monarch, a Constitutional Monarch, with no political authority or power but who reflects the nation’s highest ideals and values and reminds the people of their better selves, I.e., a monarch like Great Britain’s. That thought kept occurring to me as I sat in front of the television watching Queen Elizabeth’s funeral […]
Find Our Voices
June 29, 2022 by 10 Comments
Something fundamental about our nation changed last week. In a period of three days the United States changed from a nation and its government that are primarily concerned to protect all its citizens to a nation that prioritizes the opportunity of some of its citizens to walk around, openly in public, carrying lethal weapons. Exactly […]
Gratitude and Thanksgiving
November 23, 2021 by 12 Comments
“Praise the Lord! How good it is to sing praises to our God…Sing to the Lord with Thanksgiving!” I have never counted the times the Bible admonishes us to be grateful, to thank and praise God, but it’s a lot. Thanksgiving and praise are a major motif in the Psalter, ancient Israel’s hymn book. And […]
September 5, 2021 by 14 Comments
A Sermon for Labor Day My favorite teacher – one of my favorite human beings – was the late Joseph Sittler, Lutheran pastor, first class scholar and, for years Professor of Theology at the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. In the world of religious scholarship in the last decades of the 20th Century, Sittler […]
Beauty of the Ordinary
June 2, 2021 by 8 Comments
Every experience feels new, right and good and calls out in me a gratitude for the grace and beauty of the ordinary. For more than a year we put life on hold. It was March 2020 when our adult children went into full protection mode, doing everything in their power to keep us safe. They […]
An Easter Sermon
April 9, 2021 by 15 Comments
April 4, 2021 When you are faced with the challenge of expressing a truth for which you simply do not have words big enough – the preacher’s dilemma every Sunday, particularly this one – it helps if you have a fallback position – a great poem or good music. I’ll spare you my singing, but here are some lines […]
Wilderness
February 19, 2021 by 11 Comments
I remember it well. One day in late February or early March, classmates showed up at Fairview Elementary School with what looked for all the world like a smudge of dirt on their foreheads. I was mystified – and fascinated. There was a large Roman Catholic population in our industrial, railroad town. I didn’t put […]
Truly Precious
July 29, 2020 by 5 Comments
Near the end of David Brooks’ recent book, The Second Mountain, he describes, of all things, his faith journey. It’s remarkable. I have been reading Brooks’ New York Times column for years and always find them thoughtful and provocative, even when I disagreed with his argument. Likewise, I rarely miss PBS’s “Evening News” on Friday […]
Joyful, Joyful!
March 29, 2020 by 16 Comments
I’m attaching an item I so enjoyed I simply have to share it. It is “Ode to Joy”, Beethoven’s magnificent chorus in the 9th Symphony, based on a Schiller poem, familiar to churchgoers as the great hymn, ”Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee”. It moved me deeply, as music often does. But this presentation felt […]
Hold to the Good 