…while they are “near and dear to people’s hearts, the majority are worth less than $50 and some a good deal less.” In a career spanning three decades, the most expensive Bible she recalls sold for $1,200 and it was a very unusual volume. Such Bibles make the news but are a rarity.
[Haines] had the courage of his convictions and a passion for justice. He will be remembered also for his openness toward and support for the participation of gay and lesbian persons in the ranks of ordained persons. Behind the scenes he displayed a wonderful sense of humor and a lively, almost mischievous side that was evidenced in a twinkle in his eyes.
“I didn’t choose to be homeless. It just happened. I wish there were more resources out there to help us. It’s very hard out there to start over.”
Updated Wednesday morning The Lodi News reports on the upcoming Convention of the Diocese of San Joaquin. The Rt Rev. Jerry Lamb will be confirmed
Easter is not all about going to heaven. Still less some nasty death cult where a blood sacrifice must be paid to appease an angry God. The crucifixion reveals human death-dealing at its worst. In contrast, the resurrection offers a new start, the foundation of a very different sort of community that refuses the logic of scapegoating.
As the toll [reached] 4,000, Wainwright and hundreds of other military chaplains in Iraq and across America wrestled with hard questions constantly. These are the men and women who pray with the mortally wounded, who administer last rites on bomb-scarred roads, who sit at kitchen tables with grieving families back home
Yes, life is important – supremely so – whether one believes in Jesus Christ or not. For those of us who do, it is even more important that we make sure not to see life as the same as God or in the place of God. For those of us who believe, life is not God, but rather the gift of God. Life is not in the place of God, but is rather the place where God pours out his love most fully and completely.
For Paul the Resurrection was no metaphor; it was the power of God. And when he spoke of Jesus as raised from the dead, he meant Jesus alive and at large in the world not as some shimmering ideal of human goodness or the achieving power of hopeful thought but as the very power of life itself. If the life that was in Jesus died on the cross;