Did you know that Lincoln s Gettysburg address was 250 words long The man before Lincoln spoke for over an hour The man who followed Lincoln spoke for even longer Today no one remembers what they said Lincoln s 2 minutes by contrast changed the USA s history and the mentality of the

This Sunday is the 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time In his reflection on this week s readings Daniel Harrington writes that Luke s journey narrative provide a framework or outline for developing a sound Christian spirituality One essential element in any variety of Christian spirituality is pra

On one level this Sunday s readings from Genesis and Luke both inculcate perseverance in prayer It is surely an important point because many people give up on prayer fairly quickly if nothing happens Abraham certainly keeps after God And to judge from Luke 11 5-8 Jesus would applaud such b

The Gospel teaching on asking with its embedded parable seems to set the tone Though I am sympathetic with the sleepy householder Ask sooner friend Ask more quietly more politely Bake your own bread I hear something quite different Ask for anything Ask importunately Ask for basics As

Some New Testament scholars use the model of a sage a novel dispenser of wisdom to explain how Jesus might have looked to his contemporaries Though the idea of Jesus as sage does not do justice to the entirety of the gospel stories it certainly fits Luke 11 9-13 On the heels of the Lord s Pra

Of the many criticisms of the work of biblical scholars the one I have most recently been attacked with is that we are not theological enough so it was with some eagerness that I agreed to review a theological commentary on 1 2 Kings My eagerness was diminished somewhat when I discovered that