Why Ohioans need to stand against HB-486

Friends, this is my sermon from this past Sunday on a passage from Luke. If you prefer to watch, you can watch above, it starts at the 24 minute mark-ish. While I go off script in the video, you can read below my notes for the morning of. This is a good parable. Jesus is tossing out some, what I would call, weird for the day theological ideas, but it’s good. This is one of those passages I would really like to spend time digesting and getting pretty nerdy with you all.

A few weeks ago I passed a uniquely American parental milestone: I dropped my child off at preschool after a mass shooting where two children were murdered. This, of course, was the shooting in Minneapolis at Annunciation Catholic School where kids were murdered during their chapel service. Some of you may have seen the clip of the kid talking about his friend Victor that protected him from the shooting, and Victor was struck in the back.

Bitter is the mouth that recognizes injustice.

Every week my church releases an e-newsletter that starts with a section called “dear friends.” This is usually a letter written by a rotating crew of people focused on something happening around the church community, or has recently occurred. This week I had the pleasure of writing about Labor Day. The following is that section: Dear friends, It is Labor Day Weekend, which means the church office is closed Monday, and will re-open on Tuesday.

This week flyers for the knights of the klu klux klan was found scattered around in Norwalk Ohio, and according to the news story from 13ABC Toledo (which you can watch by clicking here), this is the second time in a few months this has happened. I have been relatively quiet on the writing front even though there has been much to say. There is so much shit going on, I haven't known where to start, so here are four things that have happened since I posted my last sermon:

Trinity Toledo This is the transcript from my sermon on 6/22/2025. You can watch it here at the 23 minute mark. The day I was finishing up the sermon, the US bombed Iran. The context is important for how this starts. Whenever there is a global, national, or local tragedy and I am preaching, I leave a minute for us to center ourselves. With the United States bombing Iran yesterday, I am sure we are all feeling and thinking different things right now. So please, let us take a moment to remember the community God calls us to be in this world.

Walter Brueggemann passed away peacefully on June 5, 2025, at the age of 92. He is survived by his wife, Tia, his sons, James and John, and their families. To read his online biography, click here.…

Ascension, Qui-Gon, and the unveiling truth around us.

Our team with Cindy Buhl This past week a few of us from the church I work at, Trinity Episcopal Church, went to Washington D.C. to share our concerns with a few people. These people were Rep. Jim McGovern’s Legislative Director Cindy Buhl, Rep. Marcy Kaptur, and Senior Aid to Sen. Jon Husted, Sean Dunn. Unfortunately, Sen. Bernie Moreno’s office could not supply someone to meet with us.

House Republicans appear to be backing off some, but not all, of the steep reductions to the Medicaid program as part of their big tax breaks bill.