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Sermon by Marjorie Brown on Holy Communion before conformation on 5th July 2009
I have tried to find a link between the readings set for today and the subject I want to talk to you about, but it was really a strain so I had to give up. I urge you to meditate on the readings yourself in the week ahead, but for our reflection today I want to quote another, very short text, from Acts 2.42: the first Christians “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and prayers”.
Since the earliest times, the Church has met on the first day of the week to do this: to hear the apostles’ teaching in the scriptures, to share fellowship, to pray, and to break bread. The name we give collectively to these four actions is the Eucharist, meaning thanksgiving. Although the first Christians were Jews, observant of the Sabbath on a Saturday, they met on Sunday for this purpose because it was the day of resurrection. They thought of it as the eighth day of creation, the day when God did something just as new as when he created the universe. On this day, Sunday, he raised Jesus from the dead and invited us to be raised with him into a new life that begins now and will never end.
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Sermon by Marjorie Brown for Trinity Sunday 2009
If you listen carefully, you can hear the sound of reluctant footsteps of assistant curates and visiting preachers all over the world climbing into pulpits today, preparing to tackle the subject of the Trinity. It is notoriously the day when vicars want someone else to give the sermon. Everyone feels daunted by this subject, and the usual wheeze is to admit defeat before you begin. Undoubtedly the most popular starting point for the day is a quote from the Athanasian Creed, also known as the Quicunque vult, which used to be recited at Morning Prayer on Trinity Sunday. It states that a Christian must believe in “the Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible, and the Holy Spirit incomprehensible.”
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Not just Christmas backwards |
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Sermon by Marjorie Brown for Ascension Day - Thursday, May 21st 2009
Today is Father’s Day in Germany, because of the celebration of Jesus going back to his Father. We do set the bar rather high for parenting – in this country we are used to associating Mothering Sunday with both Mother Church and the Virgin Mary, but to compare fathers with God himself is an even taller order.
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The Ethiopian Eunuch's Point of View |
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Sermon by Marjorie Brown for Sunday, May 10th 2009
Philip had an interesting morning, didn’t he? An angel of the Lord told him what road to take, and he followed orders and had a really unusual encounter with a rather exotic character – a meeting that changed the other man’s life forever and probably had a lasting impact on Philip too.
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Sermon by Marjorie Brown for Sunday, April 19th 2009
When I was nine years old, the children’s librarian at the public library in Canton, Ohio told me I really ought to read some books by C.S. Lewis. I resisted her advice because I liked to choose my own books, but about a year later I finally picked them up and began a love affair with Narnia that dominated my imagination for many years. Not many people in the American Midwest knew the stories so they felt like my private property.
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