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Lead Article for Happenings Email, December 16, 2025

“You must be really busy at Christmas time.” This is a common question I receive when I have a conversation with someone who has just found out I am an Episcopal Priest. It always makes me chuckle. Because while Christmas is one of our two biggest services, it generally isn’t all that busy, compared to Holy Week and Easter it’s a breeze. I say that, but I always add a caveat. Because, for whatever reason, people find Christmastide a really good time to die. It makes sense, it is one of those moments in the year when families all gather, and the effort to meet an come together is a little higher than it normally us. Kids have breaks, so are back from college, or at home with no school work to do. Work has slowed down a bit, and it becomes important to gather as a family. Oftentimes our elders, grandparents and other matriarchs and patriarchs wait until these moments to leave this mortal earth. Now, please, don’t take this as me telling you, a member or friend of St. Ed’s that you should...
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Happenings Lead Article for December 2nd

On Slime Mold Sunday last week, I said something that triggered my brain, I said we have accomplished all we have because you all show up. Showing up is important, because any given Sunday you could be doing anything else but joining us for the morning. There’s a lot of pressure this time of year. Pressure to be joyful, to be organized, to be present for everyone in your life, to hold things together even when you’re tired or stretched thin. I want to name something gently: nobody shows up to church by accident. Whether you come every Sunday or wander in once during Advent, every act of showing up is a small act of courage, hope, and trust. Because when we walk through the doors, we’re taking a risk. A risk that we might be met with silence when what we need is connection. A risk that the words or music might not land the way we hope. A risk that we’ll bring our questions or grief or weariness and not know how they’ll be held. And yet we come. We come because something in us knows that...
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Saint of the Week: Richard Hooker

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RICHARD HOOKER, ANGLICAN PRIEST & THEOLOGIAN In any list of Anglican theologians, Richard Hooker’s name would stand high, if not first.  He was born in 1553 near Exeter, and was admitted in 1567 to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, of which he became a Fellow ten years later. After ordination and marriage in 1581, he held a living in Buckinghamshire. In 1586, he became Master of the Temple in London. Later, he served country parishes in Boscombe, Salisbury, and Bishopsbourne near Canterbury. A controversy with a noted Puritan led Hooker to prepare a comprehensive defense of the Reformation settlement under Queen Elizabeth I. This work, his masterpiece, was entitled The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity. Its philosophical base is Aristotelian, with a strong emphasis upon the natural law eternally plante by God in creation.  On this foundation, all positive laws of church and state are grounded—upon Scriptural revelation, tradition, and reason. Book Five of the Laws is a massive d...
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Sermon for Sunday After All Saints. All Saints reading used.

The Rev. Aron Kramer  All Saints Sunday  November 2, 2025 Daniel 7:1-3,15-18; Psalm 149; Ephesians 1:11-23; Luke 6:20-31 The Kingdom of God has always been found in the cracks. The broken places where tears and weeping, fear and despair are more poignant than the joy of being found. In the scriptures the stories are simple, widows sharing their last bit of financial security, Mary pouring the last of the oil on Jesus, disciples gathering loaves and fish, a woman challenging Jesus for crossing cultural boundaries. We find the Kingdom of God at St. Edward’s in a Garden restored and a bridge built. Medians filled with rocks, dirt, mulch and the hope of new plant life. Laughter and conversation after church. We find it in the songs that give us memories of time with our loved ones, those who are still here and those who have died. We hear it in the stories shared at Bible study about how the mysticism of the Gospel has impacted us. The Kingdom's inbreaking can be found in our hist...
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Saint of the Week: James Hannington, Bishop and his companions

Here is a saint I was a bit unfamiliar with. His day is today, October 29th. This comes directly from Lesser Feasts and Fasts, 2022. Not so sure its the best use of sainthood in our calendar. The infomration seems a little suspect.  INFORMATION: James Hannington was born in Sussex on September 3, 1847, and was educated at Temple School in Brighton. For six years, he assisted his father in the warehouse business. The family became members of the Church of England in 1867, and the following year, Hannington entered St. Mary Hall, Oxford, where he obtained his B.A. and M.A. degrees.  Following his ordination at Exeter, Hannington served as a curate in his native town until, in 1882, he offered himself to the Church Missionary Society for its mission in Victoria, Nyanza, Africa. Serious illness soon required his return to England, but he went out again to Africa in 1884, as Bishop of Eastern Equatorial Africa.  Hannington’s mission field was on the shores of Lake Victoria. He...
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We Are Listening...

HAPPENINGS LEAD ARTICLE FOR 10/21/2025 My brother recommended a book called Nonviolent Communication. I haven’t read it yet, I still need to get it from his home in Duluth. But this past week I have heard the word nonviolent in many different ways and I am realizing I need to listen more intently. The book, Nonviolent Communication, written by Marshall Rosenberg, seeks to teach us how to foster empathy, understanding and cooperation. How do we express ourselves honestly and listen with compassion therefore reducing conflict and raising up personal connection in our networks of relationships. The book works to create a mindset of compassion in its readers, a mindset that shifts how we speak, how we think and how we act. I am often torn when I see all that is going on around us. It seems the only reaction we can truly have is a similar judgemental, violent reaction to the actions that demean and belittle our neighbors. During the protests on Saturday I watched people walking down streets...
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The Spirit is Here

I had the opportunity to meet with two very different people who are fairly new to the St. Edward's Community. One person is very much on the edges and is considering coming to Church more often, while the other is about ready to jump feet first into the place. In both meetings I found myself talking with gradual acceleration about the vision we have worked on here at St. Ed's and the possible ministry opportunities that face us. I realized, as I sit in my office reflecting, I haven't expressed the same kind of enthusiasm and energy to most of you as I have to these new faces, eyes and ears. I haven't gotten red in the face from not breathing because I don't want to take a breath and stop my stream of consciousness.  So, get ready, because it is past time I start channelling the Holy Spirit and here is the thing.  What I have come to understand is that St. Edward's is a thin place. The barrier between the Kingdom breaking into the world and our world itself is e...
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