This week’s sermon was about how the end of the story is already known: God’s love is where it all leads to, with us joined with Him. So, if that’s settled, what do we do in the meantime? We should lean into it and accept that end, following God and living in His joy.
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This service was about John the Baptist who paved the way for Christ’s coming, and compared his struggles to those of Martin Luther King, Jr. when he, also, felt people who hated him coming after him (both, unfortunately, ultimately ended up assassinated). Our priest emphasized that when we pray and reach out to God, He will always answer us in some way, whether through direct response, or through sending some messenger, or what have you. When we’re going through hard times, we should continue to pray and He will be with us in those struggles, guiding us the whole way.
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In her sermon today, our pastor talked about how she had never really understood Advent until she was watching the service about a year ago at home with her newborn daughter.
A symbol of hope that the Israelites awaited for generations was now present with them. God came and has come again and again and again, as we hope and wait.
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This week’s service was the last of Advent! It was about how creating an “Advent resolution.” Instead of like a New Year resolution, where we decide what we need for ourselves, we should resolve ourselves to listen for where God needs us in the world so we can do His will where it’s needed. The priest used Mary and Joseph as examples of people who did not set out to do a specific thing, but rather, made themselves available for what God needed from them, and in doing so, they changed the entire world.
My church’s mass was a nice way to put a bow on the Christmas season as this weekend is the Solemnity. I usually attend my church’s Saturday night 5:15 anticipatory evening mass, which I did and was quite pleased with how well attended it was, with young adults like myself, young couples, families, and old folks alike. My parish is essentially the home base for my area’s archdiocese, so our masses brings in many from all around the my state’s metro area (and sometimes lots of visitors from out of state too!).
What I took out of this mass is the message that our priest gave during the homily. That message being one that truly epitomizes this season in the best of ways through the waiting we did through the weeks of Advent, to the anticipation that will eventually come through seeing the birth of our savior come Christmas Day.
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This week’s sermon was about how all the great disciples, including John the Baptist, pointing everyone toward the true target of their teaching and works: Jesus. Through their ministries, they saw God, and followed where He led them. The priest also brought up the ministry of Martin Luther King, Jr., who argued if he could live in any time period, he would choose the one he lived in, because he saw the work of God in people in the movement for racial justice, guiding their hands.
This week a missionary visited our church. He gave a speech about how much the support of the churches has helped them to spread the Gospel in Brazil, to help those in need, and to build and establish new churches there. He encouraged us to continue to support them in any way we can as they continue their mission there, whether it be joining them in the mission, sending funds and supplies, and/or even praying for them.
Adding to his request for continued support, he reminded us that we are all members of the body of Christ; that although each of the members have different roles and gifts, no matter how big or small, they are all equally important in growing God’s Kingdom. Do not be ashamed if your role and/or gifts seem too small to contribute any good, use the gifts and blessings God gives you to glorify Him and to share the Good News with others; He can use even the smallest of things in very big ways!
“For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.”
-Romans 12:4, 5 | NIV
“There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord.”
-1 Corinthians 12:4, 5 | ESV
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This week was about Jesus calling fishermen to join His ministry, calling them to be fishers of men. The guest priest told us about his experience with God calling him to do various things, and told us that we should be on the lookout for the things God might want us to do or places He might want us to go. We should serve Him in the way we’re called to, even if it might bring us out of our comfort zone!
Our sermon was about the Beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount! Despite how much we are hurting and suffering and working, we are blessed!
Blessed is the church who forgives each other and who stands up against injustice. Who is open to all and closed to none. 
Today’s service was different! We had a “service of Scripture and song” with no sermon. At the end, a Ukrainian couple asked us to pray for them and their children and grandchildren, who are still over there. Слава Україні!
Someone recently talked about Luke 4:18-19, in which Jesus quoted Isaiah. It’s instructive, because out of all the Old Testament scriptures that describe the Messiah, this is the one Jesus used to describe Himself!
18 The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,
19 To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.
He chose a passage that emphasizes teaching, healing, and delivering, not one that talks about division, judgement, and destruction. While the judgement of God is real and will happen one day, His power to heal everyone who strives to follow Him was the first thing He chose to teach about Himself. We can better emulate Him by also focusing first on healing.
The gospel passage from this week on the 6th Sunday in Ordinary Time was a good one!
The part of the passage that was this weeks (Matthew 5:17-37) that always strikes a chord with me is this last part that relates to the commandments:
"You have heard that it was said, You shall not commit adultery.' 28 But I say to you that every one who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell. 31"It was also said, Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ 32 But I say to you that every one who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, makes her an adulteress; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. 33"Again you have heard that it was said to the men of old, You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.' 34 But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. 36 And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let what you say be simply Yes’ or `No’; anything more than this comes from evil.
The homily our priest did for it was done very well, as easily related to the fact that every single day we have a bunch of choices to make, too.
This week our sermon was about Peter meeting Jesus up on the mountain, where he is with Elijah and Moses and God tells them that God is His Son. I always found it amusing how Peter just takes this in stride. “Oh hey those legendary prophets who have been gone for millennia, I guess they’re here with Jesus. I’ll go set up tents for them I guess!”
The priest emphasized that Peter and the disciples went with Jesus up the mountain expecting for Jesus to be a new Moses. A continuation of what they had in the past, to bring about a new age of teachings. But they found out that the new Moses wasn’t Jesus - Jesus was something new entirely - the new Moses was them. They were to lead His people, to teach them, and to continue God’s will. Being a Christian gives us a duty to be our own type of Moses, and to serve God’s people and be an example of His commandments.
We had a really cool day at church! Two speakers talked about diversity and inclusion, and how they relate to our responsibility as disciples of Christ to love and serve others.
The first talked about how some mistakenly think they should keep their distance from those with different religious beliefs. She talked about growing up in a small town and struggling emotionally, and talking to her friend and friend’s mom about it while she was visiting one day. They were of a different Christian denomination, but offered to pray with her, which brought her a lot of comfort and healing. She also had her love of the scriptures strengthened by associating with them and seeing how much they loved God and the scriptures. She never would have had those experiences if she had stayed away from them. She also shared a number of experiences she had over the years serving those of different backgrounds, including nationality, race, religion, and sexual orientation. By being a true friend to them, she had many opportunities to share her own faith with them. But she also pointed out that proselyting shouldn’t be our motivation for befriending others. “Friendship should never be offered as a means to an end; it can and should be an end unto itself.” After all, Christ taught that by showing love for each other, we demonstrate that we are His disciples; sometimes we share His gospel of love without preaching a single word.
The second speaker shared his experience serving as a chaplain in the U.S. Air Force. He frequently received visits from servicemen of many different religious backgrounds and helped them with their struggles of faith, even when their beliefs differed from his. He spoke of the deep friendship that developed between the men and women he served with as they stood up for each other and fought alongside each other, regardless of their differences, and how doing so made them stronger in the face of an enemy that “didn’t care about their petty differences”. We too have an enemy who doesn’t care about our differences, but wants to undo all that is good, regardless of where it comes from. But by standing together and celebrating the good that is in all of us, which comes from our diverse experiences, we gain strength from God to stand together against evil.
It was a very powerful meeting. It actually went later than usual, but nobody minded and many people commented about it afterwards.
Today at church we had a guest choir called the GenOUT Youth Chorus. It is a choir of LGBTQ+ and allied high school students from the DC area. They performed a number of songs and also talked about the work that they are doing partnering with different groups and the engagement they would like to do moving forward.
It was so inspiring and uplifting to hear these young people be comfortable with being their authentic selves. And they sounded really good as well! They talked about their dream for a world of acceptance, a more just world, that we can create together.
This service was about the context of John 3:16 and how Jesus was talking to Nicodemus, a Pharisee. But the priest wanted to emphasize what, exactly, the Pharisees were. In the Bible, they were often the “bad guys” who were stubborn, legalistic, and prejudiced, but the context of this is lost in our time. The Pharisees were wise, educated ley preachers who were very important for Jewish life. They were valued and held “high” standing because of it. But the use of Pharisees in the Gospels is similar to the use of rich people as stock “bad guys” despite some rich people in the Bible being presented positively. Because God wanted to communicate to us that even the “high and mighty” can be ignorant before God. Even the wealthy. Even the Pharisees.
She also underlined an additional reason recognizing that Pharisees = bad is not a great interpretation: This understanding has been foundational to much Christian antisemitism through history, and we need to be careful not to fuel it.
Today’s service was on Matthew 22:1-14, the parable of the wedding banquet.
We may think of ourselves as the invited guests because we try our best to do everything right. When you get a nice wedding invitation you feel really special! You almost can’t refuse; in Jesus’s time, declining an invite from a king was almost an insult.
Our pastor pointed out that just because the story of God’s people includes enslavers and enslaved alike, we as God’s people cannot continue supporting the institution of slavery in any of its forms. It would be good for us to look at our traditional readings and ask whether they’re how God is speaking to people back then or to us today.
In this parable, Jesus may have been the guest who defied and rebelled against the king. Saying yes to God’s “kin-dom” is standing up against injustice, tyranny, and hatred. We’ve all been invited, but will we have any regrets about what we did on the way, how we lived out our faith? Will we act in courage and boldness?
Quote from today’s sermon:
“Christian community is not about self-reliance. It’s about relying on God and each other. Faith is not a solo sport.”
Because of the time in Lent, this week all the crosses were covered in a red veil, which was pretty interesting! I noticed they missed the large crucifix hanging from the ceiling. I’m assuming nobody knew how to veil that safely so they didn’t bother. 
This week the service was about Lazarus being raised from the dead. One thing I like that the priest pointed out was that it was commonly believed by Jewish people at the time that it took 3 days for the soul to leave the body after death. Jesus didn’t arrive to see Lazarus until he had already died of his sickness, and, in fact, he arrived after he was dead for 4 days. This served in emphasizing that the dead can truly be raised. The priest also emphasized that this can refer to the larger church; even when it can seem like it’s “sleeping” (Jesus’ words for Lazarus when he was literally dead), what’s sleeping can wake up with God. And she mentioned as an example of how our (local) church is having a resurgence of life, which is great!
CW/TW: Recent 
violence
I noticed that the church I’ve been virtually attending is having a Good Friday service so I’m watching it during dinner.
Among many Scripture readings was
Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, “Woman, here is your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.
—John 19:25-27 NRSV
One of the speakers related this to the town hall meetings that were recently held after Denver East High School had its second (!) shooting in 2 months. These are our children dying, but shootings can seemingly happen anywhere, targeting any group(s) of people!
Later, speaking upon Jesus crying out on the cross; “Daddy, daddy! Why have you forsaken me?” Another speaker commented that some Christians struggle with Good Friday; it leaves us waiting and asking “Why?” for so many things. Why was an innocent person, calling out for their parents, killed by the state? Why should we have to suffer gun violence any longer?
God meets us on the Good Fridays of our lives, as we call out “WHY?” in the darkness, and brings us into the light!