Dormition of our Lady

I can't help but talk about Our Lady. You know, the Theotokos, the God-Bearer, the Madonna...Mary!

This is especially true on one of her feast days. August 15, is the Dormition of the Theotokos...the falling asleep of Mary. The picture on this post is the icon of the feast hanging over the vigil lights in the church I serve.

My devotion comes from Her intervention on my behalf at a time in my life when I needed it the most. And for that miracle, I will always be grateful.

One of the best talks given about this feast can be found by following this link...

What Fr. Hopko says in that lecture is just one more reason why I believe there is something about Mary.

Considering the Lilies

I have never thought of these verses from Matthew 6 as being directly part of the resurrection story...not until this morning.














As I walked back to the office from my Tuesday sermon-study group and past our prayer garden at All Saints', I happened upon the Candy Tuft in full bloom. My heart was stirred not only by their beauty but also by the words of our Lord on the placard hovering over the gorgeous white blossoms. My mind went immediately to the words I had just poured over with some of my colleagues....

...While the disciples were telling how they had seen Jesus risen from the dead, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, "Peace be with you."

I wonder sometimes if we really believe this anymore? In our desire to be as PC and non-offensive as possible is the resurrection something that has now grown out of fashion for us? Has our passion for deconstructing the stories of the Bible and the events of scripture gone so far as to strip them of any real efficacy? Or have they simply become nothing more than moral lessons--our collective nursery rhymes?

Maybe I should consider the lilies and not worry about it so much. After all, Jesus is the one who comes to us. He is the one who breaks down those doors that we have shut for fear. He is the one who speaks peace to us in the midst of our troubles. And maybe, we might see him at dinner or on the road somewhere between here and our own Emmaus.

Not about me but we...

Did you see the you see the Sienna-Ohio State game last Thursday night? It would not surprise me if you didn’t, it was a first round game in the NCAA men’s finals last Thursday night. Number 9 cede Sienna beat Number 8 cede Ohio State and will face Louisville this evening.

I saw this snippet of a highlight from that game. Right as Sienna sank the winning shot at the last second in the last overtime, the camera pans over to their bench just as the team jumps up . Behind them, another student stands up behind the bench, pulls out a big yellow poster board with—you guessed it—John 3:16.

He didn’t have it long. This big, bald security guard stepped up, ripped it out of his hands and folded it up and threw it away. It’s not the guard was some atheist anti-John 3:16-sign enforcer. NCAA rules don’t allow any signs, religious or otherwise, at a tournament game.

Still, I want to say to the kid who smuggled in his sign: “You've got the wrong verse! If you're going to go through all the work of smuggling in the sign, at least have the correct verse!”

We all know—or many of us do, anyway—John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son to the end that all that believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

This is the slogan-passage for many Christians. To them it describes the core of Christian faith. But we forget about the rest of the passage, and its context. This is why if a kid was going to hold up bible-verse sign it should say “John 3:17.” And that reads: “Indeed, God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but in order than it might be saved through him.”In other words, God’s salvation is not about “me” but about “we.”

Read the rest of Andrew Gern's post here...