This issue of The Other Journal examines the complex relationships between ourselves, our culture, and our food from a theological perspective. The thoughtful contributors to this issue take us to Middle Earth and the Romanian city of Constanta. They swing by swank Manhattan bistros and raucous NFL stadiums on game day. But most importantly, they return us to the Communion table and to that first garden where God walked with us and gave us the gift of his creation.
When we ground our spirituality in the church’s liturgical calendar, says Hunt Priest, we experience ancient patterns of preparation, encounter and celebration that can make us more fully aware of God’s active presence in our lives and the world around us.
Chris Hoke learns something about receiving the Messiah from towering and tattooed Teddy, a former gang member in Skagit Valley, Washington.
In this meditation on Joseph’s discovery of Mary’s pregnancy, Melissa Skelton urges us to embrace the voice of God speaking in the depths of our souls, and to not be afraid.
In this Meditation on Matthew 3:1–12, Will Willimon reminds us that we are not right, that our worlds are out of kilter, and that Jesus presents us with the most difficult, demanding bad news that ever was called good, bad news that can set us straight.
In this Advent sermon, Dan Rhodes engages the deeply disturbing and yet hopeful interruption of the angel Gabriel to Mary, when he announces that she will bear the Christ-child.
For author Greg Moore, the season of Advent is rooted in a divine memory.
Advent is a season of waiting, of being drawn into the spiritual discipline of anticipation. Our spiritual director is Mary, the mother of Jesus, the one in whom we see revealed the patience of God. Mary waits for the Messiah, and in doing so she invites us into a way of life that welcomes the gospel through a posture of waiting.
As we move into the darkest season of the calendar year, daylight runs in short …
