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Proper 21 (26), 29th September 2024
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Proper 20 (25), 22nd September 2024
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Proper 10 (15)Eighth Sunday after Pentecost, 14th July 2024
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Proper 9 (14), 7th July 2024
Seventh Sunday after Pentecost Mark 6:1-136:1 He left that place and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. 6:2 On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, “Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given…
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Preaching Paths 7 July 2024 Proper 9B
Sally A. Brown, Professor Emerita, Princeton Theological Seminary Mark sets two closely related pericopes side by side in Mark 6:1-13. Both stories advance a now-familiar theme: those who share news of the reign of God, in word or deed, should be prepared to face opposition or downright rejection. Jesus did, even in his own hometown.…
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Preaching Paths 30 June 2024 Proper 8B
Sally A. Brown, Professor Emerita, Princeton Theological Seminary In Mark 5:21-43, Mark deliberately embeds one striking healing event inside another. The dramatic tension unfolding in each story is generated by their interplay. They need to be preached together. The supplicants in these interwoven stories could not be more different. Jairus, who seeks healing for his…
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Proper 7 (12) Fifth Sunday after Pentecost, 23rd June 2024
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Preaching Paths 16 June 2024 Proper 6B
Sally A. Brown, Professor Emerita, Princeton Theological Seminary Today’s Gospel reading, Mk 4:26-34 offers us two agrarian parables portraying the reign of God, followed by brief commentary on Jesus’ teaching methods with crowds and disciples, respectively. Both parables—literally, sketches “alongside-thrown” (para-bole) widespread popular expectations about the reign of God—employ a popular Semitic trope: the marvel…
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Proper 5 (10)Third Sunday after Pentecost, 9th June 2024
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Preaching Paths 2 June 2024 Proper 4B
Sally A. Brown, Professor Emerita, Princeton Theological Seminary Today’s text, Mark 2:23-3:6, presents two scenes in which questions around sabbath observance are at stake. If we trace our way backward through these scenes and the preceding ones, we discover a concatenation of issues, each “nested,” in a sense, within a broader one. We find that…