Ralph Connor Memorial United Church

The Little White Church on Main Street, Canmore, Alberta

forgiveness

Sermon: November 1, 2020 – Matthew 23: 1-12

Sometimes, when I read a scripture lesson in which Jesus says something really, really pointed, I wonder if I am on the giving side or the receiving side of what is being said.  Today’s scripture lesson, in which Jesus denounces hypocrisy with a version of the classic-and-catchy phrase, “practice what you preach,” leaves no such ambiguity.  As someone who first stepped up to a pulpit in 1981 and has had the audacity to do in the years since then, “preach” …

Read more

Sermon: October 4, 2020 – Jonah 3: 1-10

This week, illumination has come from a few different angles… and if all goes well, they will converge at something resembling a sermon! watch at https://youtu.be/EkyucrRnq1w  download PDF at Sermon_04October2020 The first angle, is from the spiritual practice we have been following all month: the Examen.  The first three steps of the Examen are all pretty agreeable: Asking God for light, Giving thanks, and Reviewing the Day. Step four, which we take today, requires some heavier lifting:  “Face your shortcomings …

Read more

Sunday Worship online – August 2, 2020

Join us at https://youtu.be/sCxVe7L6qtY for our online Sunday worship, honouring a colleague in Ministry who died of COVID in July: Rev Vickey Gibbs of Resurrection Metropolitan Community Church in Houston.    Her message of being “a follower, not a fan” of Jesus is a powerful statement of Christian discipleship. Click here for a sermon from 2016, recounting the impact of Rev Vickey and RMCC Houston: Sermon_21August2016

Sermon: March 8, 2020 – John 3: 1-17 (Lent II)

When we were in the Holy Land two years ago, we learned that when a Bible story tells you where it happened, it is worth paying attention, as the topography or history of a place makes all the difference to the stories told there. In today’s reading about Jesus and Nicodemus, it’s not so much about where it happened, as when it happened. And when it happened, was at night. click here for a PDF of this sermon Nicodemus, one …

Read more

Sermon: January 12, 2020 – Acts 10: 34-43

Cozy, predictable circles of care, are a good thing. click here for a PDF of this sermon Our twins developed a circle of best friends when they were in grade 3.  Twenty three years later, that group still stays in regular contact, and when they get together at Christmas when everyone’s back in the city, it’s like they were never apart.  Their shared history and acceptance of one another’s transitions through childhood, adolescence and young adulthood is a beautiful, important …

Read more