Wednesday, September 14, 2022

Queerying 15th after Pentecost C

Suzannah Porter and Brooke McLain musically queery the RCL readings.

For what sorrows and wounds are you calling out to God to soothe?

How will humans need redemption for blessings being squandered now?

How do you pray for people who abuse their power?

How does prioritizing financial security prevent faithful living?

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River Needham, MA ThM queeries the Tanakh reading.
ID: a person of color in sepia tones leaning over a table as if lamenting.
Tanakh: Jeremiah 8:18-9:1
When in grief I would seek comfort,
My heart is sick within me.
“Is the Becoming One in Zion?
Is not her Sovereign within her?
Why then did they anger Me with their images,
with alien futilities?”

Hark! The outcry of my poor people
from the land far and wide:
“Harvest is past,
summer is gone,
but we have not been saved.”
Because my people are shattered I am shattered;
I am dejected, seized by desolation.
Is there no balm in Gilead?
Can no physician be found?
Why has healing not yet
come to my poor people?
Oh, that my head were water,
My eyes a fount of tears!
Then would I weep day and night
for the slain of my poor people.

Oh, to be in the desert,
at an encampment for wayfarers!
Oh, to leave my people,
to go away from them—
for they are all adulterers,
a band of rogues.

Queeries for the text:
Who is in mourning?
What is the outcry of "my poor people"?
What is the Balm in Gilead?
What is the physician doing?

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Rev. Emily E. Ewing queeries the Gospel reading.
Gospel: Luke 16:1-13
Then Jesus said to his chosen family, “There was a rich man who had a steward, and charges were brought to him that this steward was wasting his possessions. 2So the rich man summoned them and said to them, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your stewardship, because you cannot be my steward any longer.’

3Then the steward said to themself, ‘What will I do, now that my Proprietor is taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to do unskilled labor, and I am ashamed to ask for what I need. 4I have decided what to do so that, when I am fired as steward, people may welcome me into their homes.’

5So, summoning their Proprietor’s debtors one by one, they asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my Proprietor?’

6The first answered, ‘A hundred jugs of olive oil.’

They said to that one, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, remove the interest, and make it fifty.’

7Then they asked another, ‘And how much do you owe?’

The other replied, ‘A hundred containers of wheat.’

They said to that one, ‘Take your bill, remove the interest, and make it eighty.’

8And the Proprietor commended the corrupt steward because they had acted wisely; for the children of this age are more wise in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. 9And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of corrupt securities so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the everlasting homes.

10“Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is corrupt in a very little is corrupt also in much. 11If then you have not been faithful with the corrupt securities, who will entrust to you what is genuine? 12And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? 13No domestic servant can serve two Proprietors; for they will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and securities.”

Queeries for the text:
What did we skip?
When else was there a rich man?
Who stewards for the rich?
Who brought the charges against the steward?
Who is strong enough for unskilled labor?
Who changes debt?
What has corrupt securities?
How do you make friends?
What is another's?
What is your own?

What are your queeries?



 

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