Will Barrett

Dear Friends,

This is the first time I’ve been asked to write or read anything for church outside of readings during services. At first I was quite nervous. Everything I read from folks at Saint Philips seems to be insightful, intellectual, thoughtful reflections on things they seem to deeply understand. I worried that my lack of experience with spiritual interpretation would leave my writing uninspired or amateurish.

But then I read Fr Robert’s Daily Bread from a few weeks ago, where he simply reflected on not knowing what to write. He discussed how sometimes prayer just doesn't come to him easily, no matter how much he would have liked it to. And I realized with that, in an interesting way, that writing and talking about scripture isn’t about understanding as much as it is about relating.

I can recall countless times at church where a reading, or the gospel, or the sermon seems to directly relate to things that happened to me that past week, or just underlying factors in my life. A particularly stressful week of college admissions was followed that Sunday by Fr Peter’s sermon about accepting what is given and moving forward. A week of lots of family arguments followed by a gospel reading where Jesus preaches about love.

The point is that the most important thing to me growing up in the church was that scripture applies to everything and anything, as long as you are willing to open your mind to interpreting it as such. Looking at the readings for this week, I came at it from a personal point instead of an “understanding and knowledge point.” A line from the gospel, “Then he opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures,” seems to encapsulate my realization perfectly, because he completely changes the way the disciples perceive a situation. As always, good timing.

-Will