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We are abdicating our responsibility for maintaining a culture of truth
Our problem isn’t that we can’t tell when someone’s lying. It’s that we refuse to punish those who lie or protect those who tell the truth. Truth is a weighty topic. And yet it all feels so subjective. The elephant parable comes to mind. The one in which many people touch the different parts of…
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Out of Line
In Mark 9, we get a vision of the flipped script, the powerless raised up and the powerful brought low. And still, we struggle to see ourselves in it. Jesus warns that being a stumbling block deprives us all Proper 21B | Mark 9:38-50 Is the second time ever the charm? At this point in…
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More Than Two Internets
We talk like we’re divided in two. But if there were two internets, it wouldn’t be split left/right. It’s more like right vs. everyone else. The way we talk about American culture is a lie based on truth. How we come to this lie, and why we stretch the truth to justify it, is vitally…
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The Good Samaritan Confusion
The point of the parable of the Good Samaritan isn’t just to be nice. Or that we’re all the same. Jesus pushes us to see how we see each other. Here’s a story poorly understood. There’s a man mugged and beaten by the side of the road. People keep going past him. But one stops…
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Deconstructing Polarization
It seems like we are so divided, but that isn’t it precisely. We aren’t divided; it’s more like we’re scattered and pretending we’re divided. We’ve been talking about political polarization for longer than I can imagine. You’d think by now we would have solved the problem. And we would…if we really thought it was a…
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Trading Spaces
What Jesus’s interaction with the Syrophoenician woman in Mark 7:24-37 tells us about what God is really up to with Jesus the Christ. How the gospel of Mark flips the Christ Project on Jesus. Proper 18B | Mark 7:24-37 It was only a chapter ago in the gospel we call Mark when Jesus was trying…
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What God Intends
In Mark 7, Jesus responds to a challenge over rule-breaking by exposing their hypocrisy. Is this just a takedown, or is he saying something else? The challenge of following Jesus isn’t doing or believing. It’s both. Proper 17B | Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 We have to go back nearly two months. Back in June, we…
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Fighting Over Credibility
Instead of dealing with the systemic abuse scandalizing the Roman Catholic Church, some are trying to fuel the culture war machine. I’m not Roman Catholic, but I think we should all pay attention to this scandal. Not just the crimes and cover-ups, but the bigger story. Now, I have a rule I try to follow:…
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