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Sunday Sermonette: Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition
We’ve had nine mass shootings in this country between August 3rd and August 7th. Nine. 37 are dead, 85 wounded. The United States has more mass shootings than any other nation on earth. The United States has more civilian firearms per capita than any other nation on earth. There are 120.5 guns for every 100 Americans, more than twice as many as war ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: Moral Superior
I take my text today from the Book of Job: and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
The Book of Job is one of the loveliest poems in literature. It’s about the eternal question: Why do bad things happen to good people? In the poem, Satan makes a bet with God that Job wouldn’t be nearly as devoted if it weren’t for all of the blessings he’d ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: Another One Bites the Dust
Tennessee Representative Bill Sanderson is a “family values” Christian. A hard-line Republican, Sanderson maintained a perfect record of voting against LGBTQ interests. He voted against bills that would have given appropriate bathroom access to trans students. He supported bills allowing therapists and adoption agencies to discriminate against ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: Evil Thoughts
I've come to the conclusion that religion is a sexually transmitted disease. You first catch it from your parents. The percentage of people who stray very far from the religion of their childhood is minuscule. As the Jesuits famously said, "Give me the boy until he is seven, and I will give you the man." Someone with no experience of religion in ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: The Sin of Eve
About six thousand years ago, in a mythical garden planted east of Eden, a man and woman clad in fig leaves stood before an angry God. “Hast thou eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat?” demanded God ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: Confidence
This is a minor update of a post I wrote three years ago. Hey, it's summertime and I'm a beach bum on Cape Cod.
In all the hullabaloo of the 2016 presidential convention season, we might be forgiven for having missed a couple people leaving the party. On July 25th, 2016, evangelist Tim LaHaye died. On July 26th, he was followed into oblivion or ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: Abraham’s Test
One of the most appalling stories in the Bible comes from the Hebrew Scriptures, the 22nd chapter of Genesis. It begins:
And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham: and he said, Behold, here I am.
And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: LG(b)TQ Pride
It’s Pridetide, that season where rainbow flags flutter and flourish. If everyone is Irish on Saint Patrick’s Day, everyone’s just a little bit gay during Pride ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: Honor Thy Father
Happy Father’s Day! Today is the day I call my father on the phone and introduce myself as the man who made him what he is today: prematurely old.
Fathers have a tough job. They clothe you, feed you, educate you, and try to give you a good start in life. Then the minute their back is turned, having exhibited no prior signs of congenital brain ( Read more... ) -
Sunday Sermonette: The Liberal Medical Menace!
I’m a liberal. I live in liberal Massachusetts. But even the most liberal state has its discontents.
Take this shocking, SHOCKING I TELL YOU!, little story from an organization called MassResistance last week:
Medical madness: Your doctor’s office may require you to list your “current gender identity” and “sexual orientation” before getting ( Read more... )