What a wonderful Boxing Day. Enjoyed our two Sunday services and then drove the 25 minutes needed to reach Bristol Mountain. Great time family skiing, and our first experience with night skiing. Reveling in the recognition that we are a half hour from skiing/hiking at Bristol Mtn or sailing on the great lake , 5 minutes from a cross country skiing park, and 10 mins from great kayaking. Rochester is a great place for families.

Monday Morning Outlook

Thous hast not the power to harm me as I have to be hurt. -- Shakespeare, "Othello"

 

Sipping a mug of Java, listening to the repartee of our kids and their loving teasing of the one who carried them each for nine months and who simply smiles at their wit. Daisy is playing in the snow. Still feel the glow of our three Christmas Eve services. What joyful music we lifted up to the Lord! Anticipating a relaxed call with Mom and Dad later today. I think it takes at least two glasses of Cabernet on Christmas Day for the coal in my Green Egg to be properly prepared for the tenderloin that will bless our table tonight. God is good, all the time!

Sermon Podcast

Click here to go to my current sermon podcast on the St. Thomas' Church web site.  

A Response to Ian Douglas and Jo Bailey Wells: "Emphasize Narrative, Liturgy, and Mission"

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Last Friday (17 Dec 2010), Drs. Christopher Wells and Leander Harding published "Teaching Jesus and the Unity of the Church," a proposal for TEC which they offer as the way forward towards reconciliation among Episcopalians after our civil war of the past decade.  Their prescription: "a movement among a critical mass of leaders, especially priests and bishops of the church, to place the teaching and preaching of basic Christian doctrines about the person and work of Christ at the center of their ministry."  More importantly, the heart of their proposal is a "line-by-line exposition of the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds" which would begin at the House of Bishops and work its way to the pews.  (Christopher Wells is the Executive Director of the Living Church and Leander Harding teaches pastoral theology at Trinity School for Ministry in Ambridge, Pennsylvania.)

On Saturday (18 December 2010), the Right Revd Dr. Ian Douglas and the Revd Dr. Jo Bailey Wells responded to this proposal with their "Emphasize Narrative, Liturgy, and Mission," suggesting that the emphasize on the creeds was well intended but not the right strategic direction, and that, instead, the path to reconciliation is marked by a shared focus on narrative, liturgy, and mission.  (Bp Douglas is the new Bishop of Connecticut, and Jo Bailey Wells is Associate Professor of the Practice of Christian Ministry and Bible and Director of Anglican Studies at Duke Divinity School.)   

Defending Constantine: Interesting review by Stanley Hauerwas

 
The review itself is classic Stanley.  Can't wait to read the book.

Read Hauerwas' review of Defending Constantine here.

Monday Morning Outlook

Once you quit singing, the revolution is over. -- Studs Terkel, in "American Dreams"

The Doctrine of the Virgin Birth

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"...for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 1:20)

Our gospel lesson for this Sunday is Matthew's account of the nativity of Jesus the Messiah (Matthew 1:18-23), a part of our story that brings us into an encounter with our teaching about the one whom the Church has long known as St. Mary the Virgin, or, even more classically, Theotokos (Greek for “Mother of God”).

I won't normally address our doctrine about Mary in our regular Sunday worship because it's a topic that requires more than we can do in a single sermon. However, questions abound in our parish about Mary and the Nativity, so what follows is what I hope will be helpful to some wondering if there really is something about Mary.  A warning: I don't see this as a question that invites simple answers, so I won't pretend I can offer the parish something serious about the virgin birth that is easy to digest in one reading. In what follows, I invite you instead to read and reflect deeply on the question in all its complexity, as the early Church so evidently did.

Still savoring a wonderful Fourth Sunday of Advent.  It was great to see our 8 o'clockers with one extra hour of sleep and in the pews with the regular 10 o'clockers as we prepare ourselves for the joy of the coming of the Lord.  But the highlight for me was the energy injected by all those families gathered for our Chancel Drama and, especially, by those adorable and much cherished angels, lambs, shepherds, kings, and, of course, our delightful Holy Family.  I am joyful, and certainly now ready for Christmas!

Monday Morning Outlook

And that's the danger of the high place, and the high man. Is it God he hears, or the echo of his own mad shouting? -- Morris West, "The Navigator"

Great weekend! Saw Navy beat Army, sang carols at our wonderful Advent Dinner, and topped it off with Cedar-planked honey-mustard glazed salmon on the green egg. Looking forward to a relaxing sabbath tomorrow.

Loving this winter wonderland, Snowshoed yesterday for about an hour and got up early to get in another 45 minutes. Almost as many calories as running. Great workout when the snow is this deep.

Praying for Emmie. Our wonderful ballerina broke a bone in her foot while dancing, and will be unable to dance for a month. You really see how passionate someone is for a vocation when they are sidelined.

Monday Morning Outlook

We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it. -- George Bernard Shaw