73F 98% mostly cloudy Wind ESE 9 mph. Had a ham sandwich and second muggaBlack, now contemplating my blueberry muffin, a lifelong but seldom indulged favorite. Flight of pelicans coast by seven levels down at sea level, inches above, skimming the Bay surface. By this time next week I will be asleep after having been up all night to witness הוֹי  doom or salvation evolve on the big screen. The breeze brings whiffs of the past, mine and others' and memories of everyone to whom I owe my Being, yes stretching back to Genesis 1,  Let there be, but focuses on StAndrewsBay and Davis Point, which never leave heart and mind and under covid discipline seldom leave sight. A silver day: Matthew 5. 1 seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain: and when he was set, his disciples came unto him: 2 and he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying, 3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4 Blessed are they that mourn: for they sha...

We do things backward(s), you know, we can't help ourselves. Our creation cycle week and work goes First Day to Sabbath, Sunday to Saturday, and the church means for us to carry this out in practice: read the lessons for Sunday as the beginning of the week and read, teach, study, discuss them throughout the week. But we are too anticipative for that, we like to read and discuss Sunday's lessons as a climax, then starting Monday get on into the following Sunday's readings. At our Wednesday evening services, for example, we don't read last Sunday's gospel, we read and discuss the gospel for the upcoming Sunday. And it's okay, I did it as a parish leader in the church all my ordained life.  The alternative, to discuss the readings and sermon for last Sunday, might work for you lot, but probably not for us, as once we read, teach and preach it we don't dwell on what's done, our minds start contemplating what's coming up next because we need to think befo...

66F 95% here outside the Beck door of 7H at the moment, breeze from the east window and cooler than comfortable, so wearing my heavy bathrobe for the first time since, what?, winter. Summer was always my favorite season, but looking back I realize that was because my years six through twenty it was summer vacation. Now that it's always vacation but not always summer, autumn and spring may share first place. No, spring, because autumn is our worst part of hurricane season. Below keeping commitment are the Propers for next Sunday, 1 November, All Saints Day. Note that the gospel is The Beatitudes, the Happys. Matthew's NT Greek word is μακάριοι, not sanctified, holy, but blest in the sense of fortunate, happy, well off, in a good place, an enviable situation. More later in the week perhaps; or perhaps not.  The Collect Almighty God, you have knit together your elect in one communion and fellowship in the mystical body of your Son Christ our Lord: Give us grace so to follow your b...

  The Collect Almighty and everlasting God, increase in us the gifts of faith, hope, and love; and, that we may obtain what you promise, make us love what you command; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. The Gospel Matthew 22:34-46 When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” The gospel of the Lord! Almighty and everlasting God, increase in us the gifts of faith, hope, and love; and, that we may obtain what you promise, make us love what you command. “Tea...

  The Death of Moses Moses on Mount Nebo Looking at the  Promised Land,  Lesser Ury, German, ca 1927 Deuteronomy 34:1-12     Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho, and the Lord showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan, all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, the Negeb, and the Plain—that is, the valley of  Jericho, the city of palm trees—as far as Zoar.  The Lord said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants’; I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.” Then Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord’s command. He was buried in a valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth-peor, but no one knows his burial place to this day. Moses was one hundred twenty years old when he died;...

The Collect. Almighty and everlasting God, increase in us the gifts of faith, hope, and charity; and, that we may obtain what you promise, make us love what you command; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. Old Testament. Deuteronomy 34:1-12     Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho, and the Lord showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan, all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, the Negeb, and the Plain—that is, the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees—as far as Zoar. The Lord said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants’; I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.” Then Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord...

  So what else is new? posits Harry Golden, born in a shtetl in what is now Ukraine where his father was a Hebrew teacher, transiting as an infant, via Winnipeg, to New York City, as he remembers growing up on the Lower East Side.   Harry and his memories and observations are a lifelong favorite read. I acquired all his books, treasures and a treasure, but think I remember giving that collection to Joe as we started our own transit nearly six years ago, I guess this month, and discovered the joys and freedoms of condo living into life's autumn! October: stuff. Oct 10 HMichael he who shall not be named and far more. Oct 17 heart issue. Oct 17 UF 60 The Citadel 0 and I didn't realize Charles Duvall was on the other side, we were the same age. October 20 +Time begins as a daily posting on CaringBridge. October October. Moved out of summer a month ago, we are having a Florida autumn, about 70°F out here at the moment, humid on the Bay. October. Last evening I was noticing how more...

  Copy-and-paste below per my +Time.1 commitment, Propers for next Sunday morning. As usual they summon me to comment somewhat. Yesterday in Sunday School class we discussed 1 Thessalonians to general satisfaction of getting the picture, Luke/Acts clarification of Paul’s sitz im leben that led to the letter, Paul’s concerns that his letter addresses, the letter itself. Of all Paul’s epistles, I am most glad that this one was saved for us, this one and Philemon. But there is the ongoing lectionary frustration of reading it in bible thumping snippets such that it’s impossible to get it except maybe to pick up a word or phrase for preaching. Anyway, here it is, and maybe more below, IDK yet. Scanning online earlier this morning yielded the headline, “People of faith should embody moral and intellectual integrity”. I’m not going to open and read the article, One because it involves a paid subscription, Two because it’s political and considering the source I already know what it’ll...