Readings: Exodus 34, 4-9; Psalm, Daniel 3, 52-55; 2 Corinthians 13, 11-13; John 3, 16-18.

The Trinity: First proclaimed as a dogma in 350, Council of Nice, France.  Church leaders were influenced by 1) reflecting back on biblical passages that identified God sources, e.g., Jesus & Holy Spirit; 2) Babylonian, Egyptian, and Greek philosophy (e.g., Plato) which believed in a plurality of gods and an afterlife.

Exodus: The second book of the O.T. & the Hebrew Torah (1st 5 books).  Basically the story of Moses leading the Hebrews out of Egypt, where they had gone because of drought generations earlier.  Today’s metaphorical passage tells of how Moses got a second set of the 10 Commandments after he broke the first set in anger at the people.  The people are in the desert.  We will read all the first 9 verses.

Already Condemned?

Last week a good friend of mine called up and said, "Stack, are all non-Catholics going to hell?"  Seems like she had been talking with a friend of hers about an acquaintance who was not Catholic.  The person said that all people who do not believe in Jesus are condemned.  Catholics hold that all who are not Catholic are condemned.  Right?

My friend who has been a lifelong Catholic said that she had heard this a long time ago, but did not think anyone really believed it anymore. 

"No," I responded, "It is not true."  Even though we have today’s Gospel telling us so, that "whoever does not believe has already been condemned."  How do you reconcile this?

Two observations.  First is about the nature of Scripture.  Second is about passages that are more inclusive.

First, the Bible.  We have an example in John’s passage today of the danger of taking one line or event literally.  If you take the Bible literally you parents have the justification to kill your son or daughter who is disobedient.  Slavery should still exist.  You should pluck out your eye if it is a source of temptation to you.  With that we would all be blind from adolescence.  This, along with much more like it, is in our Bible.

So much of the Old Testament is legend, but legend intended to convey the writer’s moral lesson.  Like today’s story of Moses & the 10 Commandments.  Legend.  Moses supposedly lived at least 300 years before the events recounted here were written down.  300 years of oral passing on.   Could you write a history of, say, the Revolutionary War or even the Civil War?

The lesson is: don’t take literally every sentence in the Bible. 

At the same time, and this is the second point, there are some lines that are terrific, like the line in Exodus today about the Lord being gracious & merciful, patient & kind.  As many of you know, this is one of my most favorite lines.  The line shows up at least 3-5 other times in the Scriptures.

So do we pick and choose the lines we like in the Bible?  Yes, I think so, using common sense and our experience.  Otherwise we are like dumb sheep.  Finally, putting together our experience of living and identifying lines in Scripture that we find helpful, we put together our own personal image of our God.  Is that God gracious & merciful, patient & loving, or condemning?  For me it is definitely the former.

What do you think?  Is God condemning people?  Or is our God gracious & merciful, patient & loving?

AUDIO: http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2008-05-18.mp3   

Welcome Home, Alison & John.

Readings:

Proverbs 31, 10-13, 19-20, 30-31,   When one finds a worthy wife, her value is far beyond pearls.

Psalm 128,  Blessed are those who fear the Lord.  (No!)

1 Thessalonians 5, 1-6,  The Lord will come like a thief at night.  (No!)

Matthew 25, 1-13,  The parable of the man going on a journey and leaving talents with his servants

Says Rocco, "Good Morning, Everybody, welcome in."

Observation on the  psalm response and Thessalonians

Could there not be a better way to establish a relationship with the Lord than FEAR?  Like maybe LOVE?!

Wake up, Buddy.  Mike is coming on and he will fascinate you.

In honor of Thanksgiving we have invited Mike Kuklenski to share his experiences in Viet Nam and since.   

Nearly 50 years after Vietnam, a combat hero struggles to understand his war

The Link:

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/news/2017/11/11/fifty-years-vietnam-combat-hero-struggles-understand-war

Mike Kuklenski sharing his experiences in Viet Nam.

Mike, a ''67 graduate of Jesuit , was awarded two Purple Hearts and a Silver Star for his heroic time as a conscientious objector and corpsman (medic).

The Team.

The marvelous Music Team.

Readings: 

Isaiah 11, 1-10, The wolf shall be a guest of the lamb.  A beautiful dream of peace by someone who lived centuries ago and dreamed.

Psalm 72,  Justice shall flourish in his time and fullness of peace forever.

Romans 15, 4-9,  Welcome one another.

Matthew  3, 1-12, I am baptizing you with water.

Apologies, Everyone. Because of the dangerously icy roads and sidewalks, we canceled our Sunday Celebration. 

Rita Dore's house on Brentwood in Plano.

Next Sunday, December 15:

1.    Bring items from this Sunday for Samaritan Inn, e.g., toilet paper and paper products. and many more listed on our Advent handout.

2.    Bring items for the Dallas Rape Crisis Center, e.g., womens' needs and office supplies, and more listed on the Advent handout.

3.    We will celebrate our Advent Penitential Rite after the Our Father.

4.    We will celebrate our 9th Anniversary & Christmas Brunch.

That is ice on the ground, not just snow.

Readings:  Ezekiel 2, 2-5; Psalm 123, Our eyes are fixed on the Lord, pleading for his Mercy; 2 Corinthians 12, 7-10; Mark 6, 1-6. 

Introduction & Homily by Tony O'Donovan:

Ezekiel 2:2-5; the prophet wrote at a very traumatic time for the Jews.  In 595BCE the Babylonians had destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple!  The people were carried off into exile.  Their whole understanding of this event was punishment for their behavior.  The style of the book is what is described as Apocalyptic. Other books in this style are Daniel and Revelations in the New Testament.  Characteristic of this style is strange visions and prophesies about the future.  Ezekiel himself has been described as a strange one!

2 Corinthians 12:7-10 Paul’s Second Letter to the community in Corinth.  In fact scholarship today is pretty much in agreement that what we have in first and second Corinthians are parts from four letters.  In the section today we have Paul what I would call ‘ranting’ about himself.

Mark 6:1-6:  Today’s gospel reading is early in Mark.  You will recall that last Sunday we had several miracles attributed to Jesus.  This Sunday we find Jesus showing up at home in Nazareth, and the people are unable to see him as anything but a carpenter.

How is your Eyesight!!

Today’s gospel strongly suggests that we take a moment to examine our eyesight!  In the gospel we find a whole town with poor eyesight.  They can only see Jesus as one of their own, a carpenter, and not as Mark has been presenting him, the Son of God. 

It becomes too easy for us to fall into traps about how we see people in our daily lives, and of course depending on how we see them affects how we treat them.

My mother used to have a saying about people, and I think she sometimes applied it to me.  “I was a house devil and a street angel”.  It can happen too easily.  We treat those closest to us perhaps not as well as we should, we take them for granted.  We go deaf to the things they say to us, and eventually the relationship becomes stale or worse, dead.  I guess another way of saying it is that “familiarity breeds contempt”.

Audio: Sorry, on vacation this week.

Picture 1  Mass with Tony concelebrating and T.J. helping

Picture 2:  Altar Servers

Picture 3: Tony celebrating after 33 years

Picture 4:  Tony receiving the community's blessing read by Rosemary with support from Reilly, Richard, Maureen, Ryan (hidden), and Ginny

Sunday, 12-26-10, Holy Family: Sirach 3, 2-14; Psalm 128, Blessed are Those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways; Colossians 3, 12-21; Matthew 2, 13-23.

Intro to readings

 We could easily believe that political correctness is a recent development, but I want to show you how it existed in the first century of the Church. 

 Our second reading today from the letter to the Colossians is a great example of “spin”.  Lets take a moment to consider the setting. 

 There are 13 letters which have Paul’s name associated with them.  Modern scripture scholarship has determined that seven are indeed written by Paul, there are three, which he definitely did not write, and there are three where there is doubt about his authorship. 

 Understand that when Paul wrote for instance to the Romans, he was writing to a small Christian community within Rome, something not unlike our little community here.  Society in the Roman Empire at that time was strongly patriarchal, namely it all centered on the man! Women, children and slaves were considered similar to possessions, namely they had no rights! 

 Now the extraordinary thing about Paul’s preaching was that he saw all people, by virtue of their baptism being equal, all belonging to the body of Christ.  Recall one of his familiar lines: “in Christ all are equal, there is no male or female, no slave or free”.  

 In the first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 7 we meet the “radicalism of Christianity”, – just as Jesus shocked the authorities by dining with sinners, Paul sees all as God’s children and equal.  So in his letter to the Corinthians he says husbands and wives are equal.  He is very careful to make sure that both have the same rights – they are equal! 

 Now take a look at the extended section of today’s second reading and we will see the spin put there by someone after Paul’s death.  In an attempt to make Christianity “fit” better into Roman society we have the phrase ‘wives be submissive to your husbands’.  Paul would have never said such a thing!  Yet he gets the blame for it today!! 

Feast of the Holy Family – Homily

 Today we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family, that of Joseph and Mary and the child Jesus, whose birth we celebrated yesterday.  I would like to reflect a little on the images we have of the Holy Family and how we are part of that family by our Baptism. 

 In the gospel we read today, this family experienced what many families today have to go through, namely living in a strange land.  Matthew doesn’t tell us how things were for them in Egypt, but at least they stayed there a few years, they were not killed.  When they returned, it was to settle in a different region, to Nazareth.

 Thanks to a global economy, unlawful governments, wars, or the plague of drugs, many people today are forced to move, either within their own country or to foreign lands.  They come as strangers into our midst.  But we don’t have to be from somewhere else to feel like a stranger.  Sometimes due to misunderstandings, or fear or hurts we can just as easily feel like a stranger in our own family.

 The Feast of the Holy Family gives us time to reflect on our actions.  By our baptism we are part of that Holy Family.  Jesus is our brother. 

 The challenge, which the gospel puts before us today as Christians, is how well do we welcome our brothers and sisters.  Remember the words of Jesus, when I was hungry, or lonely or sick, you did it to me.  Out of fear we too quickly can build walls to keep others out, either out of our country, or out of our lives.

 At St Vines, we do reach out.  Over the past year we certainly have helped the sick, through our participation both by volunteering and financial aid to the CCAC.  We have served meals at Thanksgiving; we have helped build the houses with Habitat for Humanity, given toys to kids who might otherwise not have them, and food to the Food Pantry.  These are great things and we need to continue to do them.  But we can too easily miss opportunities to tear down walls within our own family.

 As we begin a New Year, a time when we make all kinds of resolutions to do better, lets not forget to see how we may become more conscious of the Family of God and those who are lonely, from another place, struggling. 

Picture 1:    Jack

Picture 2:    Ryan with cookie

Picture 3:    The Reads, Teresa, Taylor, Doug, & Zack

Picture 4:    Emma, one of the 5 Bambini

 Picture 5:    Santa arrives

Picture 6:    All the Good Kids awaiting Santa 

Readings:

Acts 6, 1-7,   The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased greatly.

Psalm 33,  Lord, let your mercy be on us, as we place our trust in you.

1 Peter  2, 4-9,  You are a chosen race.

John  14, 1-12,  Do not let your hearts be troubled.

Buddy says, "Welcome, Everybody."

Observations on Acts:

What : The second half of Luke’s work, the first part being his gospel.  Acts starts after the Resurrection.  We will read Acts all through May and read the last selection June 1, then June 7, Pentecost.  The work focuses on the spread of the early church with special attention given to Peter and Paul and their conflicts over who was to be a Christian, and Jewish laws, like circumcision.  The conversion of Paul is described.

Cole says, "Come in, Folks, you are welcome."

Who: Luke, an educated and civilized Jew who wrote in Greek.

Date:  around the year 65, or about 30 years after Jesus’ death.

Our Selection:  growing pains in the early community.

Watch for two special lines in today's readings.  "Do not let your hearts be troubled" and "You are a chosen race."  They are not in Acts.   I want to talk about these lines.

Cole lighting the Easter Candle

Do not let your heart be troubled.  You are a chosen.

I would like to talk this morning about those two lines I mentioned.  “Do not let your hearts be troubled” and, “You are a chosen race.”   I have two propositions.

1.  You and I are the chosen race.  

2.  Everyone, all humans are the chosen race, even those hurting and doing mean things.  

I have seen this.  You have seen this.  Simple things, things we don’t even take account of at the moment.  They come up when we reflect on the blessings of our day or when we take a moment to contemplate.  Here are three little vignettes about people who are chosen, just like you.

Cole says, Hey, somebody just swiped my new hat."

Recently Rosemary, Aviana, and I went for an evening walk on a new stretch of bike trail.  It is a northern extension of the White Rock Creek Trail, our favorite.  It starts at the Hillcrest & Valley View parking lot, goes west under the Hillcrest bridge, takes a right, and follows the White Rock Creek north up to Spring Valley, running behind the large Greek Orthodox Church on Hillcrest.  It will be a delightful trail when it gets finished.

Want to see a picture of trouble, Gil and Sir Charlie.

The evening was one of the few warm ones we had this spring and the trail was longer than we expected.  By the time we got back to the car, Aviana was gassed and thirsty.  We had no water.  We looked in the park.  The water hydrants were turned off for the winter.   

I went off to check some other hydrants.  Rosemary & Aviana stayed near the first hydrant and near the car.  Families and kids were everywhere having picnics and playing. 

Suddenly a Hispanic man came out of the crowd and offered Rosemary a bottle of water for Aviana. 

Offertory, Mike and Judy, Bill and Jerry

This past week our across the street neighbor, Joyce, who is 85, full of life, and whom we visit every day, Joyce goes to Walgreens.  She is checking out and tries to pull her credit card out.  It came out, but with it are all her other cards. 

The cashier tries to help her stick them back in her bag.  Without knowing it, Joyce drops a few of the cards on the floor, one of which is her Chase Bank card.  She pays and leaves.

Cupcakes of The Week to Fred, Doug, Monica and Richard, Cole and Hue.

She crosses the parking lot and is approaching her car.  Suddenly from behind she hears a man saying, “Ma’am, ma’am.”  She turns around and a tall black man is coming toward her.  He is bringing her dropped cards to her, including the Chase card.  He gives them to her and even refuses to take a cash reward she offers.

The third vignette took place in Strasbourg, France, another French story, again in a little grocery shop, again at the checkout counter. 

Rob & Beth, "Who made that noise??"

This time Rosemary & I are approaching the counter with maybe 2 or 3 items.  We arrive a step behind a little French lady with a cart partially loaded.  She does not push on ahead of us.  Instead, she smiles at us and invites us to go first. 

I am touched by all three of these events.  They take place every day and everywhere.  We live with a chosen race.  Don’t let your heart be  troubled, because you are part of the chosen.

Where and when do you see this?

Shonda, singing God Bless America at The Ballpark in Arlington this afternoon, sees herself on the jumbo screen.