The Good Word

I have been musing about what it means to be beginning Ordinary Time for 2010 In one sense the term has a simple liturgical meaning Ordinary Time begins on the Monday after the Second nbsp Sunday of the Year The Baptism of the Lord There is paradoxically no first Sunday in Ordinary Time

Certainly the changing of water into wine is an astounding accomplishment its being the first miracle story told by John nbsp about the public life of Jesus shows its ability to make clear the identity of Jesus nbsp It was the first of Jesus signs and the disciples believed in him nbsp Bu

The strange thing about studying early Christianity in Turkey is that there are not a lot of Christians left in Turkey the lands that were home to so much of the earliest growth and development of Christianity and the location of all seven of the first Ecumenical Councils As we discuss how Christi

For reasons having to do with airline flights we trace the Apostle Paul s journey through Greece backwards at least Paul s first journey through Greece described in Acts which is often titled The Second Missionary Journey Acording to Acts 17 1-15 and 1 Thessalonians itself Paul was persecute

The manifestations of what God is doing for creation in Jesus continue apace suggesting that there are even more facets for exploration than we have seen to date liturgically rich though the past weeks have been The template today is complex the Isaian servant closely resembling Moses declares

We went on a tour of classical Athens today with stops at the Acropolis and the Parthenon which sits majectically upon it and the ancient Agora In between quite literally we went to the Areopagus called Mars Hill by the Romans The Areopagus associated with the Greek god of war Ares and m

I want to position my reflection between two catalysts nbsp First is Karen Armstrong rsquo s assertion that mythos or sacred narrative assists us to review and experience deeply the many facets of the human predicament notably here the choice between Good and Evil Second is the genre of imaginat

I want to wish all readers of this blog a Happy New Year I also want to let you know that I will be leaving for Greece and Turkey tomorrow with Dr Pavel Gavrilyuk and 25 students to explore the sites of ancient Christianity When able I will try to post on the sites the readings for our course

Elohim is something of a generic name for god it can be used to talk about many other gods than the God of Israel Each god had his proper name in the case of Israel that name was Yahweh nbsp When Matthew comments on the child described to Joseph by the angel of the Lord he says that this chil

One of the most important titles used to describe Jesus is King nbsp Given that Jesus and the people of the Gospels come from the culture of the Old Testament it is no surprise that when they wish to express their deepest hopes and desires they think of the greatest benefactor of their histor