The Law and the Land … that’s the strange link that’s forged all through this part of Deuteronomy. The Law and the Land. The Law is given for the sake of the Land. So that the people might enter the land of promise and live there. The Land is given for the sake of the …
Yearly Archives: 2005
Saturday Week 2 of Lent
Once upon a time … yep, this is one of those homilies … once upon a time, in a land far, far away there was a great country full of pride in its past glories. And that country had a great monarch, proud and righteous, clever in his alliances and bold in waging war on …
Saturday Week 1 of Lent
Both our readings impose exacting standards of behaviour: Deuteronomy says we must observe all those laws and customs and observe them with all our heart and observe them with all our soul; Matthew, in turn, will be happy if we are simply perfect. They both set the bar pretty high. Impossibly high. And Deuteronomy is …
Tuesday Week 5 Year I
This, our second instalment from the drama of Genesis, continues the pattern from yesterday—out of chaos, the imposition of order—layer by layer, species after species, goodness upon goodness—in a mounting crescendo of creation culminating, of course, in humans like ourselves—woman and man shining in God’s own image. Everything is in its place, everything is connected, …
Sunday Week 5 Year A
We used to say salt was a good thing—now we just reckon it raises our blood-pressure. Once packaged foods delighted in their saltiness — now they vie for the label “low Sodium.” Like “no fat” and “caffeine free” what we once sought out for pleasure, we now avoid for long life. Salt used to be …
Monday Week 4 Year I
It’s quite a stirring list—all those heroes of faith and all the trials they encountered. Weak people, it says, who were given strength. And such a lot of strength to face all the hardship the reading piles up, line after line. So much so that it’s quite a shock to get to the last sentence—for …
Sunday Week 3 Year A
I’ve caught myself several times in the last few days walking a particular way with these readings. That echo between Isaiah and Matthew has me wondering, wondering about the people who walked in darkness, wondering about the darkness, about the yoke, the bar across the shoulder, the rod of the oppressor. God knows there’s enough …
Thursday Week 2 Year I
‘To suit us’, says the author of Hebrews, ‘to suit us, the ideal high priest would have to be holy, innocent and uncontaminated, beyond the influence of sinners, and raised up above the heavens’. To suit us. … I wonder. I wonder if that’s what I want, who I want. Don’t I want someone a …
Wednesday Week 1 Year I
These are very earthy readings, very ‘bodied’ readings: Jesus, flesh of our flesh, touching, holding, healing; his flesh lifting up our own. And, the way Hebrews puts it, sharing our same flesh and blood so that his death could take away our death. This is a God who completely identifies with us, is us, right …
January 7th
To tell you the truth I’ll be glad when Christmastide is over and we can have 12 month’s break from John’s letters. There’s good stuff, I know—God is Love, for example—but every year they strike me as just a touch too cult-ish for my taste: a little sectarian; a lot defensive. Nearly every reading has …