Beyond Afghanistan – A Time to Break Silence

The above title is based on some words of Martin Luther King, Jr. spoken at the Riverside Church in New York on April 4, 1967 – exactly one year before he was killed. It was at a meeting of CLERGY AND LAITY CONCERNED ABOUT VIETNAM, and he began:
“I come to this magnificent house of [...]

Health care is a human right

Below is a podcast (with videos!) of our recent Faith and Life Forum. Thanks to all the participants for the great questions, and to Dr. David Baltierra of PHYSICIANS FOR A NATIONAL HEALTH PROGRAM for coming out to be with us not once, but twice. His eloquence, knowledge and kindness, as you will see, are [...]

The Bible has everything to do with the here and now

By Don Prange
Published in the Loudoun Times-Mirror, October 7, 2009
How do I, as a Christian minister, contribute faithfully to our national conversation about health care?
After more than 50 years of ordained ministry, I find that my beliefs continue to shrink while my faith continues to expand and grow. This is especially true of [...]

Brother Francis, afflicting the comfortable

“’Blessing of the Animals’,” the man read from our poster. “Where’s that in the Bible?”
True, no mention of the feast day of St. Francis can be found in the Bible. Point taken (we assumed, correctly, that this gentleman’s question was rhetorical in nature).
Leaving aside for a moment the issue of whether that was [...]

Choices

Today’s Reading is a excerpt from “My Stroke of Insight” by Jill Bolte TAylor, Ph.D  From Page 148.
……….More often than not, I don’t like how agression feels inside my body so I shy away from the hostile confrontation and choose compassion.
For me now, it’s really easy to be kind to others when I remember that [...]

A tale of two Christmas services

I don’t think I can let this Epiphany season conclude without sharing this small “aha” moment. My partner and I have occasionally attended services at another church in our community, the Lovettsville Community Church. This congregation used to be known as the Church of the Valley, founded by Pastor Jay Ahlemann. It’s the church responsible [...]

Building community, joining community

St. James United Church of Christ has become an affiliate of The Center for Progressive Christianity, whose mission is to reach out to those for whom organized religion has proved ineffectual, irrelevant, or repressive, as well as to those who have given up on or are unacquainted with it; uphold evangelism as an agent of [...]

To the Mountaintop

Published in the Loudoun Times-Mirror.

By Rev. Stephen Johnson
January 22, 2009
Sitting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington on Inauguration Day, I recalled a conversation I had at the Democratic National Convention in Denver last August with Ida Taylor of Carson, California, a volunteer who worked with me at the Convention.
I was walking [...]

The MLK speech we all should read

This speech by Dr. King is probably the least familiar to general audiences, but it is absolutely essential to understanding what he was calling us to as children of God. It is from a later version as a sermon, delivered April 30, that the quotation “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who [...]

New Year’s Greetings

It is now the beginning of another year.  I am sure you are also praying that this year will be better than 2008, not only with a lessening of the various fighting issues and disasters around the world but also with the health, economy and political issues of our own country. 
Hello Everyone.
Thank you for [...]

keep looking »