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This morning’s gospel reading from Luke is tremendously difficult and would be so much better dealt with in a classroom or a formal bible study. And even in those spaces we’d be in for a hard slog. Many biblical commentators consider it one of the most difficult parables. My clergy friends say, “this gospel doesn’t preach.” So today we, like Jacob, are going to really wrestle with the Holy One. We will probably all walk out limping. But if we let the parable do its work, we might leave with a blessing, too. Parables were Jesus’ way of “teaching” – …

Last month marked fifty years since my ordination.  I’ve been doing this for a long time! As I prepared this homily it occurred to me that I have been preaching for even longer. I think my first attempt was on a so-called “Youth Sunday” in my hometown Iowa church as a high school kid. And, Lord, have mercy, I had a student parish assignment during my seminary years in Dubuque. Those gentle souls in McGregor, Iowa must have been very patient and tolerant with their wet-behind-the-ears, twenty something preacher. Over the years of my ministry, first in United Methodist churches in …

Biblical scholars have pointed out that the words I just read from Luke’s gospel are a combination of the Q source image of mustard seed faith and the fig tree image in Mark’s gospel which Luke changes into the largess of the mulberry tree. So I’m going to take Luke’s freeing spirit of literary license to explode that image of the mustard seed faith Jesus gives us into the theme of Jesus calling us to a mustard seed life. A mustard seed life entails an understanding that small things matter, small actions matter; small, small details of our daily life …

You cannot serve God and wealth. Not just because of divided loyalty, but because the two require entirely different mindsets. Serving God comes from a place of letting go, listening, and entrusting. Jesus was serving God. At the end, he could very likely have saved his skin by recanting all the sabbath healings and the controversial message of liberation and inclusion. That recanting was the ransom demanded by the rulers and chief priests clinging to their worldly wealth and power. Jesus did not pay that ransom. He chose to let go of his very life rather than break faith with …

The scriptures for our consideration this morning, particularly the verses from Deuteronomy and Luke, have an instructional or didactic tone to them around their shared focus – the path of faith or the spiritual journey.   In Deuteronomy, we encounter powerful verses issued at a critical time for the Israelites as they stand on the brink of entering the promised land. It is considered Moses’ farewell speech in which the Israelites receive the instruction that they have a choice to make. Faith is not imposed by a dominate deity who takes away their autonomy and agency. No. This undertaking is initiated …

The preacher in Ecclesiastes & Jesus are challenging us to ask ourselves: Is life about possessing? The vanity, and yes the frustration of trying to possess life is, as the preacher writes & as Jesus says, foolish! But that doesn’t prevent us from trying to possess life rather than simply live life in the present. Maybe you live with a Godly indifference to possessing, grasping, or seizing life? I don’t do that hence these scriptures are a real gift! They so richly contrast our foolish desire to possess life instead of being rich toward God….Jesus’ words of challenge which ended …

“I came to bring fire to the earth…” “Is not my word like fire and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?…” “Not peace, I tell you, but rather division!” On each side, we are certain, certain, that the hammer of righteousness belongs to us alone. These Gospel words about family conflict could be read as a teaching about priorities —a call, as Saint Benedict would say, to “prefer nothing to Christ.” But wait. Doesn’t Benedict also tell us to treat everyone as Christ? Isn’t love of neighbor—meaning love of everyone—one of Jesus’s core teachings? Can this same …

Genesis 15:1-6;  Hebrews 11:1-3,8-16; Luke 12-13:9   I imagine that many of us have taken one or another trip in the past few months, and found refreshment.  For those who will soon be traveling, I hope you do also! For whatever reason, in the whirl of packing and putting things in order before our own travel last month, our summer of 1992 came to mind. Over a few years’ discernment, I had hammered out a new position as pastoral associate of Our Lady of Guadalupe, with the retiring pastor, new bishop, and a feisty, quad-lingual group of 35 immigrant farmworkers and …

Genesis 18: 1-15; Colossians 1:15-28;   Luke 10:38-42 In 2020 Netflix released a drama series titled “The Queen’s Gambit,” a fictional story about a young American woman named Beth Harmon and the arc of her life as she became a chess champion who faced off against some of the best chess players in the country. In the series finale there was a climactic showdown in Moscow, Russia, where she confronted some of the world’s best chess players. During those matches, a commentator remarked: “The only unusual thing about Beth Harmon, really, is her sex. And even that is not unique in …

Some weeks ago, I was asked if I would offer the homily today:  the Feast of Saints Benedict and Scholastica.  In addition, I was told that we would be celebrating the 25th anniversary of Sr. Lynne Smith’s monastic profession and the 1st anniversary of her installation as prioress of our monastery.  The challenge and the honor were quite a shock at first.  The shock passed–well, somewhat–but a good deal of my anxiety has persisted over the intervening days.  I asked Sr. Lynne if there would be any special readings for this Sunday.  Like a good Benedictine, she said that we …