Rector's Blog

This blog is also available as a podcast.

Rector's Blog Summer Throwback Series: Witness!

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog Summer Throwback Series: You Are a Blessing

This blog is also available as a podcast. Note: As part of our When Love Shows Up Summer Throwback Series, we are re-posting this blog post which was originally posted on May 31, 2019. The Church of the Redeemer believes in the full ...

Rector's Blog: It's Your Church

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Emergence

This blog is also available as a podcast . 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...

Rector's Blog: Make You Odd

The blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Not a Blog

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

Rector's Blog: Regathering Ready

This blog is also available as a podcast 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...

Rector's Blog: This Blog is Not About You

This blog is also available as a podcast 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 ...

Rector's Blog: With Ma'Kiyah Bryant

This blog is also available as a podcast . 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 ...

Rector's Blog: CARE Team Love

This blog post is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

Rector's Blog: Sent Ones

This blog post is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Church, Dead and Resurrected

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Proclaim the Blessing You See

The blog post is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

Rector's Blog: One Year

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Hard Times Come Again No More

The blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Proclaiming Suffering, Proclaiming Joy

This blog is also available as a podcast. Something really beautiful happened during the Annual Meeting this Sunday. Actually, it happened more than once, and it kept happening. First of all, I want to say that the meeting itself was magical...

Rector's Blog: A Vision of Beloved Community

The blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Proclaiming the Dream

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

Rector's Blog: Update On Regathering

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Real Unity

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

Rector's Blog: Stubborn Christians

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: When We Repent

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Your Epiphany

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

Rector's Blog: Wait and Wonder

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Rest in Peace

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Rest Dysfunction

This blog is also available as a podcast 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...

Rector's Blog: I am Thankful for You

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: We're Taking a Break

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Are You Tired?

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: In the Hands of a Competent God

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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:...

Rector's Blog: When Jesus Votes

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Why Christians Must Say Black Lives Matter

This blog is also available as a podcast. I do a lot of premarital counseling with couples. I don’t spend any time trying to figure out if these two belong together – that’s above my paygrade. And I don’t test them ...

Rector's Blog: Your Commitment in 2021

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: A Place for This Church in Your Life

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Unity not Uniformity

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

Rector's Blog: Last Sunday I Stayed Home

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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’...

Rector's Blog: Holy Connection and Communion

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

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, �...

Rector's Blog: Building Unity

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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...

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...

Rector's Blog: What Percentage of Your Income Do You Give to The Church?

This blog is also available as a podcast. What percentage of your income do you give to the church? Do you know the number? I have almost never known this number my entire life. I remember learning that in the Bible there was a mandate fo...

Rector's Blog: Where is Jesus in Your Spending?

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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 ...

Rector's Blog: We Sold Our House

This blog is also available as a podcast. 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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