Volume 3 Issue 21

• I had a wonderful dream a few nights back. It was one of those that was more real than surreal (and yes, I do dream in color) so that you are not really aware that it’s a dream until you wake up. I was preaching again—something that I haven’t done for over three years now—and I was “connecting” with the congregation. It felt good, and it was a little disappointing to awaken to the realization that it was only a dream.
  
• The dream may have been a premonition of the personally rewarding week I’ve experienced through this cyber-ministry. The Lent 2005 series has actually evoked some responses, and the quality of the virtual discussion that is developing confirms in every way my contention that the most meaningful theologizing happens through dialogue and exchange. You can see what I mean by going to the “comments” at the end of each “sermon”. What’s more, I hope that you may be inspired to make your own contribution.
  
• We are enjoying a visit from Rachel and Steve over this President’s Day holiday. It is a good time to reflect upon the great and not-so-great men who have held that office, and to ponder the day when someone other than a Caucasian male will have their opportunity. It’s easier to say such a thing now that I’ve accepted the ludicrousness of my own aspirations whether they be messianic or presidential. On a more serious note, it is an occasion to give some thought to how incredibly much room for improvement currently exists.
  
• This Second Sunday of Lent seems a good time to offer a brief explanation of why Sundays are not counted in the forty days of Lent. For the early Christian community, every Sunday was regarded as Easter (sometimes referred to as the eighth day of creation) and was therefore not included in the time set aside for penitence and self-denial. This is but one of the many traditions established by the Church that continue to be observed without widespread understanding by contemporary participants.
  
• Until next time…….Shalom!

Volume 3 Issue 20

• The sun is shining in Las Vegas on this First Sunday of Lent, the plum trees are in glorious bloom, and I weigh more than I should. I occupy a position of privilege in comparison to so much of the world, and yet I could let myself feel underprivileged in the twinkling of an eye. There is always more to want, more to think I actually need. I’ve been reviewing the tape I made of last Sunday’s Super Bowl, and I am grateful for Fox’s “fair and balanced” presentation of the values that truly make this the greatest country in the world!
  
• Thirty-five years ago tomorrow Mary and I met on our first “blind” date, and it’s been M&M ever since. My cynical outlook is tempered as I realize what I have learned about the true nature of love since then. While it is cliché to say that I found my soul mate, that is exactly what happened and my life has forever been better. If I were granted one wish it would be that everyone might have the same wonderful experience that blesses me daily.
  
• I managed to be faithful to my Lenten “promise” for the first four days, and the product can be found on the ‘Sermons’ page. The monologue can be instantly changed to dialogue by anyone who chooses to comment, but that is just a standing option. More important is my continuing quest for the meaning of my faith, and my willingness to share the journey with any who choose to join me.
  
• Until next time…….Shalom!
  

Volume 3 Issue 19

• We shall have to repent in this generation, not so much for the evil deeds of the wicked people, but for the appalling silence of the good people. –Martin Luther King, Jr.
  
• Before God can deliver us we must undeceive ourselves. –St. Augustine of Hippo
  
• O how much self-discipline, nobility of soul, lofty sentiments, we can treat ourselves to, when we are well and everything we touch prospers—Cheap: scarcely better than believing success is the reward of virtue. –Dag Hammarskjold
  
• Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate. –Dietrich Bonhoeffer
  
• We Americans live in a country that consumes an enormous and disproportionate amount of the world’s resources. We live under an administration that subordinates human rights abroad to American economic interests. We waste billions of dollars creating weapons of nuclear destruction while millions of humans starve. For the contemporary Christian, one crucial test of moral and religious conversion must remain the ability to name these forces as antichrist; for the Christian convert who refuses to confront the principalities and powers of this world and summon them to repentance and to the obedience of faith succumbs to hypocrisy and inauthenticity. –Donald L. Gelpi
  
• Genuine evangelism will spark repentance not only for our personal histories but also for our collective histories….To convert to Jesus Christ is to rise above both personal ego and cultural blindness. –Jim Wallis
  
• The prophets called Israel to repent,…They sought to transform their social world so that the future would be different: “Seek the Lord and live! Seek good, and not evil that you may live!” (Amos 5:6, 14-15) The purpose of the prophets was not to reveal the future, but to change it. The crisis announced by the pre-destruction prophets thus had both present and future dimensions. The future crisis was the threatened end of society, and the present crisis was the need to change the state of affairs that was leading to the catastrophe before it was too late. –Marcus J. Borg
  
• It is time to break the silence. The profound disillusionment caused by the return of the Bush administration to four more years in the White House has numbed me. Mary and I have been contemplating the heretofore unthinkable: leaving the country. While not having yet ruled that possibility out, its escapist implications have been sobering to the point that we are obliged to conscientiously exhaust all of the alternatives. Lent 2005 is the most appropriate time for such a process.
  
• Lent is a uniquely Christian observance, although this doesn’t mean that it is without it corollaries in the world’s other faith traditions. Self-denial and penitence are the prescribed methods for making the forty day journey (not counting Sundays) leading to the events of Holy Week that culminate in the Resurrection. How this tradition has been perverted and trivialized will be painfully obvious in the Mardi Gras revels this coming Tuesday as nominal Christians around the globe prepare to have their foreheads imposed with Wednesday’s ashes as a sign that the attempt to give up chocolate may last until the orgiastic beheading of confectionary bunnies on Easter morning.
  
• I am going to make a concerted effort to observe a more faithful and meaningful Lenten season this year. I am suffering from extreme disappointment and painful feelings of betrayal, and I need to find out for myself if there really is life beyond this grave in which I find myself. In the spirit of responsibly answering the call to which I am ordained, I am choosing to share my journey with all who care to join me. Starting Ash Wednesday I will post a brief Lenten devotional each day on the “Sermons” page until Easter. This cyber-ministry began as “Easter and Beyond” but will for the present focus its attention on just making it to Easter. If successful, then it will perhaps be appropriate to again consider the beyond.
  
• Until next time…….Shalom!