The Palm Sunday narrative is one of the few that is included in all four Gospels. We read the version in John. But there are significant differences. Matthew and John quote Zechariah’s saying about the king of Jerusalem riding on the colt of a donkey. All of them have the words of praise that greeted …
He goes before us
In today’s Gospel reading (Mark 10:32-45) we hear Jesus tell his disciples the third and final prediction of his passion - and the most detailed. But notice what Mark wrote immediately before the start of our reading today: “And they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them; and …
Prayer and Fasting and the Positive Life
A friend sent me an email this morning with the photo of a curlew. This bird has "developed a long beak to dig out food, just as we theologians must do to find truth for God's people." He told me he'd be preaching today "where Jesus is in our society today, in places where …
God’s π
Yesterday, March 14, marked the annual observance of Pi Day. It only works in the American way of writing dates, so it's mostly in this country that mathematicians get excited. But yesterday wasn't just March 14, it was March 14, 2015: 3-14-15 in the usual shorthand that we write dates, and Pi to four decimal places …
Plenty of room inside
By their attitude, the scribes in today's Gospel reading, Mark 2:1-12, are preventing God’s word from acting as a force that sets men free. The man’s stretcher makes me think of the many who are crippled because of the absence of love. Lying there and unable to rise are those who are without hope, who are imprisoned …
The Language of Seeing
The most remarkable words in today's Gospel reading (John 1:43-51) are these words spoken by Jesus: “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.” In painting this picture, Jesus is alluding to an incident in the book of Genesis (28:10-22) …
Lessons for Lent
In an interview several years ago, the famous German conductor Herbert von Karajan (1908-89), was talking about his early years as a musician. He made this remarkable statement: "Then came the decisive day when I discovered that my two hands weren’t enough to express what I wanted to express.” His two hands were not enough to …
An Open Ending
The Parable of the Prodigal Son is, in my opinion, the greatest of all the parables told by Jesus. Not only the greatest parable, but it is a genuine short story. It has more dialogue than any other parable that I can think of and fully developed characters that evolve in the process of the …
Thanks to a Martyr
I often wonder that we have too many monks in the Orthodox Church and not enough martyrs - martyrs who had a voice in shaping our liturgical tradition, that is; martyres, witnesses, to faithful living in the midst of a complex world. Then perhaps we might have more readings like today's Epistle reading from Romans. The …
Going for broke
Did Jesus have serious concerns about wealth and the wealthy? Clearly yes. But let's not forget that Jesus had many wealthy people among his followers: Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea, several wealthy women that supported him and his disciples financially and materially… and in his parables he often used images of rich people to represent God and the …
