Prairie Musings

June 14th, 2020   Lisa and the kids make fun of me because our house is sort of like that scene in Disney’s Fantasia in the Sorcerer’s Apprentice segment, where Mickey has stolen the magician’s hat and conjured up hundreds, maybe thousands of brooms and buckets to clean up the water, and they’re everywhere, out of control, running amok—only at our house it’s not brooms—it’s my books. They’re everywhere, out of control, running amok. I love books. One of my favorites I found many years ago at a used bookstore in Iowa. It’s called Crabb’s English Synonymes , and it was first published in 1816; my copy is the “new” revised edition from 1917. This book is not exactly a dictionary and not exactly a thesaurus; its goal is to explore the subtle and sometimes very important nuanced differences in words we commonly use in a similar way. I’d like to do that sort of exploration with you now. In today’s Gospel reading from Matthew chapter 9, we hear that “when Jesus saw the crowds, he ha...

(Guest Sermon by Rev. Marisa Tabizon Thompson) Year A, Trinity Sunday June 6-7, 2020 Each year we celebrate the Holy Trinity on the weekend after Pentecost. I am going to guess that it is the least popular preaching date for everyone – ministers and those who have to listen to us as we go through a set of mental gymnastics to try and explain the unexplainable. Three in one, one in three. Each distinct yet not divisible. Et cetera. I am going to skip all the heavy theology talk this year and instead try to paint a picture of duality within myself, because while it is not the same as the Trinity, there are some visible and experiential ways to think about how three make one and one makes three. About a week ago, I had the opportunity to make a recording for one of the virtual choirs you may have seen popping up lately. Dr. Sandra Montes, a force for good in The Episcopal Church through music, academia, and more, invited people to come together to sing, “Siyahamba.” Found in...