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Rector's Blog: Giving Up
This blog is also available as a podcast One of the best things about New Ye ar ’ s resolutions is when you give up on them. I don’t mean when you miss a day, or start to slack: I mean when you just throw in the towel and say...
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Rector's Blog: Dumpuary
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I want to tell you about a magical time of year called Dumpuary .
But first let me set the scene. Let’s talk about movies. For a movie to be eligible for an Oscar in 2023...
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Rector's Blog: New Year Same Me
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Just before Christmas, I told you about the Christmas cards we hang in our dining room during the holidays. Going into this past Christmas, we noticed that we had received significantly fewer cards t...
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Rector's Blog Throwback Series, The More You Love
As part of our When Love Shows Up Throwback Series we are re-posting this blog post which was originally posted on August 25, 2022
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On my 10th birthday I got a CD player and my first two CD...
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Rector's Blog: Your Perfect Christmas
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My wife has this custom of hanging all the Christmas cards we get by clothespins on a line that is draped across the wall of our dining room. Throughout this season w e eat our meals surrounded ...
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Rector's Blog: When We Are Talking
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One of people’s favorite things to tell me when they find out I’m a priest is how long it’s been since they went to church. Or that they don’t go to church at all. Or that they’...
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Rector's Blog: When You Have Enough Faith
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What does it even mean to have faith?
I finished my blog/podcast last week by asking the question, “W hat if you actually have enough faith right now? ” b ecause it’s my experi...
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Rector's Blog: When I Don't Want to Believe
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I’m not all that interested in having faith. I’m not. Yes, I lead a faith community. Yes, I believe in Jesus. Yes, I’m a Christian. But if I’m going to be honest with you, I have to t...
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Rector's Blog: Why I Believe in Jesus for Now
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Why do I believe in Jesus though?
Last week I wrote about believing in God even though terrible things happen . But why do I believe in God? Why do I believe in Jesus? Why a...
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Rector's Blog: Compared To What?
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One of the first concerts I attended after things began opening back up was Bob Dylan at the Aronoff Center in Downtown Cincinnati. People who know me know how important Dylan’s music i...
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Rector's Blog: When Money Talks
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I want to warn you right out of the gates that I’m about to talk about money. Before you shut down completely, please know that I won’t be asking you for any money today. I reserve the righ...
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Rector's Blog: When God Is Toxic
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I want to start today with a hypothetical scenario: Imagine you have a friend that has gotten into a relationship with a man and things are starting to get serious. You ask them what he’s like, an...
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Rector's Blog: The Words We Cannot Say
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When Moses asked what to call God, God gave him the run around. “I am that I am,” was God’s response. Except it may not have been. The same phrase could be translated, “I will ...
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Rector's Blog: Living Worship
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Hi Friends,
This year Church of the Redeemer is doing some work to think through how we worship – assessing our liturgies, and naming our core values as a worshiping community. In Aug...
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Rector's Blog: The More You Love
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On my 10th birthday I got a CD player and my first two CDs. They were pop phenomenon Paula Abdul’s debut album, Forever Your Girl, and glam-rock band Cinderella’s Long Cold Winter. Thus began m...
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Rector's Blog: If God is Love
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If God is not Love, I don’t really see the point of church.
I don’t think Church makes you a good person. I don’t think it exists as a tool of self-improvement. It’s not ...
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Rector's Blog: Scared of Death
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On my 30 th b irthday I attended an autopsy.
I should explain.
It was the summer of 2009 and I was working in a chaplaincy program at Washington Hospit...
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Rector's Blog: A Tale of Two Churches
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It’s a tale of two churches.
One is grieving. The church they knew and loved is gone. The building is there, as beautiful as it has ever been, and many of the people are still engag...
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Rector's Blog: Will The Church Survive?
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I hear this question so often. Sometimes it’s asked directly and explicitly. Other times it is implied. It’s not a new question, by the way. I have been an Episcopalian for 20 years, and I have ...
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Rector's Blog Throwback Series: Hoping for Peace
Editor's note: This blog is part of our Throwback Series and was originally posted on December 17, 2021.
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“This year I resolve to be more sexist.”
It was New Year’s Eve ten years ago...
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Rector's Blog, Conversion
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I remember my final year of seminary when I found out where my first job was going to be. I called up one of my mentor s, a priest who had overseen my work at a local church , and I said, “I...
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Rector's Blog, Pride Series: You Are A Blessing
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Hey, friends, I am still recovering from COVID, and am in need of rest, so I do not have a new blog/podcast for you this week. That being said, we are at the beginning of Pride month, and I did no...
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Rector's Blog: Bury The Rag Deep
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William Zantzinger killed poor Hattie Carroll. This is the first line of a song Bob Dylan wrote when he was 22 years old. The song is called The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll, and in it, Dyl...
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Rector's Blog: We Don't Talk About Abortion
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The prevailing narrative in our country is that Christianity and abortion rights are incompatible with each other. This narrative exists despite the fact that , outside of White evangelical pro...
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Rector's Blog: Learning what I Believe
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I have not always believed in someone’s right to have an abortion. In fact, my change in belief is fairly recent . I grew up in a religious tradition that taught me in no uncertain te...
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Rector's Blog: We Believe
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Friends, in the weeks to come, I will be devoting my blog(podcast) to the conversation about reproductive rights, and especially abortion. It is a difficult topic. The Christian co...
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Rector's Blog: Magnificent and Complicated
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I was at a wedding once back in my mid-20’s where both the bride and the groom had lost a parent – both their fathers had died. I remember this for two reasons: First, because my own ...
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Rector's Blog: For The Unprepared
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We are in the midst of Holy Week, and Easter is upon us, and that can only mean one thing for me: I have failed at another Lent. It has become my new tradition, failing at Lent. I cann...
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Rector's Blog: Thy Kingdom Come
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Episcopal author and activist Vida Scudder wrote these words in 1917: “This is the hour of opportunity ; this is the hour of the Church. In the last fifty years she has accomplished a great pr...
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Rector's Blog: Incompletely White
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During one of our Lenten Series discussions, I saw a really beautiful moment of vulnerability, curiosity, and affection . I want to share it with you because I t hink it illustrates some o...
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Rector's Blog: Angry and Beautiful
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The first time I heard the band Nirvana , I was in 7 th grade. Their breakout song “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was all over the radio, and its video was in constant rotat...
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Rector's Blog: Practicing Promise
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The first five books of the Bible, t he Tora h, comprise the narrative that shapes and defines the people called Israel. The other books of what we Christians call the Old Testament ...
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Holding Space for Frustration and Hope
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We are entering into a time of hope. I’m not talking about the religious season of Lent, though that is wonderful: I’m talking about this time in our church in relation to COVID-19. Tra...
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Rector's Blog: Throwback Episode, Make You Odd
Hey, friends, welcome to my podcast, When Love Shows Up. This week we’re going to rerun an episode from last year because I find it has held its relevance in terms of our community response to COVID-19. While some of our guidelines have change...
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Rector's Blog: For the Bengals
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“Ok, it’s time for a serious question,” the Search Committee member said to me. I was in the living room of a parishioner in the midst of the final round of interviews for the role I cur...
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Rector's Blog: Sibling Rivalry
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There are no wounds like family wounds. When families fight, the stakes are higher, the passions run hotter, the love, hate, resentment, and care all run deeper. This is the way of things...
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Rector's Blog: Jesus is a Jew
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Jesus is a Jew. This is a central part of Jesus’ identity, and it is essential for Christians to understand Jesus’ Jewishness if we are going to be serious about our faith in him.
...
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Hoping for Jesus
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I’m a talker.
If you know me, you already know this. I’d like to hope that my talking is not for its own sake, and that even when I go on too long and talk too much there...
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Hoping for Peace
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“This year I resolve to be more sexist.”
It was New Year’s Eve ten years ago and we were standing in my kitchen. It was just my friend Rebecca and me – our spouses were in the other...
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Hoping for Company
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We have family coming for Christmas, and I’m pretty excited about it. One of the hardest things about moving to Cincinnati has been not having family nearby. And, of course...
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Hoping for Normal
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I was a workaholic before the pandemic.
I used to think being a workaholic meant someone who worked 80 hour weeks or never took days off. I took days...
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The Gratitude in the Grief
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When my family sits around the table to eat, one of the children usually presides over the pre-dinner prayer. This prayer sometimes becomes a rambling litany of thanksgivings. Other times i...
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The Whelming Flood
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“In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows...
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Fall Throwback Series, Loneliness and Belonging
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This past Sunday the Church of the Redeemer held in-person worship for the first time in 7 months. I have to tell you it was absolutely wonderful. In the truest sense of the word: filled wi...
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The Gift and the Work that Follows
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If you’ve been around the Church of the Redeemer the last few months, you’ve likely noticed that our grounds have never looked better. This was no accident, and in fact there’...
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Tacos and Friendship
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When I told my friend Brian I would be leaving Southern California and moving to Cincinnati, Ohio, he did not bring up our friendship, or the weather, or the church I served, or the re...
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Rector's Blog: In Service of the Melody
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Typically, when I ask someone what kind of music they like, they will respond with specific genres. They’ ll say, “I like country,” or “I like rap,” or “I like classic rock,” or...
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Rector's Blog: A Need for Hope
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I didn’t really think much about Hope until it was politicized. It was the 2008 presidential campaign, and then Senator Barack Obama ran with the slogan “Hope”. In the spirit of transp...
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Rector's Blog: Waiting for Jesus
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Dear Paul, you told us that Jesus was coming back. You said he’d be coming back and making everything right. Jesus isn’t back yet, and things aren’t all right. Oh, and also people ar...
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Rector's Blog: Life on Purpose
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Do you think your existence is an accident? Are you here by coincidence? Do you just happen to exist, and now you’ve decided to cobble together something that vaguely resembles pur...
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Rector's Blog: More Than You Can Bear
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The phrase “God will never give you any more than you can handle” is a particularly nasty bit of bad theology that has infiltrated our lives and made them measurably worse . The proble...
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Rector's Blog: Uncurated Love
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I remember watching TV when I was a kid and waiting for those commercial breaks. This was when you got a refill of your drink, or grabbed a snack or, in the most dire of situations, went to the bath...
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Rector's Blog: God of Transformation
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One day God changed Abram and Sarai’s names to Abraham and Sarah. While this moment may have been coming for a long time, and while in retrospect, it may seem obvious to us why that name change ha...
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Rector's Blog: A New Sunday
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Beginning on September 12th, we will be offering a new Sunday worship schedule, and we will be returning to our full array of four worship services: Rite I Eucharist, Rite II Eucharist, The Ba...
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Rector's Blog: Meant for These Times
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My favorite Beach Boys album, Pet Sounds , includes a song where Brian Wilson opines repeatedly, “I guess I just wasn’t made for these times.” It’s a reflection on feeling disconnected,...
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Rector's Blog Summer Throwback Series: Real Unity
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Editor's note: As part of our When Love Shows Up Summer Throwback Series we are re-posting this blog post which was originally posted on January 27, 2021.
Unity is the buzzword of the month. I...
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Rector's Blog Summer Throwback Series: Witness!
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Note: As part of our When Love Shows Up Summer Throwback Series, we are re-posting this blog post which was originally posted on June 7, 2019.
What if the Church really listened to LGBTQ+ pers...
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Rector's Blog: It's Your Church
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In my first church job, whenever I would allow myself to be consumed by stress, my boss and mentor would remind me of the Pope who would conclude each day with the prayer, “It’s your ch...
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Rector's Blog: Emergence
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I was watching the cicadas in my front yard yesterday and was struck by something. First of all, there are a lot of them. I mean, a lot of them. Dozens of shells of the molted cicada exoskeletons sit...
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Rector's Blog: Make You Odd
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This past week, I preached about how odd being a Christian is. I addressed this message first to a room of several dozen people in masks sitting in every other pew, distanced at least 6 feet from on...
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Rector's Blog: Not a Blog
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Friends, I won’t be writing a blog this week. As you know, last week I announced that we would be returning to in-person worship indoors. This Sunday at 9am we will participate in Holy Eucharist ...
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Rector's Blog: Regathering Ready
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I am pleased to be able to tell you that the Church of the Redeemer will resume worship indoors on May 16th. I want to devote the rest of this week’s blog, and likely next week’s as well...
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Rector's Blog: This Blog is Not About You
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This blog is not about you. It's about your neighbor.
Your neighbor belongs utterly to God. Your neighbor carries Christ within them and is as much a sign of God’s presence in the world as ...
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Rector's Blog: With Ma'Kiyah Bryant
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In the first century, an unknown Christian author wrote a sermon-like letter to a group of fellow Christians who were living under persecution, injustice, and uncertainty. They were scared, and they ...
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Rector's Blog: CARE Team Love
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Rachel Blinka helped me get vaccinated. She didn’t know that was what she was going to do when she set up that Zoom call with me. We were just going to talk about her decision to become ...
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Rector's Blog: Sent Ones
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I originally wrote this a little over a year ago as we meditated on The Way of Love – The Episcopal Church’s rule of life. My focus, as you’ll see, was on our movement out into the world...
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Rector's Blog: Church, Dead and Resurrected
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I really thought we’d be back indoors by now. We saw the COVID case numbers start to dip after the holiday surge, and the vaccines started to come out, and I thought, “This is it: We&rs...
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Rector's Blog: Proclaim the Blessing You See
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I believe that LGBTQ+ people are a blessing to this world. The church community I serve, the Church of the Redeemer, affirms this belief, as does the Episcopal Church to which we belong. We do ...
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Rector's Blog: One Year
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This week marks the one-year anniversary of the day the Church of the Redeemer decided to cease in-person worship and indoor gathering. Friday, March 13th, 2020. The clergy, staff, and wardens gath...
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Rector's Blog: Hard Times Come Again No More
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Let us pause in life's pleasures and count its many tears while we all sup sorrow with the poor. There's a song that will linger forever in our ears Hard times come again no more 'Tis the so...
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Rector's Blog: A Vision of Beloved Community
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At the Church of the Redeemer, we have a vision .
We have a vision of a worshiping community that knows Jesus and grows in Love: United in relationships of holy connection and communion; growing w...
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Rector's Blog: Proclaiming the Dream
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What if you knew you were loved fully, totally, unconditionally exactly as you are right now? Knew it in your bones and felt convinced of your belonging in this world? Now, on top of that, what if ...
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Rector's Blog: Update On Regathering
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Friends, it’s been a while since we spoke about how our church is dealing with the pandemic, and I thought it might be time to catch up, and to provide as clear a picture as I can give you abou...
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Rector's Blog: Real Unity
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Unity is the buzzword of the month. In the aftermath of the deadly insurrection that capped off a traumatic election season that took place in the midst of the (still ongoing) greatest public health ...
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Rector's Blog: Stubborn Christians
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I became a priest, in part, out of stubbornness. I was a waiter at the time, and my coworkers had a lot to do with my decision. Throughout our time working together, many of them consistently commu...
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Rector's Blog: When We Repent
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Last week I wrote that throughout the Epiphany Season, I planned to interview parishioners about their vocation for my blog. Then Wednesday, January 6th happened. We watched a violent act of insurr...
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Rector's Blog: Your Epiphany
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Ok, so Christmas is over. The baby was born. Jesus is here. God with us. Now what? In the church we celebrate a season called Epiphany, and I’m here to tell you it’s underrated. Epiphany ...
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Rector's Blog: Wait and Wonder
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Every year is the same. Every Christmas, as the day approaches, we stress about the same things: About our expectations for the day, for the season, about if we will give and get the right things for...
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Rector's Blog: Rest in Peace
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Yesterday I held my friend David’s hand. He told me he loved me. I told him I loved him. We talked about what had been, and what was coming. He told me he was ready. He told me he loved me again. I...
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Rector's Blog: Rest Dysfunction
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My wife has a sleep disorder. It’s called Narcolepsy. You’ve probably heard of it, though you don’t necessarily know what it does. I remember thinking narcolepsy meant someone would fall aslee...
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Rector's Blog: I am Thankful for You
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One Thanksgiving we put our names in a hat. There were four families of people together that Thanksgiving – which feels so odd to imagine heading into this quiet little COVID holiday, but there...
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Rector's Blog: We're Taking a Break
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Back in April, shortly after Church of the Redeemer transitioned to remote and digital ministry, we had a realization: We were losing money. In response to the pandemic and based on our B...
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Rector's Blog: Are You Tired?
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Can we rest yet? Is it time? The dizzying, never-ending buzz, the exhausting, contentious election season, and the marathon Groundhog Day experience of a four-day Election are all in our rearview m...
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Rector's Blog: In the Hands of a Competent God
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Do you have your plan? We’ve been hearing this question a lot lately as Election Day approaches. And of course, it’s referring to your need to come up with a plan for how you will vote:...
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Rector's Blog: When Jesus Votes
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In Ireland, during the Troubles, if someone was asked, “Are you a Catholic or a Protestant?” and they responded, “I’m an atheist,” the question would come back immediate...
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Rector's Blog: Your Commitment in 2021
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I’m writing to you today about how I’d like you to make a financial commitment to Church of the Redeemer in 2021. If this makes you uncomfortable, I hope you stick around anyway: Your u...
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Rector's Blog: A Place for This Church in Your Life
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It seems like we're supposed to preface everything these days with, "I know this not how we'd like things to be but..."
We have an understanding, of course, that our lives have been radically up...
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Rector's Blog: Unity not Uniformity
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When I was growing up, we talked about politics in my family. Which is to say we argued a lot. Mostly around the dinner table. I’m not sure what there was to argue about – for all inten...
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Rector's Blog: Last Sunday I Stayed Home
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I stayed home and watched church on Sunday. I know you probably did too, since there were only 9 people in the building that day. But, y’know: Normally I’m in it. So even when we’...
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Rector's Blog: Holy Connection and Communion
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When we first started piecing together our Vision Statement a couple years ago, we knew we needed to talk about relationships. The relationships we build and foster here are like the marrow of the ...
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Rector's Blog: I miss taking Communion
This blog is also available as a podcast. "I miss taking Communion." "Really? What do you miss about it?" I was not prepared to be challenged by a priest when I said I missed communion. But that was what was happening. I wanted him to say, ...
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Rector's Blog: Building Unity
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Last Sunday I walked down the center aisle of our Church for the first time in a long time. What’s more, I wasn’t alone! A small group of us had gathered together to rehearse the st...
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Rector's Blog: No Such Thing As Secular
Last Spring, I preached a sermon about the political implications of the Gospel. It was, I have to tell you, not my favorite topic. Talking about divisive things in the church makes me squirm, and what’s more divisive than politics in our curre...
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Rector's Blog: Where is Jesus in Your Spending?
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Where is Jesus in your spending? I asked you this question last week, but I sort of hid it at the bottom of the blog, so maybe you didn’t notice it. We don’t get to avoid that question ...
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Rector's Blog: We Sold Our House
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Last Fall I was sitting in a presentation at our Annual Clergy Day and had no intention of having my life changed. My preference would have been to simply survive the day and get home before Cincin...
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"We believe that the God that created you made you as you are on purpose. You are not a mistake. Your sexuality is not a mistake, a sin, or something to be cured, fixed, or healed. You are a blessing.