PENTECOST 18 | James 3:13-4:3, 7-8; Mk 9:30-37 One of my greatest heroes is Charles Williams—I’ve preached about him before, and no doubt will again. I never visit Oxford without visiting his grave. He was a ground-breaking writer who single-handedly invented the urban fantasy genre. His novels were shattering for me when I first read them. He first came to my attention, however, because of his proximity to two much more famous writers, C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. The thre

PENTECOST 16 | James 2:1-10, 14-17; Mk 7:24-37 When I first started to study Buddhism seriously, one of the most difficult concepts to wrap my head around was the cultivation of indifference. This is often the way the Pali word “upekkha” is translated, and it has caused some cognitive dissonance for more folks than just me. I mean, if we’re supposed to have compassion for all sentient beings, how can we be indifferent? This is harder to tease out than it first appears, becaus