Laura Giffin

Christopher Thomas Sermon for Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost, Year B, Proper 25 – 10/24/21 Job 42:1-6, 10-17 Psalm 34:1-8, (19-22) Hebrews 7:23-28 Mark 10:46-52 Draw us in the Spirit’s tether; for when humbly, in thy name, Two or three are met together, Thou art in the midst of them: Alleluya!  Alleluya!  Touch we now thy garment’s hem. How do you define sin? “Well, I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description, and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so.  But I know sin when I it when I see it…”[1] Seriously, as a Christian, a confessed follower of Jesus Christ, you really ought to have a good, working definition of what you think sin is.  What constitutes sin, for you?  Is it a standard of abiding by rules and laws, maybe the Ten Commandments, or…

George R. Sumner Sermon for 21st Sunday after Pentecost, Year B, Proper 24 – 10/17/2021 Job 38:1-7, (34-41) Psalm 104:1-9, 25, 37c Hebrews 5:1-10 Mark 10:35-45 All human societies have rites of initiation, things you have to go through to qualify for something or other- boot camp, HR intro, spring training, frosh week.  You can surely think of examples in your life. For most of us clergy, at least of my vintage, this included something called CPE, clinical pastoral education. It meant long hours in a nursing home or a prison or a psych ward or somewhere similar, including on call weekends with a beeper if someone should die.  And then, in small groups, it meant processing what you had experienced, and submitting yourself to critique about how your own family of origin, affected how you see things. A little self-awareness is a good thing in a priest. It having…