outWORD by Matte Downey

Resurrection Morning by JRC Martin Many of us are used to thinking of the weekend as a respite from work and the daily grind, a few days to relax, unwind, and have a bit of time for ourselves and our loved ones. During this Easter season, I was reminded of quite a different kind of weekend, a holy weekend. It began when I read something by N.T. Wright a few weeks ago. Wright draws attention to the parallels between the creation story in Genesis and the story of Jesus found in the gospel of John. For instance, both start off with "In the beginning." Of particular interest are the last few days of Jesus' life in light of the creation story. On the sixth day, God created humankind. On the sixth day (Friday), Pilate brought Jesus before the crowd and declared, "Here is the man!" Also on the sixth day, God finished creation. On the sixth day, Jesus cried out, "It is finished!" On the seventh day, the Creator rested from his work. On the seventh day (S...

Image from paradigm-shift-21st-century.nl These past few weeks have been a bit of a blur. Two weeks ago I was in Toronto at Wycliffe College for a symposium. Last week I flew to Edmonton for another symposium at King's University and stayed an extra few days to visit friends. On the way home, I got stranded in Toronto overnight, but I arrived back in Montreal on Sunday morning just in time to give the talk at our weekly faith gathering. After a day or two at home, I got on the plane again and flew to the East coast for some meetings with church leaders. I have enough boarding passes to wallpaper a small room. Okay, that's a bit of an overstatement, but you get the point. In all of these travels, I have been privileged and extremely grateful for the opportunity to see different parts of the country, explore various institutions of higher learning, meet many new people, and spend time with old friends. We are made richer by our wanderings. Some of the people I met had tal...

House on the Isle of Iona, Scotland I have been writing a play for the past month.  It is part of my studies that are focused on how we tell our stories.  You'd think that writing a play would be pretty simple.  Come up with two interesting characters.  Put them in a dramatic situation.  Slap down a few pages of dialogue as they work it out.  Reveal a few things about their past that makes the audience go "Ohhhhhhhh" and wrap it up nicely with the protagonist having an epiphany.  Pretty standard stuff.  Not so fast. Characters are living things.  Even fictional ones.  And they resist one's attempts to box them in or predict where they will go.  The main character in my play is an older priest.  I am taking a bit of license with the role, but in general he is a faithful, well-respected, and honest man.  Or so I thought.  Before I had finished the first page he was exhibiting a t...