Thursday, October 2026: Important Announcements and a Reflection on Loving Your Neighbor



Announcement from the Education Committee: 

At this past Sunday's liturgy, JoAnn proposed that anyone who is interested gather to discuss the end of life issues looming on all of our  horizons.  The education committee would like to partner with her and Jim to host an afternoon to explore some of these topics.  

This wouldn't be a formal presentation so much as a conversation to share thoughts—which can be hard to talk about with family—in the supportive and nourishing heart of our community.  Some subjects to consider are burial options, funeral liturgies, celebration of life receptions, obituary writing, etc.  

To help with our planning, would you please respond to Mary FitzGerald (mary@edfitzgerald.com or 707-790-7037) if you think you would attend and indicate whether you prefer to meet  after the holidays in January or some time between now and Christmas.  We will choose a meeting place after we see how many people plan to participate.


Announcement #2: Movie!!! from Nancy McFarland

Hi All,  Bob and I would like to host a small gathering to watch the film,

The AI Doc, on Wed., 11/11, at 1pm at our home. 

Please let me know if you’d like to come.  Mary and Ed have seen it and recommend it

Please respond to Nancy: Nancy McFarland's Email: rnmcfar1938@yahoo.com

(Trailer for the movie) Link on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkPbV3IRe4Y


Reflection

Public theologian Rachel Held Evans (1981–2019) considers how Jesus understood love as the ultimate fulfillment of God’s law: 



Jesus made it clear that he did not come to abolish the laws of the Torah, “but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17). The life and teachings of Jesus, then, embody all that these laws were intended to be. Jesus is what the living, breathing will of God looks like. This includes compassion for the poor, esteem for women, healing for the sick, and solidarity with the suffering. 

It means breaking bread with outcasts and embracing little children. It means choosing forgiveness over retribution, the cross over revenge, and cooking breakfast for the friend who betrayed you. As Elton Trueblood put it, “The historic Christian doctrine of the divinity of Christ does not simply mean that Jesus is like God. It is far more radical than that. It means that God is like Jesus.” [1]  



When Jesus was challenged by the experts on the Law to give an answer for what Scripture is all about, he offered a very straightforward, very Jewish response. Quoting Deuteronomy 6 and Leviticus 19, he replied, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37–40). 

This is the point of every liberation, every wandering through the desert, every law about oxen and yeast and blood. To love is to honor God and keep God’s commandments. Love is the law that liberates slave and slaveholder alike. Love is the ultimate deliverance story, for only love can sustain the sojourner out of Egypt, through the desert, up the mountain, and into the promised land.  



The truth is, you can bend Scripture to say just about anything you want it to say…. We all go to the text looking for something, and we all have a tendency to find it. So the question we have to ask ourselves is this: are we reading with the prejudice of love, with Christ as our model, or are we reading with the prejudices of judgment and power, self-interest and greed? Are we seeking to enslave or liberate, burden or set free?...   

This is why there are times when the most instructive question to bring to the text is not, What does this say? but, What am I looking for? I suspect Jesus knew this when he said, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7). 

If you want to do violence in this world, you will always find the weapons. If you want to heal, you will always find the balm. With Scripture, we’ve been entrusted with some of the most powerful stories ever told. How we harness that power, whether for good or evil, oppression or liberation, changes everything.



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