We like lamb in our household. It’s expensive so we limit it to special occasions. We always have lamb and artichoke stew on Christmas. We typically have roast lamb or lamb curry during Bright Week (the week following Pascha) and we’ll usually do kabobs on the grill at least once in the summer. We have …
My sermons in Bible College were often rooted in complex etymological studies (a symptom of the Greek and Hebrew classes I was required to take nearly every semester). I would trace the meanings of words back through the years, consider other words from which my word evolved, and based on this etymological web, build beautiful …
I haven't posted anything for a couple of months although I have been writing quite a lot. But the tone of my writing has been too negative, so it's ended up in the trash bin rather than the blog. It's easy to be a critic; it's easy to postulate about what's wrong with the world. …
In the previous two essays about political Liberty and Rights, I emphasized that one of the assumptions about rights built into the Enlightenment was that they were necessarily connected to responsibility. One of the early critiques of the Enlightenment that has become increasingly obvious over the decades is that many of those Enlightenment assumptions were …
Continue reading Rights, Responsibility, Freedom, and Self-Control
When growing up I was taught that God wasn’t Santa Clause and prayer wasn’t just asking God for stuff. In order to avoid the pitfalls of just asking for stuff I was taught to pray the ACTS way: Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication. As my sense of prayer grew more sophisticated I realized that all prayer, …
Continue reading A Brief Introduction to the Prayer of the Heart
In the final section of The Origins and History of Consciousness, Erich Neumann offers an explanation of one of the great concerns facing modern society: the breakdown of civil discourse and the apparent accompanying breakdown of culture itself. The original German version of the book was written in 1949, so the context of his ideas …
Continue reading The Schism of the Systems: Culture in Crisis
Just as our concept of mishpat and tzedakah is flawed (see the previous essay), so our concept of social justice has been twisted by historical trends, and as a result, our confidence in its efficacy is flawed. This twisting of perceptions can be traced back to the Industrial Revolution which not only led to change …
Continue reading Utopia, Dystopia, the Social Gospel, and the Return of Christ
And so we come to my final big salvation word: Repentance. In case you haven’t figured it out, this little collection of essays are a Lenten meditation. It might seem odd to choose the word “repentance” on this day after Easter. “Shouldn’t you be talking about victory, or new life, or bunnies?” you ask. Ah, …
This lovely prayer is from today's Morning Prayer: Lord, be the beginning and end of all that we do and say. Prompt our actions with your grace, and complete them with your all-powerful help. I love the idea that it is God who prompts, and then, when we respond with action, it is God who …
In yesterday's Daily Common Lectionary reading (Jn 12:44-50), Jesus says, "I do not judge anyone who hears my words and does not keep them, for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world." If Jesus (who is God, after all) doesn't judge and judgment is real (the Bible is full of …
Just Another Jim 