Sermons

Christopher Thomas Sermon for the Third Sunday after Pentecost, Year B – 6/13/21 1 Samuel 15:34 – 16:13 Psalm 20 2 Corinthians 5:6-10, [11-13], 14-17 Mark 4:26-34 The Scandalous Journey of Grace “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see!” – John Newton, 1772 If ever there were a seed planter’s hymn, it must have been “Amazing Grace,” for what could possibly get seed up out of the dirt of earth but the sheer Grace of something outside of, beyond, me, or we, any of the best that the world might have to offer.  Seed-work is hard, and toilsome, and backbreaking. Clear a field.  Plow some dirt.  Dig a hole.  Drop some seed. Ah!  That seed!  The miracle of life.  Where did it come from?  What will it be?  Who knows?  Who…

Christopher Thomas Sermon for the Second Sunday after Pentecost, Year B – 6/6/21 1 Samuel 8:4-11, (12-15), 16-20, (11:14-15) Psalm 138 2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1 Mark 3:20-35 I remember that day, so many, many years ago, as though it were just yesterday. Even driving into, onto the parking lot, my stomach churned with anxiety, for I had heard story, upon story, upon story, of the awfulness of that place. Oh, I had spent weeks training, sweating, for this moment, for just such a moment as this.  But let’s be honest.  Do you really train your way into a moment like this?  I’ve come to the conclusion that conversion moments aren’t particularly “train-able.”  Maybe that’s why they are conversion moments. For on that day, so many years ago, this 23 year-old, lower-middle-class, white, suburban gay kid of privilege stepped through the doors, onto the floor of something called the AIDS ward, in…

Allen M. Junek Sermon for the First Sunday after Pentecost, Trinity Sunday, Year B 0 5/30/21 Isaiah 6: 1 – 8 Canticle 13 Romans 8: 12 – 17 John 3: 1 – 17   In the Name of the holy and undivided + Trinity: one God, in whom is heaven. Amen. It was a warm summer evening in New York City. The year was 1969, and the United States–and indeed the world–was emerging from one of its most politically charged and tumultuous decades. None of that mattered, though, because it was a Friday night. There were drinks to be had, bars to patron, and strangers to kiss. One such bar was named the Stonewall Inn and it had built for itself a reputation for being one of the few havens, a refuge, for the city’s LGBTQ+ population. One reason for the Inn’s popularity was that few bars in New York,…