With the homespun wisdom of all proverbs our first reading gets it about right: give us neither poverty nor riches. Feed us too well and we’ll forget the God at whose table we are fed. Starve us and we’ll turn to crime. Set us, O God, on the proverbial middle way and we’ll do the …
Category Archives: Berkeley
Sunday Week 24 Year C
Are you sitting comfortably? … Then I’ll begin. Once upon a time in a land far, far away there was a large and prosperous country proud of its favour in the sight of God. And that country had a monarch, large and prosperous, proud of her favour in the sight of God—so proud in fact …
Sunday Week 22 Year C
“Get off my plane!” growls Harrison Ford, the President of this Great Nation, as he finally throws the last highjacker off Air Force One to plummet to his death. “Get off my plane!” and the audience roars with well-deserved, tension-releasing, self-congratulating, patriotic laughter. “Yes!” Right has triumphed. Goodness has prevailed. And our president is a …
Sunday Week 17 Year C
Since prayer is, perhaps above all, about honesty I need to be honest with you this morning. I find myself right now at a low ebb in the tide of my life. It’s all focused on my dissertation writing which seems to be going nowhere. I can’t bring myself to do what I need to …
Sunday Week 16 Year C
Last week at our Lectors’ meeting this gospel passage stirred up a storm of indignation. Nearly everyone wanted to rush to Martha’s defense. Wanted to defend her against Jesus. Didn’t he now how elder sisters, eldest children in general, are put upon, have always had to be responsible, been forced to take care of things …
Sunday Week 15 Year C
But what is a neighbour? It’s one of those funny words that mark the difference between England and America. For a start, one of us spells it wrong! But the contrast goes deeper: I remember wondering when I came here what neighbourhoods where. In England we just have districts or places but Americans have neighbourhoods. …
Sunday of Corpus Christi
I have a burning question this morning … what happened to those twelve baskets of leftovers? What did the disciples do with all that half chewed bread and fish? Haven’t you ever wondered? The gospel writers are so delighted with the excess but they never spare a word about where it went. Did the Twelve …
Trinity Sunday
Why on earth do we celebrate this awkward feast right here, right now, when we are still reeling from Pentecost, still wondering how to put our feet down into ordinary time and get on with the brisk business of living? Why distract our attention from the here and now with this feast of the where …
Pentecost Sunday
Is school over yet? I ask because I want to start with a quiz, a tough one: what phrase appears on every American coin but on no American bank note? … It’s OK you’re allowed to cheat … … … “E pluribus unum.” Any of you know what that means? … It’s Latin: “Out of …
Sunday Week 5 of Easter Year C
How many times this week have I heard the groan of guilt and the in-drawn breath of panic as someone else has realised that Mother’s Day was coming? And the groans got louder and the panic sharper as the week wore on. I hope all you mothers out there are satisfied with all the guilt …