Sermons

Sermon on March 23, 2025“The Fig Tree and God”By: The Very Rev. Pamela Dolan “Spring is a lovely reminder that change can be beautiful.” I read this on a greeting card the other day, and it’s stuck with me. If I’m honest, I think one reason it stuck with me is that I’m not sure how much I agree with it. Spring has its lovely moments, of course, but personally I’m more of an autumn girl. I love inhaling crisp air, watching leaves change color, pulling out my favorite sweaters, and indulging in both the drama and the coziness of…

Sermon on March 9, 2025“Being Tested in the Wilderness”By: The Very Rev. Pamela Dolan “Lead us not into temptation.” This phrase is from the version of the Lord’s Prayer that I learned as a child, the version that we still use in our Rite I liturgy. The more contemporary version reads, “Save us from the time of trial.” Both temptation and trial are ways to look at what happens in today’s Gospel story, the episode about Jesus in the wilderness that always appears at the beginning of the season of Lent. Another word, one that many scholars think is the…

Sermon on March 2, 2025“Embrace Mystery, Cultivate Love”By: The Very Rev. Pamela Dolan One of the films nominated for a Best Picture Oscar at tonight’s Academy Awards is Conclave, a fictional account of a papal election, with much to say about the role of the church in today’s world. Both times I’ve watched it. I’ve been struck by the words of a homily given by the protagonist, Cardinal Thomas Lawrence, preached to the College of Cardinals the night before they are to begin the process of electing a new pope. In what are supposed to be unscripted remarks, he says,…

Sermon on February 16, 2025“People of Both-And”By: The Ven. Margaret Grayden The Via Media, or “the middle way,” is one of the most distinctive characteristics of the Anglican tradition in which the Episcopal Church is rooted.  In theological terms, the Via Media represents the blending of elements from the Protestant Reformation with elements from Roman Catholicism in a kind of happy medium—the best of both worlds.  Not surprisingly, this approach to faith works well for people who tend to see the shades of gray in a situation, rather than black-and-white absolutes.   Indeed, you might say that as Episcopalians who follow…

Sermon on February 9, 2025“Go Deeper”: A Sermon for Epiphany 5By: The Very Rev. Pamela DolanGospel passage: Luke 5:1-11 Sermon text: I’m going to be honest and just say up front that I’ve never been crazy about that image of “fishing for men,” even when it is changed to the slightly softer version, “catching people.” I guess it boils down to a feeling that I don’t want to be caught; I don’t want to be anyone’s target, or fill anyone’s quota, and I really don’t want to think of activities and services that the church provides as bait for unsuspecting…

Sermon on February 2, 2025 for the Feast of the Presentation“Loving our Neighbor and Becoming Brave“By: The Very Rev. Pamela Dolan Video of the sermon here: https://youtu.be/xD_djMrhVAgLink to Bishop Megan’s letter here. Sermon text: I’d like to add just a few words to this message [a pastoral letter sent by the Rt. Rev. Megan Traquair, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Northern California], and hopefully bring us back to our Gospel reading for today. In the 48 hours or so since I first read the Bishop’s letter, I have learned that Episcopal Migration Ministries, one of the most respected and…

Sermon by: The Very Rev. Pamela DolanSermon for Christmas Day December 25, 2024 “Light & Life” There’s a reason that candles and lights are one of our favorite symbols of Christmas. In the northern hemisphere, Christmas occurs just a few days after the winter solstice, when we have become accustomed to longer and longer nights and shorter and shorter days. Even if we’re used to the darkness, most of us are still longing for just a little more light in the world, in our homes, and maybe even in our hearts. There are so many places around the world today…

Sermon by: The Very Rev. Pamela DolanSermon for Christmas Eve December 24, 2024“Refugia” I was in fifth grade, sitting in a classroom in Aikahi Elementary School in Kailua, Hawaii, when I heard about the eruption of Mt. St. Helens. Like most of my classmates, I thought I already had a pretty good sense of the power of volcanoes. We had all seen eruptions and lava flows, either in person or in pictures, as part of learning about our home state’s ecology, culture, and history. But I don’t think anyone was prepared for what happened in Washington state that spring day…

Sermon by: The Very Rev. Pamela DolanSermon for Advent 3, December 15, 2024“Bah Humbug, You Brood of Vipers” If you are lucky enough to still be receiving actual Christmas cards in the mail, I think it’s a safe bet that very few of this year’s selection will feature pictures of a wild-eyed John the Baptist preaching repentance by the River Jordan or will be adorned with the message “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” This week’s Gospel passage emphasizes once again the countercultural, uncouth, not-ready-for-prime-time ways of this Advent prophet. He is…

Sermon by: The Very Rev. Pamela Dolan“The Compassion of God“Dec 8, 2024 In the Monastery of the Cross, an Eastern Orthodox monastery in the city of Jerusalem, there is a medieval fresco depicting two men. One is elderly, with a long gray beard, wearing the rich robes of a priest or temple official. The other is younger, wearing animal skins and a rough outer cloak. Their faces are uncannily similar and bear the same stern, somewhat pinched expression; if this looks like a family resemblance, that’s not a coincidence, as the men pictured are Zechariah and his son John, also…

Sermon by: The Rev. Pamela Dolan“Prophets, Presence, and the Promise of Truth“Dec 1, 2024 “Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly, like a trap.” Those of us who are prone to anxiety anyway probably don’t much like to hear words like this coming from Jesus. Aren’t we all on edge enough these days without our actual Lord and Savior telling us that we’d better get busy and do something before the other shoe drops, because the other shoe is going…