The Eagles Fight Song

Jon's Smoked Pork Recipe

This is not a carefully guarded secret. I use a 30" upright electric smoker set to 210 degrees Fahrenheit and hickory for pork. The flavors blend incredibly well. Hickory is also a flavor from the Ozark Mountains that I so love. Go to favorite meat market and buy as many pork shoulder as will fit with space on your grills and you need to serve, considering space for the smoke to circulate. Preheat smoker, again to 210. Allow Pork to achieve room temperature. Remove skin. Coat in mustard, a light dusting of ground cumin, and hot sauce. Place the pork in the smoker, adding the hickory shavings. Leave alone. I mean really, leave it alone, and wait 9-12 hours as the smoke blends with the flavors of the gradually heating pork. I check the smoker temperature several times, but I do not open the smoker. I replenish hickory shavings three times during the first 2 hours, but then not until I am pretty close to taking the pork off. When I take the pork off, I put it in t...

Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany

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...

On Gun Violence Awareness Sunday

Episcopal Churches here and there will declare Sunday an awareness day to educate attendees on gun violence. The clergy will sport new or died old orange vestments. No one actually looks good in orange so it won't be a fashionable affair. St. Mark's Church, Frankford is in the lowest portion of what might be called the lower northeast; we butt up against North Philadelphia and Kensington and the formerly sleepy little neighborhood, Junieta Park. Frankford has several nice quiet neighborhoods, but in the area that I serve most often that is not the case. Our neighborhood is anything but quiet. If the el is not rushing by, there is a hoopty barreling down Frankford Avenue, with occasionally incomprehensible, but generally fully articulated, music blaring. Why we are not wearing orange at St. Mark’s Church, Frankford on Gun Violence Awareness Sunday. There are several reasons for this and the first and maybe most obvious is that we, as a congregation, are intimately aware of gun...

Reflections of an Urban Priest

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