Loosed Canon

Christ the King Sunday Year C November 24, 2019 St. Michael’s Episcopal Church The Rev. Canon Michael J. Horvath Jeremiah 23:1-6; Luke 23:33-43 Both Roman Catholics and Episcopalians understand that Jesus' death on the cross-and his subsequent resurrection-are pivotal events for our faith. Through Christ's death and resurrection God redeemed humankind from sin, demonstrated once and for all that God's power and love is stronger than all power on earth-even death, and confirmed that God's promise of eternal life is for all who believe. While most Christians can agree with that, we have differing ways of talking about what that means in the way we practice faith. While both Episcopalians and Roman Catholics agree that the crucifixion and the resurrection of Christ are important-we talk about them in ways that put emphasis in different places. It is like an orchestra that plays the same music, but different parts of the orchestra emphasize different notes in ...

Pentecost 23 Sermon Year C November 17, 2019 St. Michael’s Episcopal Church The Rev. Canon Michael J. Horvath Malachi 4:1-2a; Luke 21:5-19 If there is one thing that I learned about having lived in New York City for 11 years, it’s that it is not the same city I moved to in 2006 when I left it in 2017. During my 11 years there, the very landscape of the city dramatically changed. Once crowded with factories, Long Island City has transformed into a booming residential neighborhood; in recent years, it’s seen more new apartment construction than any other place in the US. Hurricane Sandy came and went, destroying buildings and landmarks that had dotted the skyline and groundline for over a hundred years or more.  During these years, innovative architects and landscape designers took the old abandoned West Side railroad and created a park full of plants and trees now called the Highline (and now the most visited park in NYC after Central Park).  Iconic eateries and rest...

Pentecost 22 Sermon Yr C November 10, 2019 St. Michael’s Episcopal Church The Rev. Canon Michael J. Horvath 2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17 Throughout history, various men (and as far as I can tell, they have all been men) have fallen into the trap of believing themselves to be God. Students of the New Testament and early Christianity mostly remember Caligula for his order to have statues of himself set up in the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem in 40 CE as evidence of his divine status. Although the Emperors Augustus and Tiberius had been “divinized,” or declared to be Gods after their deaths by the Roman Senate, Caligula was the first emperor to demand this worshipful status during his own lifetime. He reigned in the manner of a fearsome and tyrannical god, saying things like “Let them hate me, so long as they fear me.” In the end, and after the years of turmoil that he made the Roman Empire and its people suffer, he died simply a man, killed by his own bodyguards. Jim Jones was po...