Post Archives

April 3, 2014 One of the great liberation songs for African-American slaves tells the story of Mary of Bethany weeping at the death of her brother Lazarus.  “Oh Mary, Don’t You Weep” is a classic Negro spiritual that offered the hope of freedom by telling a coded story: urging Mary not to weep for her […]

  March 27, 2014 A steamroller never sounded so sweet.  Late in the afternoon today the diesel-powered piece of road equipment that I would like most to operate before meeting my maker was doing its thing on 18th Street: packing down asphalt to seal the gaping hole that has been with us for fifteen weeks.Rejoice, […]

March 20, 2014 So, the (justifiable) rap about Hanover’s pastor: he’s obsessed with sports, and especially analogies about sports and faith.  In the Lenten spirit of resisting temptation, said pastor will abstain from offering one of the many analogies begging to be unpacked with the onset of March Madness…the annual 68 team extravaganza that leads […]

March 6, 2014Last evening foreheads were smudged with ashes to mark the first of forty purple days of repentance.  Each smudge reminds its bearer of the circle of life: that “we are dust, and to dust we shall return.” One of the passages read each year on Ash Wednesday is from the sermon on the […]

February 27, 2014 This Sunday will be a carnival during and after worship!  This being that last hurrah before Lent, we will joyfully, playfully, and yet reverently, worship God in the spirit of Mardi Gras.  All are invited to don your favorite masks, beads, and bright colors. Masks will be the key.  With a mask […]

February 13, 2014 Mr. Webster says: Freedom: a) the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice of action, b) liberation from slavery or restraint or from the power of another; independence, c) the quality or state of being exempt or released from something onerous. As we continue and conclude our march of freedom through […]

February 6, 2014In the inexorable grip of heroin addiction and clinical depression, in the desperation of a failing musical career, and deep from valley of the shadow of the death by suicide of a close friend, folk singer James Taylor wrote the 1970 ballad Fire and Rain.  The second verse is an unforgettable and timeless […]

January 30, 2014 When you arrive at 18th and Baynard on Saturday morning to attend the Freedom Forum, you will cross clear, clean, and safe sidewalks because a set of hands shoveled and salted.  You will pass through doors adorned with bright fliers produced by gifted and creative minds.  Once inside you will receive a […]

January 23, 2014 This week’s offering is only secondarily a plug to read On God’s Side by Jim Wallis and come to the Brown Bag Book Club gathering this Sunday to talk more about it.  The primary point is to share a bit of Wallis’ wisdom and faith because it is absolutely timely and so […]