Do You See What I See?

Do you know that there are over 300 hymns in Voices United that deal in some way with ‘seeing.’ And they usually have nothing to do with actual physical sight. And neither does the gospel reading this morning. In Mark’s gospel, ‘seeing’ is a metaphor for faith in Jesus. In fact, it is the first time in Mark’s…

One Can At a Time

With an election set for tomorrow and the Blue Jays in the playoffs, World Food Day isn’t getting much press! And yet, is there anything more basic than food? Perhaps water, but that’s about it. Did you know that food insecurity rates in Nova Scotia and Halifax are the worst in Canada? In a report, published a couple…

Down and Dirty!

Gardeners look at dirt in an entirely different way than non-gardeners don’t they? I can say that because, as a former non-gardener, I really didn’t pay too much attention to the ground beneath my feet. Sure, I had houseplants, whose soil came from a bag, but despite having grown up with parents who gardened, I never paid…

Love, Poured Out

I am yet another one of those unnamed women in Holy Scripture… Women who played significant parts in our holy stories… but not thought important enough to be named… You people get angry if your name is misspelled in your papers… imagine not being named at all… just ‘a woman…’ Some scholars have thought I was Mary of…

Welcome Home!

You don’t hear of me in that story that was just read did you? I am Lydia, the mother of those two boys. Those two very different boys… Nathaniel the eldest and Zachary, the child of our old age… And of course, I am a wife, Simon’s wife… I want to tell you a little bit more of…

Hospitality AND Discipleship

  I have come to believe that one of the most important words in life, including the life of the church is AND. For me it means that instead of separating things into distinct components, thereby reducing them, ‘and’ implies expanding, including and hospitality. For instance, we might disagree on some things regarding our image of God…

That’s Not in My Job Description!

In order to make sense of the story I just read, you need to have a bit of background. Jesus is taking some time away; he is tired from the demands being made upon him. He was in Tyre, which was an ancient seaport of Phoenicia: one of the great cities of antiquity, famous of its…

Snakes and Ladders

  When you think of the Adam and Eve story, what is the first thing that pops into your mind? Did you notice that there is not a single mention of an apple? And yet, I bet that image is imbedded in our minds. Whether or not we believe that the story of Adam and Eve in…

A Woman’s Place?

  As a young woman and mother I was careful to raise my son to be both nurturing and adventurous. He got dolls as well as trucks. He wore the rainbow of colours, not just ‘boys’ colours. His father shared equally in household chores and childcare. This was the mid-seventies; the woman’s movement had inspired me to dream of…