Author Archives: Chaplainmike

Thomas Merton: Living in the Freedom of Easter

  These words from Trappist monk Thomas Merton about Easter could not have been said better by any Lutheran or Protestant. He reminds us that Easter is not just about Jesus rising from the dead, defeating death. It is about our death and resurrection as well. In particular, Merton has us meditate on Paul’s teachingContinue reading “Thomas Merton: Living in the Freedom of Easter”

Why the Change in the Crowd?

A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. 9The crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Hosanna in theContinue reading “Why the Change in the Crowd?”

Holy Thursday at the Tea Party

Sometimes, I’ve got nothing. Nothing to write about. No insightful words to impart. No interesting metaphors to spark the imagination. No provocative prose, no poetry to prime the pump. I’m sitting and trying to think, but everything is fuzzy, my mind full of inchoate thoughts, like bats fluttering around in an attic. I get theContinue reading “Holy Thursday at the Tea Party”

Church: Not Where We “Find God”

Geoffrey Hill: What is there in my heart that you should sue so fiercely for its love? What kind of care brings you as though a stranger to my door through the long night and in the icy dew seeking the heart that will not harbor you, that keeps itself religiously secure? – from “LachrimaeContinue reading “Church: Not Where We “Find God””

Randy Thompson: The Church as a Hospice for the Dying

The Church as a Hospice for the Dying by Rev. Randy Thompson Forest Haven, Bradford, NH “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” -Dietrich Bonhoeffer I recently read an interesting article over at Christianity Today’s Parse blog on why the popular metaphor of the Church as a hospital for the sickContinue reading “Randy Thompson: The Church as a Hospice for the Dying”

Holy Week Thoughts: Another Look – Jesus and the Temple

Then Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who were selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold doves. He said to them, ‘It is written, “My house shall be called a house of prayer”; but you are making it aContinue reading “Holy Week Thoughts: Another Look – Jesus and the Temple”

Holy Week with Zechariah (2): Woe to Toxic Leadership

Zechariah 9-14 was a key passage for the evangelists who told the story of Passion Week in the Gospels. In volume two of his “Christian Origins” series, Jesus and the Victory of God, N.T. Wright gives an overview of the subjects addressed in this text: The writer promises the long-awaited arrival of the true kingContinue reading “Holy Week with Zechariah (2): Woe to Toxic Leadership”

Holy Week Thoughts: A Cross-less Faith

…let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him. – Matthew 27:42 * * * At Mockingbird, they have this helpful entry on the subject of “Theology of Glory” in their site glossary: Theologies of glory are approaches to Christianity and to life that try in various ways to minimizeContinue reading “Holy Week Thoughts: A Cross-less Faith”

Holy Week with Zechariah (1): Mismatched Expectations

A book which, as we have already seen, was arguably of great influence on Jesus, and which contained dark hints about the necessary suffering of the people of YHWH, is of course Zechariah, particularly its second part (chapters 9-14). …The underlying theme of the passage, as of so much Jewish literature of the period, isContinue reading “Holy Week with Zechariah (1): Mismatched Expectations”