St. Ed Said

Did you all notice the small offhanded note in the Acts reading today? Not the vision of heaven Steven has at this moment. It’s not the stones being prepared to be thrown. Not the prayer of forgiveness that ends the story. It’s the coats, the coats given to one of the most important biblical characters in all of the New Testament. Acts tells us that when the crowd rushed Stephen, the witnesses, the men who had testified against him, the men whose job it was to throw the first stones, these men laid their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. It seems like such a small detail in the middle of a murder. I tried to do a little research about stoning, because as we hear over and over, the Jews did not put people to death. They did not have a method of capital punishment. However, stoning was not a chaotic mob throwing whatever was at hand. I am not sure what you all know about this process, but it is much more methodical and intentional than we think. Stoning was a procedure. It ...

FROM YOUR SENIOR WARDEN: FRITZ WRIGHT TURF & TEFLON The Minnesota Twins played baseball in the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome from 1982 to 2009 in downtown Minneapolis. Indoor baseball on artificial turf and under a Teflon roof on a nice summer’s day was about as uninspiring as it gets. This stadium has been well documented for its shortcomings, but there were at least three good things that came out of it. Two World Series championships which are now a generation ago, and the appreciation for beautiful outdoor stadiums. In 1992 Baltimore opened Camden Yards, a retro style ballpark for the Orioles, that changed everything in stadium design. No more cookie cutter stadiums that all looked alike. More cool ballparks were built because the fans would come out to see the facility and the team. The Chicago White Sox built the last cookie cutter stadium in 1991 and kind of missed the boat on fabulous retro ballparks. A new hobby for Twins fans was born: How many of the other 29 stadiums can...

  Damien Priest, 1889 and Marianne Cope Monastic, 1918 of Hawai‘i Lessons and Psalm Isaiah 57:14-19 Psalm 32:7-12 1 Corinthians 4:9-13 Matthew 11:1-6 The Collect Bind up the wounds of your children, O God, and help us to be bold and loving in service to all who are shunned for the diseases they suffer, following the example of your servants Damien and Marianne, that your grace may be poured forth upon all; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. Their Story Fr. Damien was born Joseph de Veuster in 1840 in Belgium, the son of a farmer. At the age of 18, he joined the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. He made his first vows in 1859 and took the name Damien, after the ancient physician and martyr. When his older brother became ill and was unable to join the mission endeavor in Hawai‘i, Damien volunteered to take his place. As Father Damien began his ministry in Hawai‘i, leprosy was spreading...

Lead Article for Happenings April 14, 2026 The Rev. Chip Whitacre, Deacon Several years ago, while traveling in Japan, I read an article in one of the local English language newspapers about a word some Japanese say before a meal, itadakimasu. It’s a sort of blessing that is not overtly religious, but certainly has spiritual implications. The article explained that it literally meant, I am going to eat, but that the meaning was so much fuller than that. The author went on the explain that it was really acknowledging that a person was going to eat because someone purchased the seed and planted it and nurtured it and harvested what grew from it. And someone else had delivered the harvested product to the market. And someone had purchased it and took it to be washed and prepared into the meal that was about to be eaten. It was, in short, acknowledging the many hands that made the meal possible; the many connections between people that we all depend on for a thing so simple as a meal. I a...

The Rev. Aron Kramer 2 Easter April 12, 2026 I used to do a fair amount of premarital counseling, and there is always a moment early in those conversations I quietly looked forward to. We would get to talking about love, what it is, what it will ask of them, and I would tell couples something that almost never landed the way I intend it. I tell them that love is not a destination you arrive at and then simply maintain. It is not something you frame and hang on the wall. Love is alive. It grows and fades, brightens and dims, breaks open places in us we never asked to have broken open. It will cause them, at some point, to question each other in ways they cannot yet imagine. That's usually when I would get the looks. Because early on, of course, nothing could possibly cause them to question their love for this person they are about to marry. And I smile, one of the few moments I allowed myself a quiet I know something you don't yet kind of feeling. Because it's true, isn'...

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Lessons and Psalm Judges 7:1-8a Psalm 119:81-88 Romans 6:3-11 Matthew 13:47-52 The Collect Embolden our lives, O Lord, and inspire our faiths, that we, following the example of your servant Dietrich Bonhoeffer, might embrace your call with undivided hearts; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. From Lesser Feasts and Fasts 2024 Dietrich Bonhoeffer was born in Breslau, Germany (now Wroclaw, Poland), on February 4, 1906. He studied theology at the universities of Berlin and Tübingen, and his doctoral thesis was published in 1930 as Communio Sanctorum.  Still canonically too young to be ordained at the age of 24, he undertook postdoctoral study and teaching at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. From the first days of the Nazi accession to power in 1933, Bonhoeffer was involved in protests against the regime. From 1933 to 1935 he was the pastor of two small congregations in Lon...