Reflections of an Urban Priest

Earlier today, February 21st, I opened my Daily Office book for an inspiration for me to "share the message" as my Baptist brother calls the role of preaching for our Wednesday morning joint worship event with Oxford Circle Baptist Church; I call it preaching. I opened to the reading for today and found 1 Corinthians 2:1-13, which I've printed a portion of below. After a long day, the reading kept haunting me, as the Scripture is known to do. I opened the Mission St. Claire website and they had published the wrong lesson, 1 Cor 1:1-13, which I have never found them to do before today. So, what was the Spirit trying to convey to me? I think it means that the Spirit wants me to pay extra attention to today's lesson(s.)  I have been following posts on the Facebook site of the Third Order Franciscans for years. I have the pleasure of working with a Third Order Franciscan and so I sought out the group. There has been a running discussion over the past few days abou...

Lent is a special time for me. It is a time of introspection and mathematics: As I look inwardly at myself, I often add and subtract a few necessities. It kicks off with Ash Wednesday, a solemn day for me and my denomination and it will end on the eve of Easter. Deacon Phil and I will - on Ash Wednesday - be making ashes available at the north end of the Frankford Terminal beginning at 6:00 am for the early morning commuters. Ash Wednesday is an opportunity for those who are separated from the Christian Church to return. The forty days of Lent are days of introspection when we delve deeply into ourselves through subtraction by fasting and rest, as well as days of addition, when we add study, service, and prayer specific to the season to our spirituality. I read, and pray the Daily Office every day, which guides me to lessons which focus on the Lenten themes of the church; in theory, as I pray the Daily Office, I am praying alongside Christians of every denomination, but especial...

The lessons for the fifth Sunday of Epiphany in the revised common lectionary consisted of a reading from Isaiah 40, 1 Corinthians 9, and Mark 1. Each played a role in edifying the good news for the people of God assembled at St. Mark’s Church, Frankford today. Let’s begin today with the lesson from 1 Corinthians 9, where the Apostle Paul, shares for all time a principle of homiletics: as preachers, we must preach to the assembled body in the language that they understand. This concept is foundational in the Anglican Communion where we have learned that preaching in any tongue other than the vernacular is not the way to reach the people. That said, neither Cantonese or Mandarin Chinese possess the vocabulary of spirituality, and in that case learning another language which posses an appropriate vocabulary is imperative: the Roman church has had success teaching and working with Latin. The Apostle leads us to understand that local, relatable illustrations is the way to go. As we mov...