This was one of those weeks when, after looking at the passages in the Lectionary, I thought, “O no, not again!” These passages are about getting things wrong and being abandoned or destroyed because of it. Even when we get to Jesus in the Gospel it’s about how he has come to bring “fire” to the earth and not to unite people, but to divide, even one family member from another. And these words come into our lives when, in this country, we are under siege to self-centredness, hatred, and just plain nastiness, not the least in the name of… Continue reading →

The stories from Genesis 12-25 are about Abraham, called the Father of the Faithful by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In Genesis 12 God promised to bless Abraham by being his God, by giving his wife Sarah him many descendants, and by giving those descendants a land in which to live. Although most Christians have not tied themselves to a specific territory or land (unlike Judaism and Islam), they have, until relatively recent times, understood God’s promise of many heirs to Abraham to be fulfilled in the growth of the Christian Church. Many still do.

Today, although what the 1970’s called… Continue reading →