By Anna MacDonald Dobbs

• What Wishes Pentecost to Be? by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (5/12/2016)
  ... the dangers in approaching Pentecost with a question that directs us to focus on what we do to a subset of other people is the assumption that we can identify the needy neighbor. Once you’ve pegged somebody who “needs,” it’s remarkably easy to fall into the us-versus-them trap of thinking that we, the God-knowers, “have” God to offer, that we mediate God to the world. This week’s lectionary pa...
• Identity Politics by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (2/10/2016)
  ...02/if-a-2016-candidate-is-citing-a-bible-verse-theres-a-good-chance-its-not-quite-right/">Some even cite Scripture (or attempt to) to make their case,</a> ostensibly as a proxy for shared identity and commitments with a desired bloc of voters. It’s not so different a scenario from the story that confronts Christians this time of year, every year on the first Sunday in Lent. Jesus is faced with...
• Make Peace by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (12/1/2015)
  .... In the second week of our liturgical season of preparation (Advent), Luke gives us opportunity to consider who we prepare for and the implications for Christians located in a consumer capitalist, xenophobic, racist, increasingly oligarchic 21st-century nation-state that glorifies violence (have you sung the National Anthem lately?). Zechariah, priest and prophet, proclaims that his son, Jo...
• Truth Telling and Race in the “United” States by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (8/5/2015)
  ...a truth that is not new or of my own thought, but I believe it will continue to be a (perhaps, the) primary challenge for the church as it fleshes out this calling in this country at this time. The church abjectly fails to embody the beloved community as long as it recapitulates racial divisions inherent in the culture in which it’s situated.<!--more--> <blockquote>“American Christianity h...
• What Is Love? by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (5/6/2015)
  ...at the kind of love Christians are called to embody takes a particular, cruciform shape.<!--more--> Robin Maas offers insight, “Few, if any of us, will be called to martyrdom; but all of us are called to a series of little deaths in the form of invitations to restrain or deny self….The sending of God by God was the sending of Love - a crucified Love willing to lay down its life for friends and...
• Words by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (3/4/2015)
  ...ckled recounting it, but also because she has learned that she can evoke a similar response in other people. She looks for her audience to understand and react to what she says, and she delights in it. It’s a lot of fun to be a part of her conversation. Although she can’t put words to the concept yet, Azalea is quickly learning that language is power. Words shape reality and emotion. Deployed w...
• In the Dark by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (1/14/2015)
  ...d time with/in it when it knocks. I don’t think I’m alone in that. We as individuals and communities typically want to bring light (flash, night, or flood) and all it represents - understanding, goodness, clarity, often God - into both physical and metaphorical darkness. Depending on circumstances, the absence of light can be uncomfortable or disorienting at best, and at worst isolating, des...
• Party Prep by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (11/5/2014)
  ... (…and my self-awareness about asking for approval about my self-awareness. This is getting very meta.). Imagine reading the Gospel text this week about the Kingdom of Heaven from my perspective. Long story short, it 100 percent stresses. me. out.<!--more--> There are 10 bridesmaids. Five are wise and five are foolish. Five take extra oil with them for their lamps while they’re waiting ...
• Forgiven to Forgive by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (9/10/2014)
  ...onal tips and warnings like “forgiveness is hard!” These sites, in addition to others of the self-help variety, commonly extol using forgiveness as a way to better your own physical and emotional health, with the bonus of decreasing stress and potentially increasing your life span. Forgiveness is 100% about you. This week’s parable in Matthew offers a corrective to this stunted understanding of...
• Life Together by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (6/10/2014)
  ...ing a particular part of the meal. At the first stop, you enjoy appetizers and drinks, for example. The host at stop number two has prepared a main course, and stop number three features dessert. A plan is helpful to ensure a coherent and palate-pleasing experience. The menu at each home should stand on its own, but also complement, build on or reference the others. Welcome to a delectabl...
• God and Graves by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (4/2/2014)
  ...Jesus is on his way to the house. John tells us that Mary and Martha independently greet Jesus with the same statement, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” The underlying expectation – healing illness to prolong life - is the same that we often bring to modern medicine. In Mary and Martha’s case, it’s a reasonable expectation that Jesus could have doctored Lazarus. He ...
• Whose You Are by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (1/21/2014)
  ... unsurprising that representatives from multiple denominations are housed inside the church. The description “sharing space” would be too strongly worded and ultimately inaccurate, for these six denominations have partitioned the churches down to the tile. Armenians are only allowed in a certain area, Orthodox in another, Catholics can process in a certain area for a determined amount of time, etc...
• Again! by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (12/4/2013)
  ... Or watched a favorite TV episode or movie on loop? There’s good reason – repetition helps kids learn and facilitates brain development. Repetition and routine also provide comfort and stability, bonding children with parents, teachers and other adults who love and care for them. <strong>2.</strong> After spending time with the epistle lesson, I’ve also come to see repetition as a means of...
• How Do You Sing the Lord's Song? by Anna MacDonald Dobbs (10/1/2013)
  ...read that last line in Psalm 137. Read it again. You got it - they want somebody to enjoy bashing baby heads into rocks). Her streets empty of God’s people, Jerusalem also suffers, mourning and shedding tears (Lamentations). Separated from each other, holy people and place are incapable of singing the Lord’s Song. Yet, World Communion Sunday sounds so nice. I have thoughts of happy people at ch...