The Tinker and the Prince (updated)

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Sermon for Sunday, October 25, 2026 || Proper 25A || Matthew 22:34-46

I preached a slightly longer version of this sermon in 2020, but I was in my seventh month of looking into a camera at the time. I have yearned to share this fairy tale with you face to face, and today’s the day.

Long ago in a faraway land, the wise old king lay dying. So the king called his sister, who was even wiser than he, and said to her, “Take my crown and remove the three jewels that adorn it. When my son fills those three settings with ornaments of his own, you shall crown him king.”

“But that’s not fair,” the young prince said, and he stomped his foot in protest. “I am king the moment after you draw your final breath.”

“Not so,” his father said. “I fear I have indulged your selfishness too long, my son. You would turn the whole world upside down just to believe yourself right side up. Therefore, I decree that your aunt will be regent until you present her with three tokens showing you have learned what it means to love with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”

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Seeds of Life and Hope

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Sermon for Sunday, October 4, 2026 || Proper 22A || A Reading of “Seeds of life and hope”
from Ladder to the Light by Bp. Steven Charleston

Today we conclude our Season of Creation with a final sermon in our series about humanity’s relationship to the natural world. We began this series a month ago with the reminder that humanity is one with nature, part of nature, not over it or against it. We then asked nature for forgiveness for human exploitation and chose repentance, the changing of our hearts and minds as we interact with the more-than-human world. Then in the last two weeks, we practiced awe, awareness, and gratitude in our interactions with God’s Creation. In all these reflections, we have been guided by Pope Leo, Bishop Steven Charleston, Wendell Berry, and Meister Eckhart. 

We return to Bishop Charleston today, who shares with us a message of hope in the midst of the “gathering darkness” of this “windswept moment in history.” He says, “We are not afraid because we have seeds of life and hope in our pockets. Our task is to cast them as far and wide as we can. The breath of the Spirit will do the rest.” With this hope in our hearts, let’s conclude this series of sermons by pondering the nature of seeds and by locating our trust in the breath of the Spirit.

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Mystics in Our Own Backyards

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Sermon for Sunday, September 27, 2026 || Proper 21A || A Reading attributed to Meister Eckhart

Today is the fourth of five Sundays in our Season of Creation. So far, we have remembered that humans are part of nature, we have asked the Earth for forgiveness for human exploitation, and we have embraced the spiritual practice of awe. Today, we are going to deepen that practice with an exercise in awareness and gratitude. And we’ll begin with a foundational principle of our faith: because God created all things, all things are sacred. Every element of Creation bears the potential for sacramental encounter with God through the holy offering of our awareness. That’s why we call it “paying” attention. We put in the currency of our attention and receive a hundredfold the blessings of God. These blessings then spur our gratitude, which triggers a desire for greater awareness, which delves a deeper well of gratitude. Through God’s grace, this virtuous cycle turns us into mystics in our own backyards.

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Stand in Awe

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Sermon for Sunday, September 20, 2026 || Proper 20A || Exodus 16:2-15 || Wendell Berry, The Art of the Commonplace

Today is the third of five Sundays in our Season of Creation. Two weeks ago we listened to Pope Francis reminding us that humanity and nature are not two separate things. Last week, we recognized humanity’s tiny cameo in Planet Earth’s 4.5 billion year existence, we asked Earth for forgiveness for human domination, and we began the action of our repentance. This week, famed activist, poet, and farmer Wendell Berry guides us with his down-to-earth wisdom, as we embrace the spiritual practice of awe.

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Life is Still Growing

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Sermon for Sunday, September 13, 2026 || Proper 19A || Matthew 18:21-35; Steven Charleston, excerpt from “Nothing is Lost” from Ladder to the Light

Last Sunday we began our Season of Creation with a reminder from Pope Francis that we are not apart from or above nature. We are nature. The natural world is neither simply the scenery for our lives, nor an object for us carelessly to use and discard. The natural world is a subject unto itself, a subject filled with other subjects, each a piece of the creativity of God. Today, we’re going to zoom way out so we can see humanity’s place in Creation, and then we will ask forgiveness for choosing domination over stewardship.

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A Season of Creation

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Sermon for Sunday, September 6, 2026 || Proper 18A || Matthew 18:15-20; Pope Francis, Laudato Si’

You might have noticed that our second reading today came from a non-biblical source. This is a highly uncommon practice in the Episcopal Church, so uncommon in fact that the bishop had to approve it. For today and for the next four Sundays, we will hear readings from sources other than the Bible as we celebrate a Season of Creation. This special season is a fairly new invention in the life of the Church. The season sets off a series of Sundays in September and early October with the specific intention of praising God’s presence in Creation and recommitting ourselves to the preservation and renewal of the natural world. It makes sense that this special season takes place during the long months of so-called “ordinary time,” which is another name for the thirty-ish Sundays between Pentecost and Advent. The days of harvest are upon us. The liturgical color of the time after Pentecost is green. Godly Play calls this time the “green and growing” Sundays. So, each Sunday from now until October 4th, we will share special readings, prayers, and songs in order to grow our awareness of, appreciation for, and commitment to God’s movement in Creation.

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A Resounding Yes (Updated)

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Sermon for Sunday, August 30, 2026 || Proper 17A || Exodus 3:1-15

Twelve years ago this week, I preached the most personally impactful sermon of my entire ministry. They say if the sermon doesn’t resonate with the preacher, it won’t resonate with anyone else. I never know for whom I am writing a particular sermon, but that one twelve years ago was for me. I needed to hear it, and it turned out so did a lot of other people. Today, I’m going to revisit that sermon because it’s message is perennial, and it turns out I need to hear it again now.

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Who Did Not Know Joseph

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Sermon for Sunday, August 23, 2026 || Proper 16A || Exodus 1:8 – 2:10

Today we’re going to talk about the past, specifically about how the past is a story continually being written and rewritten. We’ll start with a few famous sayings about the past in order to ground us, and then we’ll look at the most ominous sentence in the entire Bible, which begins our reading from the book of Exodus this morning. By the end of this sermon, I hope we will all have a new appreciation for our roles in ensuring access to a story of the past that is as accurate to the events of history as possible.

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Human Precepts and God’s Commands

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Sermon for Sunday, August 16, 2026 || Proper 15A || Matthew 15:10-28

This is going to be something of a slippery sermon. It’s going to be slippery because I’m going to be skating a very fine line when I talk about the difference between human rules and God’s commandments. I’ll make sure to warn you when I get to the slippery part, but first let’s talk about why this is our sermon topic today.

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A Lantern to My Feet

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Sermon for Sunday, July 12, 2026 || Proper 10A || Psalm 119:105-112

I don’t often preach about the psalm, but today’s reading begins with a particularly beautiful verse that captured my imagination this Tuesday, my normal sermon writing day. I was planning on writing at the Westerly Library while my kids were at theatre camp, but the back rear tire of my car had a screw embedded in it, causing a slow leak. Thankfully the guys at Town Fair Tire could take my walk in. I grabbed a seat in the waiting area, under harsh fluorescent lights, trying to ignore America’s Funniest Videos on the TV. I sat there, hoping the Holy Spirit would nudge me toward some words to share with you. (Don’t worry, the tire place will become important in a few minutes; I’m not just talking about it to pad the length of this sermon.)

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