Category: Sermons

Sermon for December 20, 2015: Fourth Sunday of Advent
Rev. Amy Welin:Today we light the fourth Advent candle of Love. This last Sunday in Advent is all about our longing and expectation, and the Love that fulfills those desires. In that light, there is something wonderful about Mary of Nazareth. I am not talking about the Mary of statues and popular paintings. That Mary is often smiling faintly, as if she knows a secret. She is completely serene, and sometimes she is holding her baby Jesus. But the statues and paintings do not capture the spirit of the Mary of the gospels. Mary of Nazareth was faithful and courageous and surprising. God chose her to fulfill an important and challenging role, and she fulfilled it gracefully. Read More Read more • Leer más → “Advent Candle of Love”

Sermon for December 13, 2015: Third Sunday of Advent
Rev. Amy Welin: When our circumstances feel the most dire, it is time to seize moments of joy. That is the theology of the song We Need a Little Christmas. I found myself humming it on Tuesday afternoon after reading the article about St John’s in the Waterbury Republican.
 
We light the Advent candle of joy on Gaudete Sunday. Gaudete is the command to rejoice, echoed in Paul’s epistle. In the ancient church , this was the Sunday that answered the children’s question are we there yet? with a liturgical almost. On Gaudete Sunday, the faithful were exempted from the Advent fast, and the priests wore vestments colored rose to signify the joy of the day. We are nearly to Christmas, and we need to rejoice, because although the nights are dark and long and the news is not all good, the Day of the Lord is very near. Read More Read more • Leer más → “Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say, Rejoice!”

Sermon for December 6, 2015: Second Sunday of Advent
Rev. Amy Welin: We light the candle of peace on the Advent wreath today, in a world overflowing with violence and anxiety, which resists and even crushes the messengers of peace. We live under the pall of terrorist threats and economic uncertainty, with the painful memory of Sandy Hook and San Bernardino. If we could implore St Nicholas to leave us a little present today (because today is the Feast of St Nicholas), which of us would not implore the Wonderworker to leave us peace instead of coins or chocolate? Read More Read more • Leer más → “The dawn from on high shall break upon us”

Sermon for November 29, 2015 (First Sunday of Advent)
Rev. Amy Welin:
Thanksgiving is past and now we begin the journey to Christmas. It feels a bit anti-climactic, doesn’t it, when the decorations have been up in all the stores for at least a month? The world is already busy with the business of getting ready for the retailing blitz. And in church, we take a moment to slow down, and to be quiet, to prepare for the coming of God among us.
 
We begin Advent with a bleak reminder that the world as we know it is going to come to an end. This is the way the world ends, according to the Bible: with wars, and conflict, and terror. Get ready.
 
Nothing like adding a little edge to the season of preparation, is there? Read More Read more • Leer más → “When these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near”