Detective John Munch has died. He was 78. Comedian Richard Belzer played Munch from the first episode of Homicide: Life on the Street in 1993, through eight other series, to his last episode of Law & Order: SVU in 2016. I spoke to Belzer during filming of the Homicide episode Identity Crisis, season 7, episode 19. The episode aired April 30, 1999, so we must have shot in late ’98 or early ’99. Belzer was number one on the call... Read more
This year Progressive Christians will continue their efforts to bring justice to the oppressed, to help heal the sick, and to provide comfort to widows, orphans, and strangers, just as they have for 2,000 years. They will instinctively gravitate towards individuals and institutions doing these things and they will continue to leave the organized church. The number of people self-identifying as Christian has declined steadily over the past decade. That downward trend will continue in 2023 as Protestant denominations hemorrhage... Read more
Another mass shooting and another angry, white man. Because mass shooters are nearly always angry, white men. In Angry White Men by Michael Kimmel, “Kimmel locates this increase in anger in the seismic economic, social and political shifts that have so transformed the American landscape,” According to Amazon, “Downward mobility, increased racial and gender equality, and a tenacious clinging to an anachronistic ideology of masculinity has left many men feeling betrayed and bewildered. Raised to expect unparalleled social and economic... Read more
Or else it’s for no one. Communion is for everyone. The presence of God found at the communion table is for everyone. To withhold communion is to withhold God. No one is in a position with the authority to withhold communion from anyone. Catholics are divided on withholding communion for American politicians who support legal abortions in the United States. The real divide among Christians is between those who think that there shouldn’t be any rules at all, and those... Read more
What’s the context of Jesus riding into the capital city? When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil. Do you remember the only miracle in all four Gospels? Jesus feeds hungry people. Jesus feeding the multitudes. We read the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000 as a miracle of the five loaves and two fish. In the Gospel of Luke and the Gospel of Mark, the men are gathered into groups of 50 and 100. This means nothing... Read more
Washington offers the Christian response Photo by wikipedia During his International Leadership Summit, Saturday, T.D. Jakes hosted a Master Class session with Denzel Washington, who briefly discussed Washington’s role in the immediate aftermath of Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the 94th Academy Awards. “Well, there’s a saying, ‘When the devil ignores you, then you know you’re doing something wrong,’” Smith said. “The devil goes, ‘Oh no, leave him alone, he’s my favorite.’ Conversely, when the devil comes at you,... Read more
Two shows, “Inventing Anna” and “The Dropout,” have at their cores the true stories of white, pretty, female con artists. Both women were tried and convicted of duping others out of enormous sums of money, based on little more than fanciful ideas. In “Inventing Anna” on Netflix, Julia Garner plays Anna Delvey a/k/a Anna Sorokin, who defrauded friends, banks and hotels out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Six weeks after her release from prison, Sorokin was taken into the... Read more
Luke 15:1-32 The Parable of the Lost Sheep 15 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. 2 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” 3 Then Jesus told them this parable: 4 “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he... Read more
Christ Rock made a bad joke about Jada Pinkett Smith and Smith’s husband Will walked onstage and hit Chris Rock. Smith went back to his seat and minutes later, won an Oscar. This is our culture. Resorting to violence is a natural impulse of an actor in violent movies and passively witnessing the natural impulse of audiences watching. Perhaps, this could be a pre-planned comedy bit. Who knows what people were thinking as they sat by and watched a man... Read more
“From dust we come, to dust we return,” is spoken at funerals, but it hasn’t really been possible until now. From south of Seattle comes a new alternative to traditional funerals – composting. Bodies are composted into soil by a company called, Recompose: “At the Greenhouse, each body’s transformation from human to soil happens inside of a Recompose vessel. This takes 30 days. The facility houses 10 Recompose vessels, which are constantly monitored. After 30 days, our staff moves the... Read more
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