Tag: Apocalypse

This past Sunday, across many Christian traditions, the season of Advent began. This season begins with apocalypse, revelation. Contrary to the popular and colloquial use of the term apocalypse, it does not mean “end of the world.”  Quite literally, apocalypse means revelation, pulling [the curtain] away. When a play begins there is an apocalypse – the curtain is drawn, and the show is revealed. When I was a child, every morning was apocalyptic; my mother would pull the covers off me, my day began exposed to the chilling reality of a new day.   The entrance to the sanctuary of St….

Dave Delaney, Salem, VA Warm-up Questions 1. What’s the most impressive building you’ve ever seen or visited in person? What was the effect on you? Why do societies build such big, solid, expensive, and ornate buildings?  What’s the giveaway signal that someone is trying to sell you a dubious story  – a politician or a sales spokesperson or even a teacher? Why are some people drawn to believe fantastic claims that really should raise people’s suspicions? When do know to trust rather than doubt what someone is saying? How worried or confident are you about the security of your own…

Karl Barth wrote: “What took place on the cross of Golgotha is the last word of an old history and the first word of a new.”[1] Keeping in theme with this apocalyptic motif, Samuel Adams writes the following, with reference to Dietrich Bonhoeffer: In his Ethics, Bonhoeffer progresses from the disciple’s conformation to the crucified one to the disciple’s conformation to the risen one: To be conformed to the risen one—that means to be a new human being before God. We live in the midst of death; we are righteous in the midst of sin; we are new in the…