Happy New Year! We begin again, here in 2022.
And as we begin this new year, there is a collective hope that it will be different. There is a hope that this year, we will finally deal with the coronavirus, or it will genuinely just go away, so that when 2023 rolls around, we will no longer be wearing masks, or social distancing, or worrying about a new variant, or doing any of the things that have become part of our lives in the past two years.
This is what we hoped a year ago, at the beginning of 2021. We were glad that 2020 was behind us, the year that Covid spread throughout the world, and we all thought that surely by the time this New Year’s came, Covid would be gone, and life would have returned to our so-called “normal.”
Read MoreYou may have heard me say that Kirk and I have been reading through the Bible since the beginning of January. We have been using a system that will get us through the entire Bible in a year. So, with half the year gone, by now we have read a whole lot of Bible stories. One thing I have been reminded of, from reading this much, is that whenever someone in the Bible makes a promise, they must stick to it. In fact, there have been a few stories where I start cringing as Kirk is reading it aloud, because I can tell that a person is making a promise that could come out very badly.
Read MoreThe first church I served as a priest was a church in Hawaii that each year would have a Eucharist service at the beach. We would hold the service under a shelter and then have a meal together, go swimming, and relax for the afternoon. One year some parents asked if they could have their baby baptised at this service — meaning in the ocean. I immediately said yes. The ocean or a river is a great place to have a baptism — for reasons I’ll mention in a moment.
Read MoreI’ve been doing a few weddings lately. In the past few weeks, there have been two weddings here at St. Nicholas Church, of two young women from Adare, members of the church. And there’s another wedding on 2 October. I just met with the couple (by Zoom) on Friday. So I’ve been thinking lately about weddings, and I have had the delight of meeting with couples as they have been preparing to get married. When I meet with couples, I often talk with them about the importance of traditions. …
Read More
