Tag Archives: courage

How Sorrow Turns to Joy

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Easter 3A, 23 April 2023. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

  • Acts 2:14a, 36-47. For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away.
  • 1 Peter 1:17-23.  Love one another deeply (or constantly) from the heart.
  • Luke 24:13-35. Were not our hearts burning within us?

O God of our aching and burning hearts, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may and cost what it will.

In today’s Gospel portion, we heard the Easter story of two on the road to Emmaus – one named Cleopas and the other is unnamed, which allows me to understand that the other was a woman. It’s a beautiful account of the art of resurrection, about how, even when we doubt it, we don’t understand it, we can’t imagine it, and we certainly are not looking for it, we might come to recognize that the Risen Lord can be walking along with us when we are overcome with grief and deeply afraid. The Risen Lord can be right in front of us without our knowing it. The Risen Lord can be in the midst of us when we share our food. Before I go further down this Road to Emmaus, however, I must go back to our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles. Continue reading →

On the Fear of Stepping into Ourselves

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All year long, I have navigated resistance that seems to get heavier by the day, at times feels like depression; shape-shifts as needs be; takes on oh-so-many elusive forms; mutters in my ear that I can’t do it, that I shouldn’t do it, and even questions what is the point of doing it; finds excuses, blames others, drains me of all willpower to go forth. Resistance!

Where is it coming from? Anyone who has known me for a long time can attest that I am pretty much as strong-willed as it gets. I have never had any issue plunging into the unknown if intuition strongly told me to do so, never doubted my purpose, my path, or my mission. Only now, as the start of my professional life, which I have strived for for so long and in so many ways, draws closer, do I find myself pulling back. Shrinking. Disappearing. Resisting.

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Silent Appreciation

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One thing I am coming to learn is to not be afraid of hearing the word no. Even if I feel certain someone will say no, when it comes to inviting someone to participate, I am learning to ask anyway. Not only because it is nice to be included and thought of even when you don’t plan on participating, but also sometimes the answer is yes! This week I made it my mission to go out of my comfort zone and ask people to join my artmaking even if I feel certain they will say no.  While I did get many no’s at common art on Wednesday, I also got so many more yes’s than usual because I put myself out there and was okay with hearing no. This has become a theme throughout my time at common art. I find whenever I push myself to ask anyway, I am so happily surprised by people’s willingness to join in.

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A Shade Braver

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Proper 28B.  14 November 2021. The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

1 Samuel 1:4-20. The Lord remembered her.
Hebrews 10:11-25. Let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds.
Mark 13:1-8.  This is but the beginning of the birth pangs.

O Eternity, O Word of Thunder, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

We are nearing the end of our liturgical year. This is the last we’ll hear from the Gospel of Mark for another three years. It’s highly ironic to me to pray the beautiful words of the opening collect about scripture (to read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest) on a day when our appointed Gospel lesson is the beginning of the apocalypse in Mark. Episcopalians generally don’t like dwelling on the fact that we have apocalyptic scripture. We don’t know what to make of it, and we’d rather not have to try.  Next Sunday, which is the last Sunday in our liturgical year, we will hear a passage from the Passion narrative of Gospel of John. It is a jarring lectionary move; you’ll have to keep your knees bent slightly so that you don’t topple over! Continue reading →

Enduring Mercy & Forgiveness

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Proper 22A
October 4, 2020

Exodus 20:1-4,7-9, 12-20. So that you do not sin
Philippians 2:1-13. I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call in Christ Jesus
Matthew 21:33-46. Listen to another parable

O God of mercy and forgiveness, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

I have a little exercise for you. Many of us are out of shape from not being able to sing together, so I’m going to say some opening words of various hymns and see if you can complete the first line –do it at home if you’re joining us by livestream. Those of you at home can even sing your parts! If I say: “Amazing grace,” you’d know that the next words are: “how sweet the sound.” If I say: “The Church’s one foundation,” you’d say: “is Jesus Christ her Lord.” If I say: “O God our help in ages past,” you’d say: “our hope for years to come.” If I say: “Immortal invisible,” you’d say: “God only wise.” If I say: “This is the day that the Lord has made,” you’d say:, “Let us rejoice and be glad in it.” One more time: “This is the day that the Lord has made. (Let us rejoice and be glad in it.)”
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Courage & Compassion

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Third Sunday of Easter
April 26, 2020

Acts 2:14a, 36-47 For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away.
1 Peter 1:17-23 …Love one another deeply from the heart.
Luke 24:13-35 Were not our hearts burning within us?
O God of our aching and burning hearts, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.
Three weeks into Eastertide, we are still hearing stories of the first day after the Sabbath, the day when the women found the tomb where Jesus had been laid to be empty. It’s a different Gospel from the last two weeks, and the stories are different. In Luke, Jesus’ first appeared not to Mary Magdalene, but to two of his followers who were headed out of Jerusalem to a place called Emmaus – one was named Cleopas. The other, a woman, I imagine….what was her name? Oh, it doesn’t say. Well, anyway. It’s a beautiful account of the art of resurrection, about how, even when we don’t understand it, we can’t imagine it, and we certainly are not looking for it, we can come to recognize that the Risen Lord can be walking along with us; the Risen Lord can be right in front of us without our knowing it, opening our eyes to the scriptures and opening our hearts to thanksgiving for shared meals. When they hurried back to Jerusalem to tell the eleven, they heard that the Risen Lord had also appeared to Simon (presumably Simon Peter), but there’s no story about that.
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Twenty-Sixth Sunday after Pentecost

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Twenty-Sixth Sunday after Pentecost, (28B), November 18th, 2018; The Rev. Susan Ackley

1 Samuel 1:4-20 On the day when Elkanah sacrificed, he would give portions to his wife Peninnah and to all her sons and daughters…
Hebrews 10:11-14 (15-18) 19-25 And every priest stands day after day at his service, offering again and again the same sacrifices that can never take away sins.
Mark 13:1-8 As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!’

What is your first political memory?

Someone asked that question at a breakfast I was with with a group of strangers. My first memory was the McCarthy hearings. I remember my mother doing housework and at the same time watching the hearings on our fuzzy black-and-white television. It was odd to me, because we didn’t usually have the tv on during the day. Strangely enough I remember McCarthy’s face, bland, self-possessed. The whole thing was disturbing to me; I knew something was bad but my mother didn’t explain anything to me. I couldn’t articulate it, but in some child way I was wondering, what will the future hold?

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For what shall we ask?

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Eighth Sunday after Pentecost (10B), July 15, 2018

2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19 Michal…despised him in her heart.
Ephesians 1:3-14 [God] chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before [God] in love.
Mark 6:14-29 What should I ask for?

O God of Love, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

This is one of those Sundays when acclamations of thanksgiving and praise seem inappropriate after the readings. We have a particularly terrible set of readings when it comes to the denigration of women.
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Abundant Life

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Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost, 22A, October 5, 2014; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Exodus 20:1-4,7-9, 12-20 Do not fear.
Philippians 2:1-13 But this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead.
Matthew 21:33-46 Listen to another parable.

O God of grace, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

In our first lesson this morning we heard one of the most famous passages of scripture in the whole Bible. You don’t have to be Jewish or Christian to have heard of what are commonly known as “The Ten Commandments.” In our church tradition, this passage is called the Decalogue – literally “ten words” from God because of references in Deuteronomy to the ten words or ten things that were written in stone on Sinai – ten things that Moses reported hearing from the Source of all being on the Holy Mountain.

Here is the oldest example in our scripture of instructions for how to live long and well in community. The passage begins by telling us that God the Author spoke all these words, reminding the people first that it was God Who brought the people out of the house of slavery. It was God Who brought the people out of the narrow places – mitzrayim – between rocks and hard places – also called Egypt in the Hebrew Bible. This moment marks their new beginning – a fresh starting point for the community – another chance to live in an entirely new way. And God is expressing God’s will – God’s desire for God’s people. “Listen,” God is saying, “I have moved you out from a place of dishonor and disrespect. You are free. You are no longer trapped. You are not enslaved. I have redeemed you. You are valuable. You are precious to me. And here’s how you, my beloved, will behave when you have no other gods more important than me. Here’s how it will be when you know deep in your hearts that you are my people.” Continue reading →