Remember that resurrection is more than mere resuscitation! It is life transformed! It is faith in possibilities, when others are convinced of inevitability.

  Mary Magdalene was the first person, male or female, to witness the empty tomb…the first to see angels who reported the resurrection…the

Reinhold Niebuhr's brother, H. Richard, argued for faithfulness to the example of Jesus's nonviolence, while Reinhold believed this was naive and unrealistic in an imperfect world. H. Richard was the purist to the Christian faith, believing that following the Golden Rule, no matter the consequences, is what Jesus and God called us to do -- the success of the mission being in God's hands rather than our own. Reinhold, however, looked at the more practical side of things, substituting his or the world's idea of what was possible and changing his ethics accordingly. H. Richard thus trusted more in the providential moral arc of history as M.L. King, Jr. , would call it rather than a realist's version of what humans believe is attainable given their corrupt nature. In essence, H. Richard focused on the power of God's grace to transform our spirits and the world for the better, while Reinhold accepted a more cynical view of our ability to be radically changed as a specie.

I recently heard a Christmas Eve sermon titled “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” recited entirely in rhymed couplets and delivered without a manuscript. Running for nearly eleven minutes, it was quite a remarkable feat.

Can a living, vital and real faith that is true to the experience of the past, while dismissing the explanations of the past, be born anew in this generation? I believe it can and so to engage this task I issue this call to the Christian world to transform its holy words of yesterday into believable words of today. If we fail in this task there is little reason to think that Christianity, as presently understood and constituted, will survive this century.

What went wrong? Oh, what went wrong? I sought to be humble But boasted

Before we start, we all will exit outside to the labyrinth and begin our silence. Walk the labyrinth to the center and back out while meditating on quieting and listening to the Divine within.

THEME The Vision that Transforms THOUGHTS FOR REFLECTION 1. To see Christ in another human being is illumination. To see Christ in all human beings is transfiguration.