Declaring Our Independence
The two nations on the North American continent that celebrate independence from Great Britain do so three days apart each year.  Here in Toronto, this year’s Canada Day celebrations on July 1 were muted, despite...
Daughters of Rizpah: Working Through Trauma
Buttry, Sharon A. and Daniel L. Buttry. Daughters of Rizpah: Nonviolence and the Transformation of Trauma. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2020.
Sharon and Dan Buttry have dedicated their lives to working for justice and peace....
Paper Doves Take Flight
I initially created these paper birds for an Easter processional to accompany the theme "Sing a New Song," but they are equally appropriate for Pentecost, the Peace Sunday of Advent, Christ's Baptism, or perhaps...
Remembering the Radical Roots of Mother’s Day
Before the flowers, before the jewelry, before the cards and candy Mothers’ Day was a day of activism. In 1858 Ann Marie Reeves Jarvis organized the women in her area into Mothers Day Work...
World of Meaning
This month marks the 40th anniversary of the death of Howard Thurman (April 10), an early twentieth century African-American theologian, poet, pastor, and activist whose work I am still getting to know. His most...
Jesus’ Life and Martin’s Death
A sermon about the convergence of Dr. King’s assassination and Jesus’ resurrection preached Easter Sunday, April 4, 2021. The biblical text is Mark 16, a jarring revelation of the discovery of the empty tomb....
Jesus People
Texts: Isaiah 25: 6-9, Mark 16: 1-8
This sermon was originally preached Easter Sunday April 6, 2015 at the First Baptist Church of Hyattsville, Maryland. Below is the audio recording of the entire sermon including...
Jesus’ Life and Martin’s Death
This Easter Sunday marks the brightest dawn the world has ever known paired with the anniversary of one of the darkest evenings America has ever witnessed. Today is the day, some two thousand years...
Books for Reckoning with White Supremacy in the American Church
The Cross and the Lynching Tree, James H. Cone (2011)
The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism, Jemar Tisby (2019)
White Too Long:Â The Legacy of White Supremacy in American...
A Journey with the Cross
The first time I ever saw a flowering cross, I was visiting Todd in Athens, Georgia back during his days as a Latin scholar at UGA. It was Easter Sunday and First Baptist Athens...
