October 19, 2014 Psalm 99 Matthew 22: 15-22 Rev. Catherine Purves For the past few years, Barbara A. Gusew (Barb, Sr.) has helped refugee families with their taxes. As you can well imagine, filling in tax forms in a country that is still foreign to you and in a second language is immensely difficult. Barb is extremely patient and very careful and knowledgeable about how those infernal forms have to be filled in. …
October 12, 2014 Matthew 22: 1-14 Rev. Catherine Purves When it comes to weddings, there are basically two kinds of people in the world. There are the people who receive a wedding invitation and joyfully prop it up on the mantelpiece. Then they immediately fill in the reply card and mail it back to the happy couple. Right away these folks start to think about shower gifts and wedding presents and they are…
October 5, 2014 Exodus 20: 1-4, 7-9, 12-20 Rev. Catherine Purves I don’t think I have ever memorized the Ten Commandments. Maybe I have, but I can’t remember doing it. I certainly don’t recall having received a prize for accomplishing that feat as a child. And I’m not sure that, even now, I could recite all ten of them in the right order. That, of course, presumes that there is a right order. …
September 28, 2014 Psalm 78: 1-8 Matthew 21: 23-27 Rev. Catherine Purves If you come back this afternoon at 4:00 for Charissa’s ordination, you will be caught up in a wonderful worshipful jamboree. There will be people from at least three churches, Pittsburgh Seminary faculty and students, family, friends, and possibly some people who just wander in off the street when they hear the music and the celebrating. Ordinations are huge, important events…
September 21, 2014 Matthew 20: 1-16 Rev. Catherine Purves I make no secret of the fact that I hate math, and most people who know me soon learn the sad truth that numbers mystify me. If Presbyterians believed in purgatory, and if I one day found myself there, it would consist of endless math problems. I don’t begin to understand the stock market or anything to do with economics. Balancing books, filling out…