Perhaps more than any other person we have canonized, Johnny Cash exemplifies what we mean by saint. Not that he was a pure, moral, and good person; he was not. But integral to sainthood is the hagiography, the story of the saint that we tell. We know they are not entirely true, but we tell them because we are really …
Undone by Love: The Redoing (Program)
This is from a couple of weeks ago. (Still catching up from vacation and the beginning of school.) For this service, we broke up into small groups. A portion of our “Prayers of the People” from the series was read followed by a moment of silent reflection and then some discussion questions. At the end of the service, participants were …
Undone by Love: The Redoing
Before I moved to Dallas, I was a manager in the Information Systems department of a medium-sized company that owned funeral homes and cemeteries. Yes, even funeral homes have information systems. And, yes, I was a nerd. The part of my job that I liked the most was facilitating groups of people in a software design process. I got to …
Undone by Love: The Other (Program and Sermon)
Program Jann’s Opening Both my parents were preachers, but only one was ordained. I grew up in a small town in Louisiana in the 1950s and 60s. It was in a time in the South when water fountains were labeled “colored” and “white,” and we didn’t know gays and lesbians existed. My father almost lost his job as pastor of …
Undone by Love: The Other
Before Church in the Cliff opened, Lisa and I went to Cathedral of Hope a few times. One time, during the passing of the peace, I turned and encountered a transgender person. I was taken aback. My mind couldn’t register him or her. I didn’t even know what pronouns to use. Then I had an epiphany: God is like that. …
Undone by Love: The Neighbor
(Note: This was from last week. The web site was down and this could not be posted.) There are two streets that run on parallel tracks through North Oak Cliff, the neighborhood where Church in the Cliff and many of its people reside. When I drive down Jefferson Boulevard, I feel like I should have hired a translator for the …
Undone by Love: The Alien (Program and Sermon)
Program Scriptures An Immigrant’s Prayer by Remigio Hernandez Sermon I know we’re always looking for ways to annoy our fundamentalist friends and family, so here’s something: the exodus, the central narrative of the Jewish tradition and the paradigm for the Christian journey, didn’t really happen. It’s true. There’s a pretty substantial archaeological record from the period it would have happened, …
Undone by Love: The Alien
Last week we talked about the earth as neighbor, one who shows us compassion. She provides the possibility of life, so it seems a peculiar act of violence to carve her up like the concubine at Gibeah (Judges 19). We imagine ourselves as God separating the light from the dark. In a tragically misguided sense, that is exactly what we …
Undone by Love: The Earth (Program and Sermon)
Program Genny’s Introduction The journey of becoming an ecotheologian of sorts began for me through caring about people: I have a distinct memory from my first semester of coursework at Brite, where I was reading a text by Eleazar Fernandez where he asks the question: What does it mean to have hearts as large as the world? I was already …
Undone by Love: The Earth
It seems that as I think about this series more and more, I keep circling back to the question asked in the Luke 10 version of the greatest commandment story: “Who is my neighbor?” It’s a reasonable question. If we are to love our neighbor, surely we should know who that is. The answer, presented in the parable of the …
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