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The central focus of Jesus’ message was to announce the imminent coming of the kingdom of God. This is what he was sent to do. (Luke 4: 43-44) This kingdom would be on earth for the people of Israel. (Matthew 10: 5-8) Although Jesus gives few details on how this kingdom would operate.

When the intellectual history of the 20th century is written, a few achievements will tower overall. Einstein’s theory of general relativity will be one; the laws of quantum mechanics will be another. The Big Bang Theory of the origin of the universe will be a third.

I pray, and look to scripture, and consider our role as people on an ever-changing planet as residents in and stewards of creation.

Saint Paul is often regarded as a particularly troublesome writer for those who try to reconcile animal liberation and Christianity.

If we want peace, it has to start with us. We must uproot violence from our language, in the ways we relate to one another.

Making a difference is a deep motivation for many of us.

Global warming is the latest proof that we have crossed a boundary into a truly apocalyptic age, for we now live in a period when anthropogenic change is overpowering nature and life itself.

This week we celebrate beginning of summer (Wednesday). Let us remember how generous the universe is. For example, the sun. The entire energy of the earth runs on one billionth (!) of the energy the sun emits every day.

We are considering how Courage, like Joy, is one of the signs of holiness in our time.  In yesterday’s meditation, Martin Luther King Jr. reminded us that we “must love something more than the fear of death” if we are to live. 

The one thing that enraged most people about Jesus of Nazareth was that he had the gall to tell people that their sins were forgiven when clearly there were systems of civic and religious power that were set up to make sure people got what they deserved.

Easter, Ascension, and Pentecost do not form three seasons. The Easter season celebrates the three dimensions of the resurrection, ascension, and the sending of the Spirit.

Earlier this week, I read that Spain has ruled cigarette manufacturers responsible for the cost of cigarette butt clean-up. I was SOOOOO excited about that; completely over the top!

Dr. Martin Luther King, whose Feast Day we celebrate today, had his criticism of church and religion.

The Food Tank is INCREDIBLY excited to share with you that the Food Donation Improvement Act passed both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives and is now heading to President Biden’s desk for final approval! It is a major bipartisan accomplishment.

Here are some recent news items to which I have added a few facts that seem related. Have fun putting it all together, creating your own narrative about what it all might mean, if anything. 

Santa must evolve. He has to become more meaningful, more relevant, more present. Santa’s way of being in the world, as the children’s greatest gift-giver, needs bringing up to speed. What we need is a Santa children will want to emulate, and who can help them learn to serve the Earth as a long-term thank you for the miracle of life.

What does a Modern Christianity look like to you? Will you help build it?

Revisioning ancient faith for the modern world is not an easy task. No simple answers exist. The process will be long, complicated, conflicted, and uncertain.

Let us celebrate this wondrous thing called love.  The kind of love Jesus was talking about in his Sermon on the Mount was agape – unconditional love. 

Join Rev. Dr. Caleb J. Lines for the highlights from his Sunday service on Reproductive Rights on June 26th, 2022!

We live in a world characterised as 'fragmented'. It isn't fragmented. It's diverse. If we ecologically pattern our thinking, we reframe it, and that applies to science and scientific thinking too.

We are all part of this wonderful Cosmos, always have been and always will be.   This unknowable life-force-energy mystery, which I am comfortable calling ‘God’, has been, is, and always will be the active creative force in this changing, expanding and evolving wonderful Cosmos.  And in ME!!!

Who ever thought we would say this, but it seems to be the case that society could be collapsing before our very eyes. The common bond that forges a basis for unity is disintegrating, indicated and exemplified by the litany of headlines that continue to bombard us.

While it may look like there are individual trees in the above picture, quaking aspens grow in colonies of tens of thousands of trees, or stems, which are all connected by a single root system.

The Christian cross, taken as a modern working symbol, can also find a new role, a complementary one to its original deep association with the crucifixion. One that speaks a common language in cross-religious or interfaith contexts.

This isn’t an easy story — it is especially hard to avoid the pitfalls of any Christian preaching about the destruction of the Temple (I pray I didn’t contribute to those anti-Semitic interpretations!). But I think it is one of the most important stories in Mark, a short section of verses that help make sense of the entire gospel.

This morning, I preached at Platte Woods United Methodist Church in Kansas City. They’ve been doing a sermon and education series on Freeing Jesus - and they asked me to come and finish up their study of the book.

Many of us wrestle with fear, despair, insecurity, and loneliness in this time of sustained global crisis. I worry for the future of the human family and life itself. But these times are also an invitation.

We have a dark wicked side. It controls many of our thoughts and actions. It ensnares the smart and the dumb, the privileged and the non privileged, the healthy and the sick. In today’s world it undermines many of our economic, social, political, philosophical and religious structures.