Mother Claire's Sermons

When I was in the sixth grade, my friend Erica and I devised a secret code language through which we would pass notes to one another. Each of us had a key, and would then “decode” notes so that no one else could read them if they somehow fell into the wrong hands. But those notes were kind of a project, to write them, “translate” them into our code, and then to “translate” them back into English. The secret language only lasted a couple of months. Turns out sixth graders don’t have secrets that are worth that much work. We did devise a new code a few years later, but in that code our notes were totally normal except for the code names we used for the boys we liked. If you look at my ninth grade yearbook, you’ll find a note from Erica about me and “Banana”, whose identity remains known to Erica and me alone. The apostles had a special knowledge. Like the identity of Banana, only much bigger. They had the identity of the Messiah. And unlike Erica and myself, they wanted the world to deco...

In 1976, Paul and Linda McCartney wrote Silly Love Songs . It’s not a profound song. If you haven’t heard it, the title of the song is enough information. And it isn’t meant to be profound. That’s kind of the genius of it. It’s purposefully silly, tongue-in-cheek, maybe even bad, but it is at least enjoyable. The McCartneys wrote it in response to accusations by either the press or by John Lennon - depending on who you ask - that all Paul wrote were “silly love songs” and “sentimental slush”. In response, Paul and Linda wrote it as a commentary on his critics, while inviting his audience to laugh at him with him. It’s quite clever. And part of why it works is, for as much time as we spend thinking about love and relationships, we aren’t great at describing what love is. First John’s Epistle is widely seen as a commentary on the Gospel of John. It’s not really a letter, but more of an essay or a homily. Scholars are wishy-washy about whether the Epistle and Gospel have the same author, ...