“I Love a Parade” is a classic 1932 song introduced in the first show with Duke Ellington leading the band. John Philip Sousa’s marches are part of the tapestry of our patriotic celebrations. There is something about a parade. The Greenbelt Labor Day parade is the focus of attention every year, followed by friends gathering… Read More »
Checking our Spiritual Temperature
Every year I anxiously await the first signs of bloom on our saucer magnolia tree – and then I check the extended weather forecast to see if a cold snap might shorten the glory of the tree by a sudden freeze. The tree is ready to be in full bloom and our weather forecast is… Read More »
Lament Psalms
This past Sunday during Time With Young Disciples I talked to them about praying when you are feeling sad, or scared, or overwhelmed. I said all they really needed to say was “Help”. God would (and does) understand. I also said the biblical writers had developed a way to pray in difficult times and… Read More »
Reflecting on Violence
I thought this week’s meditation would be about the Central Atlantic Conference meeting scheduled for this weekend. What is the CAC? How is Greenbelt Community Church connected to the CAC? What will be the themes of this year’s Annual Meeting? And then war erupted in Israel and the Gaza Strip. I would like… Read More »
The Gift of Friendship
Today, October 4th, when this column goes out, we will conclude our Fall Book Study, Dinners With Ruth A Memoir on the Power of Friendships by Nina Totenberg. It has been a wonderful month of fellowship and storytelling as we read this book about friendship. In the next to last chapter, Nina Totenberg diverges from… Read More »
World Communion Sunday
This Sunday is World Communion Sunday. Instituted in the mid-1930s at Shadyside Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh, PA, it was designed to open their congregation’s awareness of the peoples of the world. The service was to challenge them to envision a table big enough to receive all who would participate in the bread and wine… Read More »
Matthew 15:14-16
14-16 “Here’s another way to put it: You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket,… Read More »
Honoring First Responders
As I write this the commemorations of September 11 are in progress. Twenty-two years ago the skies were a particular brilliant blue before the first plane crash. This morning the skies over New York and Washington and probably Shanksville happen to have clouds which give an eerie memory of smoke clouds that were also… Read More »
On this September 11
There are a few events that are a part of our vivid memory for our entire life. We know where we were. We remember how we felt. They shaped us. Mine include the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Jr., the planes crashing into the Twin Towers on September 11th and sadly, the events at… Read More »
Labor Day
As Labor Day approaches, I often think of the legacy of Francis Perkins. If that name is not familiar to you, I highly recommend going to https://francesperkinscenter.org/learn/her-life/, There you will find a biographical sketch of this woman who served our country during the time of the New Deal as the first woman Secretary of Labor. … Read More »
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