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Showing posts from February, 2025

How to call disciples

Sermon for Epiphany V, 2025, delivered at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Louisville, KY Text: Luke 5:1-11 Twenty years ago, I started a three-year quest that led to a Masters degree in Biochemistry. I took one class at a time, and would leave my lab job for an hour to an hour and a half on class days, and then return to finish my work day. There were two other lab techs I worked with, and after I left that lab job, I learned that they both went for their Master’s degree. One of them told me that once she saw me do it, she realized that she could do it as well. I had no idea that they were paying attention to me, watching me juggle a full-time job, classwork, and raising a family. In June of 2020, we started our food collection service here at St. Paul’s to help Calvary church downtown keep their pantry open during the pandemic. The area around Calvary had recently become a food desert when two grocery stores had closed, and people found themselves without many options between social ...

What is evil, and where is justice?

Newsletter article, January 2025 On December 23, 2024, President Biden commuted the federal death sentences of 37 death-row inmates in a politically motivated move against incoming President Trump. What actually happened was that President Biden changed the death sentences to life in prison without parole, so those convicted will not be released from prison, ever. For those 37 people, their sentences have become similar to sentences given in Western European countries for the same crimes. For many Americans, this may have seemed like an absolution of the crimes committed that led to the sentence. For murder and other serious crimes, Leviticus 24:19-20 is interpreted by us to build laws of equal retribution, and Jesus’ call for non-violence in Matthew 5:38-41 is ignored. We have heard the anguish of families of murder or manslaughter victims when the verdict on the perpetrator is handed down, and it is not death. Even if a death sentence is carried out, I have to wonder if the pain of a...