As we come together each week for worship, what are we doing? You might be surprised at how many different “obvious” answers people can come up with in response to that question. For instance, we are making space in our lives to pay attention to God. We come to offer our lives and our joys, and our concerns. We come to spend time with one another, to remember ourselves as part of the Body of Christ, and to check in with each other about concerns and needs and our lives in general.

All of those things are true, and there are many more good answers besides. But the specific one I want to consider in this letter is this one, by Ellen Davis: “Worship is a vigorous act of reordering our desires in the light of God’s burning desire for the wellness of all creation.”

Ellen Davis is a professor of Old Testament at Duke Divinity School, and she points to the many places in the Old Testament where God is at work, creating, healing, and renewing. Many of us are more familiar with the New Testament—where we can also see places where God (in this case Jesus) is at work, healing and renewing. And we know that all that Jesus did for us, on the cross and in the resurrection, was done to bring us back into a place of healed relationship with God.

But why does Davis call worship a “vigorous act”? She is pointing out that worship is not something we consume, and it’s not something we watch—it is something we participate in. As we were taught early in seminary, “liturgy” means “work of the people.” And our participation affects us.

It turns out that jetlag is as real coming west as it is going east, and I feel like my brain is still half asleep, but it is so good to be back—I am so looking forward to seeing all of you on Sunday! I had a rich and wonderful time in the Netherlands and am looking forward to sharing more about my trip with you in the near future.

But first, Annual Conference 2025: everything went very smoothly. There was a beautiful service combining the waters from all over Western Pennsylvania for a service of remembering our baptism and our common call. We commissioned and ordained new elders and deacons, and celebrated the service of those who retired this year. We had a service honoring those pastors and their spouses who have died in the last year, and included their families in our remembrance. We voted on the constitutional amendments, the tally of which will only be announced when all annual conferences have voted. And we voted on more “local” legislation as well: the annual budget for the conference, affirming nominations for conference positions, clarifying points in previous legislation, etc.—the usual run of documents.

As you read this, I will be winding down the trip in the Netherlands and preparing for the flight home.  I will go right from the airport in Pittsburgh to Erie for Annual Conference.  I ask your prayers for traveling mercies, and for our Annual Conference as well:  that it be a good time of fellowship and worship and reconnection in the conference, as well as a constructive time of legislation for the Conference. 

Anticipating that I will not have had time to prepare for the coming Sunday, I have arranged for one more sub for you this weekend:  a young student from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary named Gregory Brown.  Gregory is one of those quiet, popular types of students, and he has a deep, rich voice—I look forward to listening to his sermon online, and I trust that you will make him feel welcome and supported in this time of ministering and learning. 

As you all already know, this week I am in the Netherlands on a learning trip, encountering churches and ministries in the Netherlands, so this will be a short letter.  I ask your prayer for our group of 12 travelers, that this might be a rich time of listening and learning, and that the trip go smoothly and well. 

In the meantime, for Sunday I have asked the Rev. Tom Hoeke, a newly retired UMC pastor with many years in Western Pennsylvania, to sub for me on Sunday.  Rev. Hoeke is a particularly appropriate sub in this case since he himself immigrated here with his family from the Netherlands when he was a child.  I know that you will all make him very welcome. 

For this newsletter I’d like to introduce a denomination-wide summer reading program.  All United Methodists are invited to participate:  we’ll be reading the book of Romans as well as 1 and 2 Corinthians through the summer, a chapter a day.  There’s an entire webpage devoted to this (you can find that here: https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/articles/read-a-chapter-a-day-summer-2025-challenge-resources?utm_source=%2BREAD+A+CHAPTER+A+DAY&utm_campaign=342cfdaaf8-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2024_01_31_01_12_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-c99e73e62b-417344691&mc_cid=342cfdaaf8&mc_eid=a23df2b577, as well as a Facebook page.  There’s also a Zoom small group available as well (see on the webpage above). 

I hope you can join us as we read, even if you miss a few days.  It’s a time of focus for our entire denomination, and a short time of study for you each day.  Maybe you’re a morning person and prefer to do this with your first cup of coffee, or maybe you’d like to use it as a way to wind down before bed.  However and whenever you do it, and whether or not you use the extra denominational resources, you’ll have an opportunity to encounter the gift of Scripture, and to know that you are doing it with thousands of other Christians, all reading the same thing on the same day.  And if it’s easiest for you to do it on the computer, you can use Bible Gateway or some other such online resource for the Scripture—just google the chapter for the day. 

It all begins on June 9th.  You can sign up here (https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/articles/read-a-chapter-a-day-summer-2025-challenge) if you’d like some emails to keep you on track. 

As I write this letter, just in the last few weeks we have hosted a voting site for an election, an e-waste collection (and one that aims to recycle everything and not simply dispose of it all), and I have booked my first wedding in our beautiful sanctuary.  We even already have two registrations for our VBS!  Good things are happening at McKnight!

I am working to book some of the speakers and events that we have been contemplating, with special focus on the ones you prioritized on the forms that you sent or gave back to me.  For instance, I am meeting here with a representative from THRIVE next Thursday, and she and I hope to schedule the refugee dinner and talk at that point, once she has seen the facilities.  We’ve already had Micheal Airgood here, and he spoke a little about his time in Ukraine, but we may want to have him back for a more extended reflection than can happen in a sermon—please let me know what you would like.  And—of course—we have the upcoming VBS.  As we get more on the calendar, we will keep you informed.

As we continue to discern together what we are to be doing in this moment in our culture as McKnight UMC, part of the body of Christ, we have a LOT of things upcoming.  First, tomorrow is our FREE e-waste recycling event.  Invite your friends—it’s a good opportunity to put the church on their mental maps, so to speak, and they can come for smoothies or açaí bowls, too.  

On Sunday, we’ve got Michael Airgood coming to lead worship.  Michael is a licensed local pastor in our own United Methodist conference, and he has spent a great deal of time in Ukraine (including recently) and will be speaking to his experience and ministry there.  We will also have a guest pianist (Fabio Gentili) while Alex is in Ecuador; I’ve heard him play and he’s pretty amazing.  It should be an excellent Sunday at McKnight, full of worship and good music and some time for reflection. 

We’re also turning toward gearing up for our science-based Vacation Bible School—please see elsewhere in this newsletter for details and to save the date.  We want to make sure that all the kids who attend VBS experience church as a friendly place, full of love, that they hear something of God’s love for them, and that they learn about this wonderful creation that God has given us to live in. 

Well, that was quite a storm!  I hope that you and yours are all safe.  If you need help, please let us know at the church, and we’ll see what we can do to either help ourselves or to connect you with someone who can help you better. 

As we celebrate the Easter season (which is several weeks after Easter!), I am looking forward to continuing to think with you about the resurrection and what it means—and how it makes such a huge difference in our lives.  We will do this thinking through worship and Bible study, and through some of the other (many!) activities of the church. 

A big thank you to those of you who coordinated an Easter Egg Hunt for our kids, and thank you to Carla for her faithful service with curriculum and crafts for church school!  Thank you also to all who brought cookies on Easter, and everyone who contributed soup, bread, cookies, and thoughtful conversation to our Lenten Soup Suppers. 

First of all, a resounding thank you! to everyone who has filled out a response to our ideas about how we can be in ministry together in the coming months. I have a much better idea now of what kinds of specific events and ministries are important or interesting to you, and that will help Council to make good plans. If you haven’t yet had a chance to do so, please feel free to still hand that to me, or to put it in my mailbox. There’s a copy in this newsletter as well as copies on the counter in the narthex (which some call the welcome center). Your input is greatly valued.   

I also want to invite you to participate in this year’s Annual Conference mission event. At conference we will be making hygiene kits for the Mission Barn, given out to people in the wake of disasters or as needed in ministry with vulnerable populations, and all of the churches in the Pittsburgh District have been invited to contribute nail clippers. It’s a small thing for each of us, but if even one pair of nail clippers was given for each person who attends church in Pittsburgh, we can make a huge number of hygiene kits, freeing Mission Barn funds for other ministries, such as flood buckets—and we all know how very important those are in our area of the world.  

First of all, a resounding thank you! to everyone who has filled out a response to our ideas about how we can be in ministry together in the coming months.  I have a much better idea now of what kinds of specific events and ministries are important or interesting to you, and that will help Council to make good plans.  If you haven’t yet had a chance to do so, please feel free to still hand that to me, or to put it in my mailbox.  There’s a copy in this newsletter as well as copies on the counter in the narthex (which some call the welcome center).  Your input is greatly valued.   

I also want to invite you to participate in this year’s Annual Conference mission event.  At conference we will be making hygiene kits for the Mission Barn, given out to people in the wake of disasters or as needed in ministry with vulnerable populations, and all of the churches in the Pittsburgh District have been invited to contribute nail clippers. It’s a small thing for each of us, but if even one pair of nail clippers was given for each person who attends church in Pittsburgh, we can make a huge number of hygiene kits, freeing Mission Barn funds for other ministries, such as flood buckets—and we all know how very important those are in our area of the world. 

And finally, and most importantly, I am looking forward to celebrating Holy Week with you, starting with Palm Sunday this Sunday, and then moving to Maundy Thursday, at which we’ll celebrate communion together, as Jesus did with his disciples in the upper room, and then a Tenebrae service on Good Friday. 

First of all, a resounding thank you! to everyone who has filled out a response to our ideas about how we can be in ministry together in the coming months.  I have a much better idea now of what kinds of specific events and ministries are important or interesting to you, and that will help Council to make good plans.  If you haven’t yet had a chance to do so, please feel free to still hand that to me, or to put it in my mailbox.  There’s a copy in this newsletter as well as copies on the counter in the narthex (which some call the welcome center).  Your input is greatly valued.   

I also want to invite you to participate in this year’s Annual Conference mission event.  At conference we will be making hygiene kits for the Mission Barn, given out to people in the wake of disasters or as needed in ministry with vulnerable populations, and all of the churches in the Pittsburgh District have been invited to contribute nail clippers. It’s a small thing for each of us, but if even one pair of nail clippers was given for each person who attends church in Pittsburgh, we can make a huge number of hygiene kits, freeing Mission Barn funds for other ministries, such as flood buckets—and we all know how very important those are in our area of the world. 

And finally, and most importantly, I am looking forward to celebrating Holy Week with you, starting with Palm Sunday this Sunday, and then moving to Maundy Thursday, at which we’ll celebrate communion together, as Jesus did with his disciples in the upper room, and then a Tenebrae service on Good Friday. 

Welcome to April—we are looking forward to celebrating Easter together!

As we live out these final weeks of Lent together, we still have the opportunity to gather for food and for thoughtful conversation at the Lenten Soup Suppers.  Tonight I’ll be cooking—Crockpot Chicken Chili and Lentil & Artichoke soup—I hope you can join us.  Carla usually makes bread for us, and she and others contribute cookies.  It should be delicious and it’s an opportunity to encounter each other in a way that is different from what we do in church.  It’s more interactive, with more listening to a variety of voices, as we get to know each other and our faith better each week.  

We are in the early stages of preparation for our VBS, Wild Wonder, which will take place the week of July 14th.  Kathy Duncan at the preschool recommended mornings over evenings, saying that the kids tend to have sports in the evenings, so we’re going to go with that.  We’ll need a variety of volunteers, including food, art, and shepherding kids.  The size of the VBS will have to depend on how many people we have available to help, because we need to keep everyone safe and we need to not exhaust our volunteers.  Please let me know if you can help, whether it’s providing supplies, working directly with kids, or working not directly with kids. 

I’m excited about a VBS that isn’t overly produced, and that certainly won’t be the same as all the other churches in the area.  Wild Wonder is a science-oriented curriculum, and I hope that we can sow some seeds about God being in science, not separate from it.  I also think that in a world in which fewer of even Christian families believe that church attendance is important, this VBS can be a great chance for some kids to encounter church as a friendly and kind place to be. 

As we progress through Lent, we can see the days become brighter and longer, and our sense of possibility expands.  Growth is beginning in the natural world around us, with snowdrops and the first daffodils blooming, and spring winds are clearing some of last year’s leaves away. It’s as if the whole world is headed to Easter with us. 

Before we get there, though, we need to not rush past the realities of Lent.  We have insights to gain here, too, in the quiet time.  We continue to spend time reflecting together in worship and on Wednesdays, at our soup suppers.  You already know that I love worshipping together, but Wednesdays provide us with different opportunities, which I also love:  we can hear more from each other about how we encounter the scriptures and the world.  Wednesdays emphasize listening to each other, and that is always a gift to a community.  I hope you can come and be part of it as we reflect together. 

Meanwhile, on Sundays, I hope you can check out our bulletin board, as Carla and the Sunday school kids keep it fresh with new activities that they have done together.  Many thanks to Carla for all that she does!  And while we’re talking about kids, we’re holding the week of July 14th for our VBS this year. 

 Finally, thank you to all of you who have responded to our survey of your interests regarding what activities we do together as a church. 

I was way too old when I realized that, in fact, everyone is making it up as they go along.  We train, we study, we prepare—and yet, in the moment, it’s always up to us to figure out how best to meet the moment.  Or at least how we plan to meet the moment right “now.” 

That is not to disrespect all of the training and education that we do, in fact, do.  I am a really big fan of education.  I continue to audit a course at my seminary every semester to extend my learning—even though my education did actually give me the tools that I needed for the calling I currently have in the church.  I just love learning more, and discussing interesting and important things about God and about faith with people who are as interested as I am.  

I hope, too, that as I learn and talk and listen, I can share these things with you, as we study and worship together.  In addition to our worship services, of course, right now we have our Lenten soup suppers.  I love this tradition because it allows us fellowship as well as learning—we encounter each other personally.  These opportunities allow us to think about how we are meeting—and each other—in this particular moment.  What questions do we have?  What tools or knowledge do we have? What ideas or insights might we glean from our neighbors?  And, importantly, how can we offer love and support to another person as they live their lives? 

Greetings on this sunny day! 

We have begun our Lenten season together with Ash Wednesday, a good part of which is reckoning with our humanity.  We are finite creatures, at least in this life.  We are beloved by God, but we are not God.  We are full of possibility, which is given to us by God.  Without God breathing life into us, we would be less than we are.  Because of that, Lent is a time of humility, and of recognizing our need, but it is also always about gratitude to God.  

I actually love Lent, because in a culture that values cheerfulness and mastery, it’s good to have a time to admit that not everything is always okay in the world—including in ourselves.  We can admit, in this time, that the world is broken, and that, sometimes at least, so are we.  It is good to have a time in which we are allowed to be honest, and not be always packaging ourselves for public consumption.  

And admitting that the world is broken allows us to respond.  It allows us to respond to ourselves, to notice that we need care.  It allows us to respond to others, who also need care.  And it allows us to respond to the wider world around us:  as theologian Norma Wirzba says, the “remedy for a broken, lonely, and commodified world” is “nurtur[ing] the places and creatures that nurture us.” 

 Lent is a time in which we repent, but it is also a time in which we notice that we have needs. 

Greetings in this early and still changeable March! 

I’m looking forward to observing Lent with you.  Some of you will have seen the Pope’s recent statement on fasting and Lent.  Instead of worrying about not eating chocolate or some such treat, the Pope suggests that we fast from indifference towards others:

1. Fast from hurting words and say kind words.

2. Fast from sadness & be filled with gratitude.

3. Fast from anger & be filled with patience.

4. Fast from pessimism & be filled with hope.

5. Fast from worries & have trust with God.

6. Fast from complaints; contemplate simplicity.

7. Fast from pressures & be prayerful

8. Fast from bitterness; fill your heart with joy.

9. Fast from selfishness and be compassionate.

10. Fast from grudges and be reconciled.

11. Fast from words; be silent and listen.

While Pope Francis is not the only person making such statements, his list does help us to remember the real priority of Lent, which is not so much punishment as it is to remember who God is, as well as a right relationship with God—which then has an effect on how we live with each other. 

Here at the end of February, we’re into the lead-up into Lent now, and I’d like to give you a heads-up about what we’re up to this year.  We’ll be doing “Ashes to Go” for the preschool, and I’ll have an Ash Wednesday service at 7:00 that night.  I hope you’ll come, if you can—in some ways it’s a service about being human, and in some ways it’s about living with finite time.  Whatever our advances are medically and technologically, we are still finite human beings, and Lent has a way of framing our finite bodies in relationship to God that is both humble and loving. 

And we’ll be continuing this year with our popular Lenten Soup Supper series—we’ll meet each Wednesday at 6:00 in the Fellowship Hall.

Once again, I’d like to thank you for your participation in putting together love baskets for shut-ins and other people in or adjacent to the church—they were so well-received, and brought joy to both giver and receiver!  As our world seems to get ever more anxious and even hostile, love and direct human contact can do a great deal.  Thank you to all who gathered, donated, organized, and delivered the love baskets on behalf of the community!

One comment that I did hear back after the delivery of the baskets was that some people feel that the church worship service is too early.  I’m not a morning person, either, so I can understand that!  But it seemed to me a good time to explain why our service is earlier now than it was before I got here, and that is that I pastor both McKnight UMC and Epworth UMC (in Allison Park).  My pastoring both churches allows each to pay only a portion of my salary, instead of the full amount, which helps both churches to balance their budgets.  But in order for me to do both services, one service has to be early and one later.  As McKnight was already meeting at 10:00, moving the service up a half hour was a relatively easy change—especially as McKnight doesn’t have air conditioning—I’ve seen how drowsy people can get in the summer when the church is too warm!  I hope that explanation helps.

Finally, I went last night to a continuing education lecture at PTS, in which the Rev. Dr. Lovett Weems, a professor at Wesley Theological Seminary who studies church trends, spoke to us about the times in which we find ourselves—how we might think about them and how we might respond.  One key takeaway was the idea that Covid only accelerated a trend that was already happening in church populations—which I actually already knew.  But what I didn’t do with that knowledge is take it to the next step, as Dr. Weems did:  if Covid only accelerated what was already happening, and church populations were getting smaller, then what we were doing then already wasn’t a sufficient response to the world as it is now.

This does not mean that we should disrupt everything—church is clearly working as it is for a significant number of people, likely including many of you and also me.  But it does mean that we need to think in new and different ways if we want to offer this love and this grace that we have found to people who aren’t already churched.

Last night I attended a conversation between Rabbi Shai Held and the Rev. Dr. Jerome Creach at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, in which Rabbi Held’s new book, Judaism is About Love, was discussed.  It was such a good, productive conversation between the two speakers (and including the audience), and I thought that I could share here some of the insights from last night. 

First we had to define terms, so Rabbi Held spoke on how love, at least for this kind of discussion, isn’t so much a feeling or an emotion—although there are elements of emotion there.  Love is rather a “disposition,” a commitment to putting oneself into a kind of slow, steady work in a relationship.  There is a kind of habituation to the work of love—we are trained and we train ourselves into the habits of love. 

This kind of love isn’t just the love that we hold for God.  If we love God, then we must also love God’s beloved creation, and this love carries a variety of obligations as well as a way of viewing ourselves and the world.  Rabbi Held said, for instance, that there is a continuity between human rights and holding the door for the person behind you.  In either case, you are recognizing and honoring another person in the world as God’s beloved creation. 

Rabbi Held said so much more, and I do encourage you to read his book and consider what he has to say. 

In the meantime, I also want to thank you for your excellent work on our Valentine’s “baskets,” which turned into Valentine’s bags. 

February greetings!  This week in my letter I’d like to bring your attention to a couple of upcoming events: 

There’s an upcoming conference retreat for the laity, to learn and grow about the sacraments of communion and of baptism.  It’s a 3-day retreat at Jumonville (beautiful!) on March 23-25th designed to help you learn more about the sacraments, which are one of what John Wesley calls our “means of grace.” 

Also upcoming is the rescheduled Martin Luther King, Jr Worship Service, which will take place on February 16th at 4:00 p.m. at the Monroeville United Methodist Church.  Speaking will be Dr. Joe Smith, director of spiritual formation at First UMC Pittsburgh, and our bishop, Sandra Steiner-Ball. 

Both of these events are posted on our bulletin board in the front hall.  Posted as well are two QR codes that you can scan, so that you can register for emails and/or Facebook connection with our Pittsburgh District.  We Methodists are connectional—we don’t exist in random isolated communities but always in connection with each other, supporting each other and extending our reach in ministry to the world.  Staying connected helps us to see the larger picture so that we can listening to each other and participate more easily.