A Sermon Is A Valuable Thing Now

She Knew That Was Not An Honest Prayer, And She Did Not Linger Over It. The Right Prayer Would Have Been, Lord . . . I Am Miserable And Bitter At Heart, And Old Fears Are Rising Up In Me So That Everything I Do Makes Everything Worse.

When We Accept Dismissive Judgments Of Our Community We Stop Having Generous Hope For It. We Cease To Be Capable Of Serving Its Best Interests.

People Don't Acknowledge Loneliness In Themselves, And Don't Appreciate Its Benefits, The Reflection And Attentiveness That Come With It, The Deepened Acquaintance With Oneself.

That's The Strangest Thing About This Life, About Being In The Ministry. People Change The Subject When They See You Coming. And Then Sometimes Those Very Same People Come Into Your Study And Tell You The Most Remarkable Things. There's A Lot Under The Surface Of Life, Everyone Knows That. A Lot Of Malice And Dread And Guilt, And So Much Loneliness, Where You Wouldn't Really Expect To Find It, Either.

I Really Don't Know Why People Have So Much Trouble Now Writing About Religious Faith. It Is True That Clichés Can Override More Interesting Impulses. But The Desire To Find Meaning, To Be Generous, To Live Well In An Ethical And Spiritual Sense, Is So Widespread That It Should Not Seem Alien To People When It Is Expressed In The Terms Of Traditional Religion.