My Blog about Obama's Nobel acceptance lecture

I mentioned in my sermon this morning a blog I wrote about the speech. Here is a link to it.
http://www.creativeconflictresolution.org/jc/2009/12/the-obama-doctrine.html.

The experience of working with other members to create worship for us reminds me a bit of my days as a Boy Scout.  I was really proud of what my patrol was able to do on a campout... and I was really glad to get home to clean dry clothes.  It was a wonderful and spontaneous morning and it will be good to have our staff return.

Rehearsing Baptism

Yesterday at Pilgrim we remembered the baptism of Jesus and our own baptisms as well. We enjoyed a largely pot-luck luncheon (with thanks to the Morris’s and to Karyn Taylor for work in kitchen on the lasagna and French bread). And we passed the 2010 budget.

I wish I had brought my camera to worship. A central part of the service was a rehearsal of our baptism as Cindy washed our foreheads with the sign of the cross. There were many beautiful moments.

Jenny asked the kids during Children’s Time about how we remember things and how one way is to rehearse them. She asked about when we rehearse our baptism and I thought of my morning shower. The ancients thought of sin in terms of cleanliness and so bathing was actually about restoring one’s place in the community by washing away sins. We don’t normally think of it that way…but we could. What if every shower were a sacrament—an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace—by which we remembered that there is nothing we have done, and there is nothing that has been done to us, that can separate us from God’s love. Everyday is a new opportunity for manifesting the love of God to others and we are all a part of the Beloved Community.