By John Snyder (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

Series Introduction

Starting this week and continuing for the next four weeks of Lent, we’re going to take an in-depth look at the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper (a.k.a. Eucharist, Holy Communion, etc.). It has been the practice of this church for the past several years to celebrate the Eucharist weekly during the season of Lent or Easter. This year, the elders of our church have agreed to extend that practice beyond just one liturgical season. The one thing the elders asked of me is that I not let it become rote, routine, and empty of meaning. The main way I want to grant that request is by making these five weeks, as we prepare for Easter, into an extended meditation on the many levels of meaning we find in this most central ritual of the Christian faith.

We’re starting…

From a sermon by Meister Eckhart (c. 1260-1327)

Reblogged from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL):

Just as a spring, which perpetually flows and waters the roots of the flowers, so that the flowers bloom and receive their colours from the water of the spring, so the Godhead imparts Itself to the capacities of the soul that it may grow in the likeness of God. The more that the soul receives of the Divine Nature, the more it grows like It, and the closer becomes its union with God. It may arrive at such an intimate union that God at last draws it to Himself altogether, so that there is no distinction left, in the soul’s consciousness, between itself and God, though God still regards it as a creature.

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By File photo, Canwest News Service [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons  By Monica A. Coleman

Reblogged from Real Spirituality for Real Life:

Theologians Charles Hartshorne, Sallie McFague and Carol P. Christ all discuss how important it is to think of the earth as the body of God. Humanity and the rest of the created world can think of themselves as living on, or more aptly, within God’s body. Such thinking, they assert, can lead us to greater reverence of the earth. After all, if we care about God, we would care about God’s body and treating it well. We would take better care of our natural environment.

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By Francois Polito (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons Reblogged from Sojourners:

Two boys — among others — have been killed and their families ripped apart by gun violence. The law that is meant to protect fails them. Not only do Stand Your Ground laws institutionally legitimize racism by mostly white men carried out against mostly black men, instead of reconciliation and peace, gun violence and racial fears are allowed to win the day. Where just laws were meant to preserve the common good, unjust laws like Stand Your Ground excuse us from living out our best values. It is time to make that clear from our pulpits, starting in Florida.

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Book of Kells, Folio 32v, Christ Enthroned. This image is in the public domain, according to Wikimedia Commons

 Excerpt from the Acknowledgement page of Christ In Evolution by Ilia Delio, OSF.

Sister Ilia gives voice to the question that rose up in my heart during the most recent battle of the creation-evolution debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham:

For a number of years I have been teaching courses in Christian spirituality and I am repeatedly impressed how the mature Christian mystic almost always arrives at a profound experience of Christ in the universe. Through the mystics I have discovered a new way of doing Christology that differs from the analytical and philosophical approach of contemporary systematic theology.  This book is born out of a theological questions clothed in a mystical garment, namely, what is the meaning of Christ for us today?

Our world today, marked by global consciousness and…

By Макаров (http://ru-oldrussia.livejournal.com/11583.html) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The text is Matthew 5:21-37.

Introduction

Starting at a very young age, people in our society are taught that certain answers are expected of them in certain situations.  There is a Sunday school urban legend that illustrates this point beautifully:

There was a Sunday school teacher leading a class of very young kids.  As part of her lesson one morning, she held up a picture of a squirrel and asked the kids if they knew what it was.  There was a dead silence in the room.  The teacher was puzzled.  She thought, “Surely, these kids know a squirrel when they see one!”  So she asked again.  And again, there was silence.  “Now kids,” she said, “do you mean to tell me that no one in this room knows what this is a picture of?”  Slowly and tentatively, one little boy in…

Portrait of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
By Betsy G. Reyneau National Archives and Records Administration
Donated Collections
Record Group 200 Source: [http://www.archives.gov/digital_classroom/lessons/memphis_v_mlk/images/king_portrait.gif h By Peter A. Georgescu

Reblogged from Huffington Post:

When I read “Strength to Love,” a tremendous collection of Martin Luther King Jr.’s sermons, I was surprised and moved on its last pages by this particular passage, which described God in ways that feel foreign to me. While I think of God as a kind of spiritual energy, Martin Luther King Jr. related to God as a person.

The agonizing moments through which I have passed during the last few years have drawn me closer to God. I am convinced of the reality of a personal God. True, I have always believed in the personality of God. But in the past the idea of a personal God was little more than a metaphysical category that I found…

Jacopo Amigoni [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

By Rabbi Aaron Alexander

Reblogged from Huffington Post:

It’s a stunning message. No matter how small or insignificant you may perceive yourself to be, and no matter how often others may cause you to feel this way… you matter. You are essential. You can change the world. Don’t let go until you do.

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