Advent 1, Cycle B
“Come back, O Lord! Return to us! Split the heavens open wide and come down the way you used to come!” With these words, paraphrased and summarized from the Isaiah tradition, the inspired leaders of the Isaiah tradition called out to the Lord at the end of the period of Israelite exile and during the [...]
Thanksgiving Day
Our seminary experiences and our work as pastors may have provided for us relatively few resources for use as leaders in the celebration of national holidays such as Memorial Days, Independence Days, Veterans’ Days, and National Days of Thanksgiving. We may be urged by members of the congregations in which we serve to combine national [...]
Christ the King (Proper 29), Cycle B
John 18:33-37 We have in John 18:33-37 a combination of historical recollection that the Jesus of history had been tortured and crucified by the Roman governor Pontius Pilate as a political leader, a potential “King of the Jews,” and consequently a potential threat to the Roman occupation of Galilee and Judea, and of theological reflection [...]
Proper 26 | Ordinary Time 31, Cycle B
As we near the conclusion of another Church Year, we see that the texts selected for us for next Sunday emphasize priorities for our lives. The major texts, Deuteronomy 6:1-9 and Mark 12:28-34, boldly proclaim that God is and must be Number One in our lives and that we must remember this at all times. [...]
Proper 27 | Ordinary Time 32, Cycle B
1 Kings 17:8-16 and Psalm 146 both, though in different ways, describe how the Lord God provides what is needed by the poor and oppressed, and most of all for the widow and the fatherless. Mark 12:39-40 is a warning against the scribes who are said to act as if they are very religious, while [...]
