Author Archives: edithmhumphrey

Philippian 4:4-9; John 12:1-18 Numbers 22; Zechariah 9:9 When fishes flew and forests walked And figs grew upon thorn, Some moment when the moon was blood Then surely I was born; With monstrous head and sickening cry And ears like errant wings, The devil’s walking parody Of all four-footed things. The tattered outlaw of theContinue reading “Palm Sunday: Being a Donkey”

Readings: Hebrews 6:13-20; Mark 9:17-31 Genesis 14:14-20; Genesis 22:16-18; Isaiah 52: 13-53:6 Usually, when we hear the word “forerunner,” we think of John the Baptizer, who prepared for the coming of the Lord.  But our epistle reading for this fourth Sunday of Lent tells us that we have an even greater Forerunner—Jesus himself, the oneContinue reading “Fourth Sunday of Lent and St. John Climacus: Following the Foremost Forerunner”

Hebrews 1:10-2:3; Mark 2:1-12; Psalm 101 (102 MT), Daniel 7. More than twenty years ago, when I was fairly new to teaching, I had one year in which I cobbled together four lectureships at different institutions.  Each of them had a different character—one was secular, one was evangelical, one was a liberal arts college runContinue reading “Without Precedent! (Second Sunday of Lent)”

Romans 13:11-14:4; Matthew 6:14-21 Isaiah 58:1-11; Sirach 28:1-7 “Give me tears, O God, as once Thou gavest them to the woman that had sinned, and count me worthy to wash Thy feet that have delivered me from the way of error. As sweet-smelling ointment let me offer Thee a pure life, created in me byContinue reading “Forgiveness and Fasting: Cheesefare and Forgiveness Vespers”

How is it possible that the good creation which God entrusted to us has become for many a means of enslavement? How is it possible that the creation, which God called “good,” and which he meant as a lovely nexus of signposts towards him, we have turned into ends in themselves, idols that can neverContinue reading ““Hastening to that Fatherly Refuge:” The Sunday of the Prodigal Son”

Matthew 15:21-28; 2 Cor. 6:16-7:1; Dan. 7 Today’s gospel reading, at first blush, is a scandal. How is it possible that Jesus could even seem to have refused anyone who came to him for help? Yet, working from the rules that I learned in grad school of contemporary Biblical scholarship, this passage, above all others,Continue reading “Going to the Dogs? The Seventeenth Sunday of Matthew”

Readings: 1 Timothy 4:8-15; Luke 19:1-10 Daniel 7:12-14; 17-18; 1 Chronicles 16:7-14 What makes a BIG human being? What does it really entail to “man up,” to use a politically incorrect, but graphic “exclusivist” expression? Our readings for Divine Liturgy this Sunday, the Sunday of Zacchaeus, tell the story of a man who was smallContinue reading “Sons of Abraham, the Son of Man, and a Wee Little Man: Sunday of Zacchaeus”

Hebrews 13:17-21; Luke 17:12-19; 2 Kings (4 Kingdoms) 5; selections from Isaiah This Sunday, as we remember our great Father Anthony who deliberately went into the desert in order to become closer to God, we also hear the story of one who made an outcast by his condition, and how he was healed by ourContinue reading “Loving Lepers, Foreigners and Israel: Twelfth Sunday of Luke and St. Anthony the Great”

Titus 2:11-14; 3:4-7; Matthew 3:13-17; Mark 1:1-8 Isaiah 9:1-2; 27:1; 40:1-10. I remember when I first encountered the Orthodox Church, I was surprised at the “spin” that they put on the feast of Theophany, celebrated at the same time as the Western Epiphany. I was not used to contemplating the Holy Trinity at this timeContinue reading “On Dragons, Water, Light, and the Holy Trinity: Theophany and its Forefeast”

Hebrews 11:9-10, 32-40; Matthew 1; Joshua 2, 6:23-25 For someone not brought up in the Orthodox tradition, this Sunday’s reading from the gospel may seem strange: why read a genealogy in Church? That may be interesting for the historian or the Biblical scholar, but what does the ordinary person do with all those “begats”? Indeed,Continue reading “Rahab? One of these names is not like the others! (Sunday before the Nativity)”