Season of Growth
Practice your Preaching
4 November 2017
When you are setting out on a great adventure, you want the guide who is helping you to choose all the gear, plan your route, and help you train to have hiked the same planned journey – not just watched a video about it on YouTube or Discovery Channel. All too often we have guides…
The law of life
28 October 2017
The question that Jesus is asked in the gospel today from Matthew 22 was a common one that the Rabbis of the day would be asked – “which is the greatest commandment of the Law?” Since in the first five books of the Hebrew scriptures, also called the Torah, the Rabbis had discerned a total…
Real Revolution
21 October 2017
As an Australian, we can often feel small and forgotten, because we seem to be so far away from where all the action is happening. Our population is relatively small, we don’t have a huge army, or nuclear weapons to protect our vast land area. Yet we are also one of the wealthiest nations, with…
Wedding Party
14 October 2017
Organising a party takes a lot of work. There’s the venue to be set up; the catering, entertainment and music; the invitations. If it’s a wedding then there’s all the ceremony stuff as well. When we throw a significant party, we’re happy to do lots of work and planning so that it will be a…
The Vineyard and the Stone
8 October 2017
I remember always being a little annoyed and scared by this parable. We are used to Jesus talking about the landowner as God, his Father. But as the story goes on and the wickedness of the tenant farmers becomes clearer, I want to shout out to the landowner – no! Don’t send your son. They…
Doing the question
30 September 2017
After Jesus had made his triumphant entry into Jerusalem at the start of chapter 21 of Matthew’s gospel, the question that everyone was wondering was – is he the one? Is he the long awaited anointed king, the one the Jewish people and leaders called the Messiah? So, Jesus tells a parable to the religious…
God is Generous
23 September 2017
“My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts” says the Lord in the first reading. Which is such good news when I’m having a bad day and my thoughts are all over the place! This truth is so central to getting our heads around this gospel today. Our deeply ingrained sense of justice kicks in, and…
Reconciliation Flow
17 September 2017
Peter asks a very valid question today: “How many times must I forgive a sister or brother (who has not even necessarily repented or asked for forgiveness) – as many as seven times?” He points to the reality that forgiving someone is not easy. It is one thing to forgive a person who asks for…
Learning to forgive
10 September 2017
When you are in the middle of a fight – what do you do? Every day we see the results of not doing forgiveness and reconciliation well. On the world scale, it is the continuing threat of terrorism, wars, suicide bombs, ISIS, etc and on a more personal scale, it is seen in broken marriages…
The Cost of Discipleship
2 September 2017
Just before our Gospel today, Jesus asked the disciples who the people and then who they said he was. Simon Peter, speaking on behalf of the other disciples, declared that Jesus is not just another prophet like the crowds say he is – Jesus is the true, anointed King of Israel, and the Son of…
Who is Jesus?
26 August 2017
I bought a Google Home recently – it’s a voice operated speaker that lets you geek out to control your music, lights and find out stuff. It comes with a guide to let you know the kind of questions that you can ask it. One of the questions that it suggests is: “Hey Google, who am I?”…
The Canaanite Woman’s need
20 August 2017
This is a very difficult gospel. It is hard to listen to, and hard to pray with a gospel where Jesus appears to be so sexist and racist, especially in the light of ongoing violence in so many countries around the world, all of which is based on discrimination and hatred because of difference. We…
Walking on Water
12 August 2017
The Gospel begins with Jesus sending the disciples off in their boat, while he sends the crowds home. Just before this passage, he had heard that his friend and cousin, John, had just been executed by the ruthless tyrant Herod. He wanted some time alone. He needed some time alone. So he went off in…
Transfigured and transformed
6 August 2017
Have you ever had an experience that was so sublime, so magical, so amazing – that you struggled to share all its details even with a close friend? Maybe the event wasn’t even all that weird or far out – but all the elements came together in a way that you know that mere words…
Treasures of the Kingdom
30 July 2017
Today we conclude a three-week series of readings from the thirteenth chapter of Matthew’s gospel. This chapter is jam-packed with parables and their explanations. The section today has three short parables drawn from ordinary life – a treasure that is hidden in a field; a fine and valuable pearl that is found by a merchant,…
Growth in patience
23 July 2017
In chapter 13 of Matthew’s Gospel, we are presented with a series of 7 parables (of the 40 or so that Jesus tells during his recorded ministry) – which provokes a first question – what is a parable? For most of Christian history, parables have been treated as allegories – with many different interpretations available….
The secret of joy
1 July 2017
Discipleship, Season of Growth, Teaching, Year A
Jesus makes today a series of fairly bizarre declarations about himself and his position. He tells the disciples – who at the beginning of this chapter 10 of Matthew’s gospel are commissioned and sent out to share in his mission – that anyone who prefers ‘father or mother’; ‘son or daughter’ to me is not…
Declare before God
24 June 2017
Discipleship, Season of Growth, Solemnity, Teaching, Year A
Commitment Sunday The Gospel today invites us as a church to ‘declare ourselves before God’ as good stewards. God loves giving – he gave no lesser gift than the wonderful gift of Jesus to ensure that we are not alone in this life. We are also invited to not be afraid – the most common…
Corpus Christi – Lessons in Love
17 June 2017
Season of Growth, Solemnity, Year A
This Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ does not only draw to a conclusion this extended season of Easter Feasts – it also draws together the whole of the mystery and wonder that we have been celebrating since the beginning of Lent. The twin feasts of Trinity and Corpus Christi hang uneasily at…
Trinity Love
10 June 2017
Season of Growth, Solemnity, Year A
For God so loved the world that he sent his only Son… The famous and beautiful Gospel today (from John 3 verses 16-18) is the last part of a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, a man who is called a leading Pharisee and leader of the Jews. Even though he is a teacher of the…
Temple builders
19 February 2017
Season of Growth, Series, Year A
The first question that Paul addresses today in I Corinthians 3 is whether he in fact is the founder of Christianity. It had been commonly claimed that Jesus only ever intended to proclaim the coming of the kingdom of God by reforming Judaism, not to begin a new religion, and Paul is accused of being…
Spirit Wisdom
12 February 2017
Season of Growth, Series, Year A
Although it may seem that St Paul is having an each-way bet today, he is not. He says that although the Cross is foolishness for the wise and a stumbling block for the Jewish people, there is still a wisdom that is at work here – but it is not a wisdom that is available…
Proclaim Christ Crucified
5 February 2017
Season of Growth, Series, Year A
When pondering the nature of God, Paul could have spoken about the various ways that God had been revealed across the centuries, the different qualities of God, the effects of God, or the ways to encounter God, based on philosophy or rhetoric – common in Greek culture. Instead Paul focuses on one basic element -…
Somebody boast
29 January 2017
Season of Growth, Series, Year A
The liturgy presents us with the final section (26-31) of chapter one of First Corinthians today, which means we have jumped over verses 18-25 which provides the essential context of the passage. Paul speaks in a powerful rhetoric about the cross – ironically telling us that God will destroy the wisdom of the wise. It…
Preaching Jesus united
22 January 2017
Season of Growth, Series, Year A
Corinth was located at the end of a neck of land attaching the Peloponnese peninsula to mainland Greece and having a port facing east (Cenchreae) and another with access to the west (Lechaion), Corinth was geographically predestined to be a corridor of commerce and a potpourri of cultures. Ships could be hauled across the isthmus on chariots on the 6km paved…
Grace and Peace in Corinth
15 January 2017
Season of Growth, Series, Year A
Each liturgical year, the second readings for the first eight weeks of the Season of the Year are taken from the first letter of St Paul to the Corinthians. In Year A we read sections from chapters 1-4; in Year B from chapters 6-10; and in Year C from chapters 12-15. The letter is also read at key points in…
Four Transcendentals: One
27 November 2016
Advent, Season of Growth, Seasons, Series, Year A
One small piece of wisdom that has come down from the ages (it was first stated in Greek philosophy, and then offered into the Christian tradition through the writings of the Eastern fathers, St Augustine, and then codified in scholastic philosophy through the writings of St Thomas Aquinas) is the Latin phrase: omne/omnia ens est…
Christ the King of mercy
20 November 2016
Season of Growth, Solemnity, Year C
Many of the parishes around our Diocese celebrate First Holy Communion on this day – which seems like a lovely idea, given the name of the Solemnity with which we conclude the liturgical year. But I am intrigued about the disjuncture between the apparent theme of the liturgy and the strong and provocative images that…
Sun and temple and Alpha
13 November 2016
As we come to the end of the liturgical year, the darker tone of the readings this week match well the international mood after the results of the presidential election in the US. The images are rich and evocative, and require us to unpack them a little. We begin with the image of the sun -…
Living Simply 4 – Today Matters
6 November 2016
Season of Growth, Series, Year C
In the Gospel today (Luke 20:27-38), a group of Sadducees (the only mention in the Gospel of Luke) come to Jesus with a question, involving a bizarre scenario about seven unfortunate brothers and their common childless wife. Although the context of the resurrection of the dead is presumed, Jesus doesn’t complete the argument, leaving it…