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I Feel the Light Again
When last I blogged, I described my winter sun feeling. Actually, the lack of feeling as the very bright day star was all-kinds-of-seen but not-at-all felt through the frigid air. I likened my spiritual state to that; aware of God’s reality but not feeling his presence. During the last week of Advent, God graced me […]
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Shiny Happy Valley of the Shadow
Jerry Seinfeld did some stand up in Sioux Falls a few years ago. He riffed on our habit of talking about the weather. So indulge me (I’ll get into the spiritual stuff too). We’re having some actual autumn here. That’s a thing for us because spring and fall are too often too short preludes to […]
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…by his faith…
I imagined that decades of Holocaust documentaries, dramas, books and my own visits to Dachau and Yad Vashem had me innoculated against strong emotional reactions to presentations about the Shoah. I was wrong. Ken Burns, Lynn Novick and Sarah Botstein present a jarring look at the Holocaust in a global and in particular American context. […]
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Location, Location, Location
My dogs kept waking me up the other night. Maybe God appointed them to the task, because a fruitful time of reading and prayer ensued. What resulted was a stream of Biblical consciousness on Facebook. It started with awareness that Jesus washed his followers’ feet while knowing that the Father had given all things into […]
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Was 9/11 the Last Sign of “Christian America”?
The arguments fly back and forth about America as a “Christian nation.” On the right, it is an imagining of the past: an appeal for return to a once muscular moral order that, in the model of the Bible’s Book of Deuteronomy, brought national prosperity as the reward for obedience to standards revealed by God. […]
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Office Hours?
The death of the Queen? Everybody’s covered that. 9/11? I’m working on some thoughts so maybe next time. Sooooo… Working at a Catholic hospital, there are some overtly Christian opportunities. Writing devotional pieces for employee email lists is one. This past weekend, one of mine showed up, so I share it with you here. Hope […]
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Christmas in September
Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. (Luke 13:24) I work on Sundays and can’t get to services, but I do listen to recorded sermons when I’m able. I’ve been blessed by preachers opening up these hard verses. “Agonizing” to enter through […]
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DC Serves up Bovine Wine
Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink, who acquit the guilty for a bribe, and deprive the innocent of his right! (Isaiah 5:22-23)… Hear this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who say to your husbands, “Bring, […]
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Shut the Front Door
After hearing yesterday’s Gospel, which included Jesus’ imperative to, Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able (Luke 13:24), I bumped into a correlation in the ever scary (for clergy) Matthew 23, But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom […]
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Shaky
Not gonna write much this week and probably next. We have a family medical situation unfolding. I was scheduled to preach and celebrate a liturgy this coming Sunday but that’s scrubbed. I was working on a sermon from Hebrews 12:27-29, …the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that […]
Northern Plains Anglican
Just call me NPA
Northern Plains Anglican 