Stop staring into heaven, brothers and sisters, the angel says. Jesus is gone. Carried away on the clouds. Swept up into the sky. The fire has yet to descend and Pentecost is a week away. Go home, the angel tells the disciples. Go home and climb the stairs. Go home and say your prayers —…
At eight years old, I was an overtly and overly pious parochial school kid. First in line for Friday confession, first in line for first Friday Mass. Holy cards falling out of my missal, I knew my Baltimore Catechism like the back of my hand. At eight years old, I was destined to save souls.…
When my kids were growing up, the vacuum cleaner meant only one thing. It meant that someone was coming over. As soon as the kids saw the vacuum out of the closet, they would want to know who it was. Unfortunately, we did not cleanup for just anybody – so, whenever the kids heard the roar of the…
To paraphrase a community in despair: “Show yourself, Jesus. In the middle of drought and famine and disease, for God’s sake, show up!” This urgent lament belongs to the little village of Kingala, whose story is told by Barbara Kingsolver in her novel — The Poisonwood Bible. The book is a fictitious tale of a misguided mission…
“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” John 11: 21 In John’s Gospel, you can clearly hear the pain in Martha’s, and then in Mary’s voice; the longing; even the accusation: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When you’re in grief – when the…
The renowned architect Frank Lloyd Wright once told of an incident that perhaps seemed insignificant at the time, but it had a profound influence on the rest of his life. The winter when he was nine-years-old, he went walking across a snow-covered field with his reserved, no-nonsense uncle. As the two of them reached the…
I have always loved this Gospel story. And often thought that preachers I have heard in the past were always so much more stuck on what they thought they knew about this woman than on what was actually written about her in the Gospel of John. As I began to study the story in preparation…
Who remembered that the most famous verse in all the Bible was part of this curious little story about Nicodemus? That’s a rhetorical question. I didn’t remember either. Nicodemus is an interesting character. John tells us that he is a Pharisee, so a member of the religious elite; but more than that, he is a…
Happy Easter everyone! In the Gospel of John, Mary Magdalene was the first to arrive at the tomb nearly 2000 years ago. Because some of us have heard this story so many times there’s always a danger that the details become like wallpaper in someone’s home you’ve walked into a million times and you now…
How are your table manners? What’s acceptable dinner conversation at your house? Generally, forboden topics are sex, politics, or religion, right? Apparently, they interfere with one’s digestion. Hard to do though, right? Growing up at mealtime, my father’s medical talk just about pushed my mother over the precipice. My dad would accept calls from the hospital or patients…
Emmanuel Voices 
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