What happens if we focus on the relationships, not the persons when we try to understand the meaning of the Trinity?
When I was a graduate student, the hot topic in Condensed Matter Physics was the idea of Phonons. A phonon is a way of looking at vibrations in the lattice of crystal (or anything close to that) and treating the vibrations as if they were a particle, not a wave. We can do that mathematically pretty easily. The question though is whether doing that leads…
@wnknisely Thank you for posting this, came across it last night and found it helpful, and the presentation with the bird song etc was very relaxing. May God continue to bless you.
The Holy Spirit drives us out of our intellectual and emotional fortifications
The Spirit took the disciples into the pagan lands, showed them decisively that God was not going to limit God's love. The Spirit doesn't just lead us into foreign lands - it leads us into the ways of thinking too. If truth is truth, shouldn't scientific truth need to be taken seriously by the Church who seeks the Lord of Truth.
Ascensiontide: The Apostles act on their own, taking a step in faith
What I find fascinating in this week’s reading from Acts is the way the gathered Apostles decided to chose the next Apostle, and the faith that they displayed in so doing. First, they began to prepare for the future. (Twelve was an important number, but it stopped being the defining number. Apostles were killed, or died. New Apostles emerged or were elected.
The Conversation: Political polarization may resolve itself
Polarization may phase out of American politics as younger generations shift into power: The sharp increase in political polarization in America over the past 50 years has been driven in part by how different generations think about politics. But the rise of younger generations to political power may actually erase the deep social divisions associated with polarization. That’s one of the strong possibilities…
Perhaps you’ve heard someone describe themself as a “Friend of Bill”? That doesn’t mean they’re literally a friend of a person named Bill, they’re not in a relationship. It means that the person is a following the 12 Step program that Bill W had a part in creating. It means that the person is working on overcoming their addiction and trying maintain their sobriety.
This surfaced in my daily review of highlights from books I’ve read over the past couple of decades. I hope we still have space in our common life in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion for the irrational holiness of the numinous.
All nourishment, all life comes from him. We use that nourishment and that life to bring forth fruit and seeds. Fruit that will feed others. Seeds that will plant new vines, with roots that go deep into the dark rich soil and bring forth everything that is necessary for more fruit and new seeds to be created. That seems simple and clear, but I don’t think we generally think about what it means.
Describing the ruler of the people as a shepherd of the people is common in Mediterranean cultures. The Pharaoh is often depicted holding a flail and a shepherd’s crook as a sign that he was both a war leader and a shepherd to the people of his Empire. The rulers of Babylon and Assyria were described in the same way. King David was a shepherd before he was the King.
The Wounds Remain. They point to something important.
My apologies again this week. I’m writing this from our diocesan Camp and Conference Center (ECC) where I’m spending the weekend on retreat with the deacons of Rhode Island. It’s an incredible blessing to spend this time with them, to get reacquainted after being dispersed around the state and from each other for over a year, to hear their stories, and to pray together.
Binding and Loosing; the role of the Church in a post Resurrection Cosmos
It’s been quite the week for me. We had a wonderful celebration of Easter Day at Trinity Church in Newport RI, and then I jumped headlong into a long list of chores and tasks that got put off during the last weeks of Lent and Holy Week. I say all that to ask for your understanding that I’m not posting a new sermon, but rather reposting one from three years ago.
There’s good reason to be worried. There’s good reason to be pessimistic. There is little reason to be hopeful. But Easter brings hope in the midst of doubt. For those who have eyes to see, or hearts to discern; Easter changed everything, though only a small group of people understood that at the time and that might well be true now too.
What we think of success and power is not how God thinks of them. God who has everything, all success and all power, gives it all up to save us and to transform who we are, and to remake the Creation that had gone sideways. Jesus, stages the “anti” Triumph when he enters Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. He comes as saving victim, who forgives us while he is dying, a death that happens because of our rejection and turning from God.
Able to follow myself on Threads here on Twit.social Mastodon. Now if the big news agencies turn on sharing, and they keep posting to Threads, I can access all the stuff I want to access in good old comfortable Ivory!
The Divine role of Emperor or King seems to be making a comeback. The Return of Sacral Rulership?: Ancients would learn, and our Founders too, that the language of sacral rulership is incompatible with a functioning democracy or republic. In 1787 Ben Franklin famously declared that with the Constitution, the founders had given America “a Republic, if you can keep it.” Franklin knew well the perils faced by republics because he had an…