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Dear Members of Gloria Dei, 

I received an email today from the Bethlehem Institute for Peace and Justice (BIPJ) outlining the life-giving purposes Lent calls us to.

Today marks the beginning of Lent. Ash Wednesday is a somber day that invites us to pause and re-center our hearts. It is a sacred moment in which we remember that we are finite—formed from dust and returning to it. This truth is not meant to weigh us down but open us to a greater hope.

Ash Wednesday calls us to humbly examine our lives before God, not in shame but in honesty. In God’s upside-down Kingdom we are invited to acknowledge where we end so that grace can meet us. 

To support our Lenten journey of learning to acknowledge where we end so that grace can meet us, BIPJ has developed a six-week Lenten devotional, Becoming Peacemakers in a Violent and Chaotic World, which aims to move beyond personal piety, fostering a transformative "costly love" during the Lenten season. The teachings offer a perspective from the Holy Land specifically addressing conflict and justice from the viewpoint of Palestinian theologians.

You can sign up to receive these weekly devotionals to your email - here.

I just finished listening to the first installment, "The Weight of Complicity," by Lamma Mansour and strongly commend it to you for its bracing, prophetic truth-telling addressing the Church outside of the Holy Land.  

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Once again,  Lutherans Connect is offering a daily Lenten devotional with with music, scripture, poetry and reflective writing. This year's theme - LC† From Dust, Still Holy looks at "the body as sacred space,” how each of us is made in God’s image. How much do we idealize what bodies should look like or be capable of? How can we challenge those preconceptions to see the sacred that lies within each human being?

To receive the devotion daily by email, write to lutheransconnect@gmail.com. You can also view the daily devotions on the LC† Facebook Page. 
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For those who prefer the feel of paper in hand, we have prepared a printed Lenten devotional booklet from the Salt Project featuring the writing of Madeleine L'Engle - Life Stories: a 40-Day Devotional on Madeleine L'Engle's A Circle of Quiet. We will have printed copies available this Sunday.  
With Madeleine L’Engle as our guide, this devotional explores biblical stories alongside passages from her classic memoir, A Circle of Quiet. Created in collaboration with the stewards of L’Engle’s legacy, this resource invites us to follow her lead, retelling the stories of our lives as we take stock of how far we’ve come, reconnect with where we are, and turn the page toward the future, catching sight of what God is calling us to do next.
Walking the Lenten road together, 
Pastor Vida 

 

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Pastoral Message