Prairie Musings

  My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior (Luke 1:46-47). This past week, David McCain (you may know him as the parishioner who plays the chapel organ at our “regular” Saturday evening worship), dropped by the church to pick up some Bible study materials, and he shared with me a YouTube video from Southwark Cathedral in London. This video was a livestream from a few weeks ago of a memorial service for their long-time cathedral pet, Doorkins Magnificat. In this service, they prayed, “We remember that every part of creation is in the sight of God, the creator, the sustainer, the sanctifier, not just of humankind but of all that God placed in the garden of God’s delight…Creator God, not a sparrow falls to the earth without you knowing. All things reflect your glory, and all life reflects your life.” They read part of 18 th century poet Christopher Smart’s poem, “Rejoice in the Lamb” For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry. For he is the servant of the ...

Dr. Laura Scow and I have had great fun creating our Favorite Advent & Christmas Hymn Podcast series--you can find the first five episodes (we have three more to go) on the Music @AllSaints YouTube playlist . More than any other holiday, Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without its music. But silence, too, is an important part of our preparation for the celebration of the Feast of the Incarnation...silence in Advent prayer, silence away from the bustle of the world. (Perhaps one of the unexpected things you've found, as I have, about this pandemic Christmas is that it is easier to stay disconnected from the distraction and noise of our typical consumer-focused secular holiday season?) I'm reminded of one of the letters from the demon Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood in C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters, in which he describes how much he hates both music and silence: Music and silence-how I detest them both! How thankful we should be that ever since our Father...

The holidays are wonderful, joyous times—that can also be difficult and lonely. This year, especially, might be more challenging than in the past. Here are some ideas and resources to help us all share, reach out, and connect even when we can’t be together in the same place. As I think about what celebrating Thanksgiving and  Christmas will look like this year, and some of the changes and sacrifices we’ll have to make, I am reminded of our ancestors. I think about the simple family celebrations Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote about in her “Little House” books, and I wonder if this year gives us—forces us perhaps—to have a simpler holiday too. We’ve been saying to each other for a long time now that Christmas has become too commercialized and too busy—maybe we can all take a lesson from our prairie forebears! Read a book together out loud, taking turns or having grandparents read. If you haven’t read A Christmas Carol in a long time, I recommend it. It is a beautiful story was actual...

  For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance (Matt 25:29a). (Proper 28A readings here .)   Today’s sermon starts with a trivia lesson: Our English word “talent” comes to us from this parable of Jesus. In his time, a “talent” was about 75 pounds of silver. This was its only meaning until about the 14 th century. After that time, the definition slowly expanded and eventually came to mean “natural ability,” the way we use it today. This passage is clearly appointed for this last Ordinary Sunday, the Sunday before Christ the King and then Advent 1, because this is the end not just of autumn, but of “pledging season.” It’s a natural fit, don’t you think—faithful servants rewarded for investing their master’s gift and giving back double, and an unfaithful servant who does nothing and is cast away with weeping and gnashing of teeth. The typical message from this is pretty straightforward: fill out your pledge cards generously! However, I’m ...

Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full  (Matthew 14:19b-20). Scarcity. How many of you have experienced scarcity in the past four months? Did you try to buy TP, or Kleenex, or wipes, at Costco or Target or Walmart, but find empty shelves? Could you only buy one or two items of meat, because the grocery was limiting purchases? What about flour and yeast? Lucky for us, these problems were not due to major, long-term issues, but just the short-term combination of panic-buying and minor supply-chain disruptions.  Today’s Gospel reading gives us a story of abundance—the miraculous feeding of 5,000 people (many more than that, actually, as Matthew tells us only the men were included in that count). As we’ve been reading through Matthew this su...

You might think this is a strange post for a priest to write, but I think it is very important in this time of so much vitriolic rhetoric that Christians make a strong stand. The Book of James in the Bible has quite a lot to say about the power of our speech and the need for taming the tongue: If someone thinks he is religious yet does not bridle his tongue, and so deceives his heart, his religion is futile (1:26). The tongue is a small part of the body, yet it has great pretensions. Think how small a flame sets a huge forest ablaze. And the tongue is a fire! The tongue represents the world of wrongdoing among the parts of our bodies. It pollutes the entire body and sets fire to the course of human existence – and is set on fire by hell...It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse people made in God’s image. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. These things should not be so, my brothers and sisters (3:5-6, ...

“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light ” (Matthew 11:28-30). Weary…that’s a good word for what I’m feeling right now—how about you? Weary. Weary from the COVID-19 fight: weary from its social isolation, weary from the loneliness of not spending time with friends and family, weary from the worry and uncertainty and unpredictability of the spread of the disease, weary of the day-by-day grind. Weary, too, of the ever-escalating rhetoric on both sides of the political spectrum: weary of the yelling and the violence and the threats, weary by our inability to find common ground and common purpose in our lives together in community. Just…weary.  In today’s Gospel, Jesus invites us, and all who are weary and carrying heavy burdens, to come to him and find rest. Jesus offers u...