Did You Know?

The Pennsylvania Dutch are not really Dutch. They are a group living in southeastern Pennsylvania, primarily in Lancaster County. Their background is German, which in German is “Deutsch.”

As I begin a series on The Revelation a cartoon from the Naked Pastor

Wishing You Some with Sprinkles

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks to Indexed.

A review of the notables who died in 2008

Click here for a rather full list from the Boston Globe, complete with pictures and description. Some figures are local but most you will know.

Mary consoling Eve

iMonk posted this picture today. It touched me.

Teacher Fired for Marrying Divorced Man to Sue Catholic School

Here is the link to the story here. There is so much that is stereotypical here.

One, the Protestant church comes to the rescue! The Roman Catholic Church won’t marry you? How legalistic and unkind! We will. Come on down. I have literally seen this hundreds of times in my thirty years of pastoral ministry. The Protestant church is the marrying grounds for RCs who do not support the church to which they belong.

Two, the new couple in some shape or form return to the RC Church, in this story, as a RC school teacher, only to find out that the RCs meant it – no remarriage.

Three, the consequent outrage of the new couple that anyone would dare to judge them even though they broke their vows with their church and their families.

I have seen this scenario so many times that I would need more fingers than my family has to count them all. And I have fallen into this trap as many times, it seems. One of the lowest points in my journey to even lower self-esteem was when I met a woman who had been left by her husband and who I had married to another. I only knew the man and his new love, and even though I inquired about whether or not they were “free” for remarriage according to biblical guidelines, I too easily went along. A few years later I happened to meet the former wife. She kindly responded to me without judgment, but it became clear that he had escaped the RCs to remarry. I was the dupe they found. Did they end up going to my church? Yup, that is until they were married. Now they dabble in Roman Catholicism in a different parish where no one knows the history. But looking into the eyes of a woman who was trying to do the right thing within the RC communion and knowing that I had provided a way out for her husband was a new low for me. It changed a lot about how I go about the remarriage thing.