Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany (Year C, RCL)

We have become a society of people who cannot prevent our own children from being killed in their classrooms—and who do not much mind the killing of other people’s children by weapons of war.

In meditating on the words of scripture, I discover a Word who meditates on me.

“Anyone who thinks he knows the orthodox consensus can always be shown to be wrong,” says David Bentley Hart.

In John’s Gospel we meet a body of flesh and blood. And microbes. 

If so, what did he mean?

Trees symbolize a holy channel that faithfully stewards the power of God into the world.

Luke’s Beatitudes call us to live in the tension of a cross-shaped life.

It’s hard to believe in an enchanted world.

Hart thunders like Amos against cruel, incoherent religion.

Jesus mourns a human existence unconcerned with the needs of the whole.

“If we don’t understand the Judaism of Jesus’ time, how can we understand him and his message?”

“If to get a good message you need to make Judaism look bad, then you don’t have a good message.”

When the vandals took Art’s gnome, they took his joy.

Jesus comes to a level place to bring the kingdom of God to all those who are gathered.

Trusting in God is fruitful, says Jeremiah. But what about when it isn’t?

In the Eastern church's art, Christ arises triumphantly and magnificently—but not alone.