Sermon for Sunday, Lent 5A, 2020 The readings for this weekend speak to God’s power over for the forces of death and destruction. They testify to our collective memory of how Jesus entered human history and reshaped our story forever. Today, perhaps more than ever before in my life, I need to hear this teaching. I’m struggling each day to not give up to despair. It feels like so much has been taken from us. […]
The most intense insight I’ve had during the beginnings of the COVID-19 crisis is how profoundly connected we all are. I knew it intellectually, and I believed it theologically, but to see it being demonstrated so directly has made it real to me in a way I didn’t imagine. One person’s health depends on the people around them. One person becoming sick can start a chain reaction of misery for many. One person, physically distancing […]
Holy One, give us courage for this moment. Let us meet each day and its challenges as it comes. Give us a godly hope and then let us be a sign and a light for others. Protect all those who lives are in danger. Bless the dying and heal the sick. We ask this in the name of Jesus our Savior and our Redeemer. I’ve started rationing the news I read and watch. My habit […]
Some of you may have wondered about the letters that come after my signature. “SOSc” stands for the Society of Ordained Scientists. It’s a “dispersed” religious community, and I have taken my life vows as a member of that order. The members have been professional scientists at one point in their career (and a significant number still are), and most of them are ordained in one of the churches of the Anglican Communion (though there […]
Walter Ong, a Jesuit who studied linguistics was fascinated by the difference between oral and literary cultures. Oral cultures value one sort of communication structure and literate ones another. (The difference is explained in The Atlantic article by Robinson Meyer linked below.) Twitter (and to a similar degree Facebook, and I guess in a way even Instagram and Snapchat) represents an intersection between the oral and literary communication paradigms. Meyer writes: Before Ong died in […]
We’ve become slaves to the pace of the technology in our lives. My “epiphany” this first week of Epiphany was that I don’t have to let myself get caught up in the machine pace of daily life, especially when I’m on a break.
Daily reading of the Bible has changed who I am. I believe it can change you too.
That "something else" has often endorsed a utopian political agenda that aspires to bring about the Kingdom of God on earth through human effort.
May God gift you with the awareness that Jesus is with us, with you, right now. May Jesus, walking beside you in this Christmas season, be a light that makes your burdens easy and your heart sing with joy. +Nicholas
I speak as a faith leader, and as a scientist. I want to publicly thank Governor Raimondo for her decision to ban flavored E-Vaping products in this state. Better to stop and evaluate than to risk people’s lives. There are a few arguments to be made that this technology is less harmful than the known dangers of a cigarette, but there are many more concerns about the additives and their interactions. This was tragically demonstrated […]
