A Two Goal Lead is the Most Dangerous Lead...

Lake Superior is beautiful today! 

Wow, caught this picture this morning, Naomi was up early, and so Eliot was not long to follow. If I had slept in, I would have missed this! Vacation is so good.  

Leaving for the North Shore soon, will blog again when I get back! Be well, A+

This is the sermon I preached on Tuesday Night at the Celebration of St. Mary, mother of our Lord. I like it a lot, what do you think? Sometimes, I feel like a motherless child Sometimes, I feel like a mother, a motherless child Sometimes, I feel like a motherless child A long, long way from my home When I first started thinking about this sermon, what to say and how to say it this song by a band called Hootie and the Blowfish, burst into my conscious. As I sat with it and let the words wash over me, I realized this song embodies the sense of the world and the people walking in and on it. There is despair and longing in those words, there is truth and even beauty in those words. They are a call to all of us, all of us gathered here today to remember this compassionate and courageous woman who did God’s will simply by saying yes, and with that yes was overwhelmed, and overjoyed by the glory of God. One of the Church fathers, Tertullian, has said, “The Glory of God is a human be...

Yesterday as we were about the begin the 4:30 service, a group of people walked in and sat down to join us for the service. As I asked them questions, I found they were from Canada, down here for the 4 game series the Toronto Blue Jays had with the Twins. We get a lot of visitors like that, I still have been unable to get over the fact that something like 15 or 20 New York Yankees fans were at our Easter Sunday service for the series against the Twins this past year. It was amazing. Anyway, Walter was very generous and played the organ for them and told them all about the greatness that is that instrument. It was tons of fun. They went on their way happy an dsatisfied and prepared for the rest of the week. That is one of the great things about Sunday's at the Garden, you just never know who is going to walk through those doors. It is quite fun, kind of like eating Jelly Belly's and wondering what flavor you'll get. Be well, A+

So Justin Chapman has been hanging around for the summer as the first Summer Intern under my tenure, which has been fun and exciting and cool. His primary tasks are 2-fold, one is to help develop the 4:30 service that we are trying to get off the ground and the other is to help form a plan for growth for the next year. Anyway, as we were looking at our plan, we started talking about how cool it will be to do some real shaking up of our liturgy for the 4:30 service. Pretty soon the plan, which, of course has at its center the development of the service, went on the back burner and we started talking about how some of the things we were planning to accomplish would turn everything upside down in some interesting and fun ways. I imagine the Liturgical Police out there might get a little upset about what I am planning to do, but hey, sometimes you just have to take some risks right. Anyway this all happened after a phenomenal conversation with Rachel at the OC, Old Chicago, I can only w...

So Sara's sister Laurie is in El Salvador right now doing some fun, challenging and amazing work. She just posted a blog about her experience of returning photos an acquaintance of hers took of people in a village there 15 years ago. It is really powerful. Read it, then write a check. If you didn't click on the above link, feel free to click this one: http://lauriemcginley.blogspot.com/2006/08/terrys-return.html#comments Laurie, hopefully if she is willing, will do some presentations about her work in El Salvador at the Church sometime this Fall. Thanks Laurie! Be well, A+

So I was standing at the back of the Church, getting ready to say my little opening spiel about welcome to Gethsemane and all that, when one of the members of Gethsemane runs out and says to me, "YOU HAD TO HAVE DONE THIS ON PURPOSE!!!" I looked at him dumbfounded and said, "What?" He showed me the bulletin for today and what was written down as the opening hymn. Now, let me first share with you that I try my best to get through the bulletin each Thursday before I send it off to be printed. I try hard to catch all the spelling errors and all the fun stuff you mess up when you are creating a bulletin, even one that is mostly done for you already... The opening hymn for today was "The Glory of the Lord shineth" or something like that, except that I put down the "lorry of the Lord..." Everyone cracked up when, after saying my welcoming schtick I added, "Please stand and join me in singing our opening hymn, The Lorry of the Lord, which we w...