“Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out”: The Example of Mary?

July 17, 2022Posted inSermons
Our reading from the Gospel of Luke today is one that causes many people to get cheesed off with Jesus. Here are two women, one leaves all the work for the other to do and when she has the nerve to finally ask Jesus to tell her lazy sister to finally get up and do some work, what does he do? Criticises hard working Martha and praises lazy Mary! Where is the justice in that?
Mental Health and Social Stigma: The Gerasene Demoniac

Mental Health and Social Stigma: The Gerasene Demoniac

June 19, 2022Posted inSermons
“Keep to yourself; do not come near me, for I am too holy for you” (Isaiah 65:5). This is the ‘holier than thou’ attitude that the prophet Isaiah spoke against in our second reading today. For the Hebrew prophets this attitude smacked of hypocrisy. Worshiping out of a belief that we are better than everyone else is not true worship but a selfish enterprise. Yet so much of our lives is geared towards giving us a sense of superiority over our neighbours. We see this in the consumerist sense “buy this car and be the envy of your friends,” “wear this dress and be the envy of your colleagues” etc. but also in how competitive our society has become, “look how hard working and productive I am,” “look how much money I have.”
Icon of the New Testament Trinity

A Unitarian Sermon on Trinity Sunday

June 12, 2022Posted inSermons

“It is often supposed in orthodox circles that Unitarian ministers spend a good deal of time in their pulpits attacking the official doctrine [of the Trinity], whereas in reality we hardly ever mention it.” – so said the Unitarian Minister and one time Principle of Manchester College, Oxford, Sidney Spencer. Well today I am going to mention that doctrine and, in speaking about a doctrine concerning the nature of God anyone, myself included, can run into problems. In some respects, then, this is not an easy sermon for me to preach.

man with fireworks

Our New (300th) Year: What Are Our Hopes And Dreams For It?

January 2, 2022Posted inSermons1 Comment
Our first reading today comes from the Book of Ecclesiastes, said to be by the pseudonymous author Qohelet [Koh-HEL-ith] – this is a very odd book of the Bible in many ways. I never cease to be amused by the stances various biblical commentaries have on this book. One of the Anchor Bible commentaries on the book opens with the following: “Ecclesiastes is the strangest book in the Bible.”

The Price of Prophecy

July 11, 2021Posted inSermons
Both our readings today relate to prophets who faced consequences of being prophets. In our sermon today I would like to concentrate on Amos, from who’s book our first reading is from. Amos is one of the twelve minor prophets of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible. In Jewish Bibles the books of the twelve prophets are presented as one combined book, yet they are presented as individual smaller books in Christian bibles.

New Year: Predictions and Perspectives

January 3, 2021Posted inSermons
About a week ago, my Dad forwarded me an article that he found highly amusing. It was published on the website of the Daily Mirror with the headline ‘Nostradamus terrifying predictions for 2021’. Now I’m know that the tabloid press is commonly perceived as having no aversion to kicking people while they are down, however to do such to the hopes of an entire population first struck me as being in bad taste and highly frivolous. It still strikes me as very frivolous, but we might be able to use it to our advantage. It is, after all, a very useful and, depending on one’s sense of humour, fun, way to think about the future.

Queerness, Shepherds and the Holy Family

December 30, 2020Posted inSermons
Liturgically it is not too late for another Christmas address. We are, technically on day 5 of what is a 12-day long festival of Christmastide! The life of Jesus queered social boundaries from the start. Who outside the Holy Family should hear of his birth first but shepherds. Shepherds were, according to the religious orthodoxy of the day, seen as ritually and physically unclean. They were at the mercy of the constant demands of their flocks and had no time for the meticulous program of ceremonial hygiene that would have been demanded of the average person.

First Sunday After Christmas

December 27, 2020Posted inSermons
So in this past week we arrived out of the season of Advent into Christmas. Many of us completed our Advent calendars, listened to carols from King’s College, Cambridge, and left appropriate festive fair by the fireplace for Santa and his reindeer on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Day you might have been lucky enough to have your family with you for a great dinner, you might have called friends and family members from afar, or maybe you felt slightly green around the gills after over indulging in the chocolate from your selection box.