Seeking Authentic Voice

The Sunday after Senator Gabbi Giffords was shot, in a mass shooting in Tucson, Arizona, I went to church hoping to hear some reflection on that violence. However the preacher that morning did not address it in his sermon, although Giffords and the other victims were lifted up in the Prayers of the People. Still, I found the lack of comment in the sermon to be unsettling, it taught me that as priests and preachers we need to be willing to address the tragedies and current events in the context of the scripture readings, to place the confusion and horror and sorrow in the history of God's action in the world.  So it was a bit of challenge for me to figure out how to address the recent killings of two more black men and the mass shooting of police officers in Dallas in the context of our planned summer sermon time. We had planned to hold congregational dialogues in our sermon time. My concern was that people would skirt the issue rather than face it head on. I wanted to facilita...

A reflection on Proper 10C - Luke 10:25-37 The phone rang, it was a colleague of mine, she had something she wanted to discuss with me and wondered if we could talk over lunch. A few days later while we ate our salads, she told me about Dorothy, a single mom with a young daughter, living on disability and public aide. My colleague assured me that she had visited Dorothy; that her situation was legitimate and that what she needed was some assistance until her daughter was out of high school. Up to this point my colleague was providing that assistance but now she was leaving her church and moving out of state. She wondered, since the woman lived near my church, if we could help? I thought perhaps my church might want to help. I took Dorothy’s situation to our leadership team and we talked about it. In the end we agreed to help with monthly groceries and PACE bus passes. We held food drives and had people bring in chicken and hamburger, cereal and cheese, vegetables and fruit. Someti...

A reflection on Luke 10:25-37 for Proper 10C The phone rang, it was a colleague of mine, she had something she wanted to discuss with me and wondered if we could talk over lunch. A few days later while we ate our salads, she told me about Dorothy, a single mom with a young daughter, living on disability and public aide. Dorothy’s husband was murdered a number of years ago, no one knows the circumstances surrounding that death. But in the years since Dorothy has become a scrapper – one who knows how scrape by on very little. My colleague assured me that she had visited Dorothy; that her situation was legitimate and that what she needed was some assistance now and then until her daughter was out of high school. Up to this point my colleague was providing that assistance but now she was leaving her church and moving out of state. She wondered, since the woman lived near my church, if I could help? I thought I could, and I thought my church might want to help too. So I took Dorothy’s si...