The Shelburne & Primrose Sunday Morning podcast brings you Sunday service, music, and more — straight to your device. Currently on hiatus; enjoy the podcast archives!
This is my last podcast, the third of a series of three personal reflections as a kind of farewell to all of you. And today, I wanted to reflect on the current state of our churches, of Christianity, and its future, and some of the things I have learned in my years ministering within those constructs.
Read MoreThis is the second in a three part series of personal reflections as I prepare to leave my role of spiritual leadership at the pastoral charge - my audio goodbye card. Last week, I wove together some of my favourite scriptures with selected music we have been recording this last year. And today, we are going to look at some of the basic theologies within our faith, again, through my own personal experience with them.
Theology is just a fancy word for the study of God. And the word God – theo - is just a place holder for something grand and astonishing and stunning, a creativity beyond us.
Read MoreWelcome to the season of Christmastide, and to this, the first of a final thee part podcast series. I have been thinking what might be interesting to share with you before I leave, and I hope I have come up with something you will find interesting.
This first podcast is a collection of my favourite scriptures, ones that are foundational to my own spiritual journey, and will have undergirded all that I have taught you. T
Read MoreChristmas Eve in our Christian calendar marks the end of the Advent season, a time of reflection and contemplation, and heralds in the season of Christmastide, twelve days when we celebrate the symbolic birth of Jesus the Christ, around whose way of love, we gather. And we have just passed through the Winter solstice, the longest night in the year where we live, and a very real reminder of the astonishing complexity of this blue orb we are privileged to call home.
Read MoreLast week, we gathered around The Magnificat, Luke’s canticle he ascribed to his heroine Mary. And today, we read the scripture that actually came before this, the scripture that is commonly called The Annunciation. This is the well-known text where the angel Gabriel arrives to talk to Mary about the child she will bear, and call, Jesus. Luke’s telling of this tale is a sweet exchange, offering us a picture of Mary as a contemplative young woman, thoughtful and careful in her responses, with a lively curiosity, and a deep faith. “Nothing is impossible with God,” Gabriel declares. To which Mary responds, “Here I am, the servant of the Lord. Let it be according to your word.”
May we all desire such steadiness of gaze and humility, and thus open ourselves up to the astonishing life that lies before us.
Read MoreJoy is a central theme of the Christmas season. And during Adent as we anticipate this celebration, we consider where exactly joy comes from, where it resides, why and how we may, or may not, have it. It might help to remember that though at the centre of the story of Jesus’ birth there are singing angels and adoring animals, there are also frightened shepherds, nasty potentates hailing from Herod’s court, slaying soldiers, and fear, anxiety and uncertainty in abundance.
But at the heart of the story is Mary and it is to her we turn this week
Read MoreIt is the second week of the Advent season in the year 2020, a year fraught with uncertainty, and that uncertainty is far from over. But as we spoke about last week, uncertainty is a constant in life, for in truth we can never know what any day will bring. Perhaps a new love. Perhaps death. Perhaps new understanding. Perhaps conflict where one least expects it. Perhaps unmerited, and generous grace, which by its very nature is unexpected. Perhaps compassion extended towards us. Perhaps a new discover of how to extend it to someone else.
Read MoreThis is the first Sunday of Advent, the four weeks of reflection that proceed the season of Christmastime. And throughout this season of contemplation, we will be looking through the lens of the mystic tradition that sees the sacred in all things, God in all matters.
You will have heard it said, that to sing is to pray twice. And as we love to sing in this season, we will let the sacred texts of our seasonal music be our scriptures these next weeks.
Read MoreToday is Christ the King Sunday, the last Sunday in the liturgical Christian calendar. This particular designation is relatively new, being instituted originally in 1925 with the hopes of refocusing the church on the kingship of the one upon whom our faith is based.
In the year 2020, what is the significance of Christ the King Sunday? What does Christ being a king mean to us today, In the midst of the ever-worsening pandemic, in the midst of on-going political disruptions?
Read MoreOur podcast today gathers together an eclectic group of social activists that have followed Goethe’s imperative: “Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.” And they have begun where they were, with what they had to work with, boldly, prophetically, using the talents they were given to offer them up as gift to the world. And God and all the universe showed up to guide them and support them on their way.
Read MoreOn November 11th, in Canada, we celebrate Remembrance Day, a day set aside to honour those who died in the First and Second World Wars and all the wars, really, before and after. And not just to remember and consider the soldiers who died, but to reflect on those who supported them, loved them, lost them, and carried on in whatever way they were able. And in our United Church faith tradition, we bring this remembrance into our Sabbath gatherings on the Sunday before November 11th, which is our podcast today.
This is a complex matter.
Read MoreNovember 1st is the middle child in what is collectively called ‘Allhallowtide’ – a triduum, three days of commemoration that includes All Hallows Eve – which has been shortened in our modern English to Halloween, all Saints Day, November 1, and All Souls Day, November 2nd. So, though we tend to think of October 31st as a blitz of candy and costumes, it is actually, originally, a Christian holiday and part of our feast calendar.
Read MoreI am not unaware of the rising tensions in our world at large, or the rising tensions in the political arena, or the rightful protesting for a more equitable world on the streets. I am not unaware of the tensions that may be rising in your own homes, within your families. I am not unaware of the uncertainty before us, or the uneasiness that is settling often into our hearts. I am not unaware of these things because they too are part of my life.
Which is why I am more and more grateful for the wisdom of a Sabbath practice, a day or time when we lay aside the harness of our lives that drives us to control and manipulate this world, to draw profit from it, to change it, to alter the course of time, to concern ourselves with its direction.
Read MoreOur Thanksgiving podcast includes the Apostle Paul’s affectionate letter to the folk in the newly formed church of Philippi urging them to be joyful in all circumstances. Paul is writing the letter from his jail cell – an important piece of information. In a jail cell there are few distractions and time to really consider matters. Think of the famous, thoughtful writings that have come from Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Dietrich Bonhoeffer among others. They had time in jail to distill their thinking, to take time to consider – as possible death awaited them – what was most important to tell people about.
Read MoreThis week we continue on into the season of creation, learning from St. Francis of Assissi, a saint in the Catholic tradition. And by an odd coincidence, we are also touching on Saint Bernadette of Lourdes, and the many layers of fascinating story around the song written in her name. Jesus brings us also the parable of the Tenants in the Vineyard as we consider the way of the human mind when it allows itself to be separated from God, the divine mind.
Sabbath, you will remember, is an atmosphere which we enter voluntarily that we may rest from the weary press of the world, let go of the will to shift and change the world, and concentrate instead, on the shifting and changing of our internal landscape – we concern ourselves on the Sabbath, with our soul. And as we consider our own soul, so we aid and uplift the collective soul of the world.
Read MoreHere is a dabbling of gathered treasures to enrich your life this very day – some beautiful music from visiting musicians and composers, reflections on the wonder and power of nature, and narrative and musical scripture readings exposing a faith that is pliable, alive, and full of questions that we may live out the answers, not claim ownership of them.
Deep Breaths. One of you this week, having experienced a great disappointment, quoted back to me, the wonderful words of Julian of Norwich, the words that were the theme of her shewings as she called them, or visions, as we might call them. An anchoress living an isolated life in the midst of the black plague in England, she experiences Jesus saying to her, “And all will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.” And so, it shall.
Read MorePeace be with you this beautiful September week, with the frost creeping into our gardens, and the trees beginning to show off their beautiful fall colours. Our podcast today, is the podcast that aired last Easter morning, full of music and beautiful readings, and a simple message: Love is the conduit for the miraculous. It was true last Easter, and it is true this September as well.
Read MoreToday we have a quiet, reflective time as we listen again to the Holy Saturday Vigil Podcast. And we have as our guide, Macrina Wiederkehr’s wonderful book Seven Sacred Pauses, Living Mindfully Through the Hours of the Day, as our guide. We studied this book last year as a group. It is readily available digitally and in print. I would encourage anyone who wishes to bring calm to their lives to acquire a copy.
Read MoreHere is Part Two of our Good Friday Podcast from last April. It is a personal reflection in music and story of what I think it means to stand at the foot of the cross today, to embrace the mystics life, and that in its simplest form, is to embrace the sacred in all people and all matter. And this, of course, is open to all people, regardless of formal religious inclinations, or lack thereof.
Still, there is, on this Good Friday, an opportunity to contemplate the unique mystic tradition within the Christian faith.
Read MoreWe can learn from the stories of our faith about what happened then, so we can better negociate what to do now.
So, in the relistening of our foundational story, I want you to listen for three things: three things you might consider and watch for in the story. Jesus’ steadiness. The crowd’s seeming power. And our required stand against the power of empire.
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