how I

It is passages like this one from the prophet Micah that reveal how much Jesus was a Jew, knew the Hebrew Scriptures, and was deeply formed by them. If we do not fully appreciate this fact, then we try to know the human text (Jesus) outside of the clear and total context (post-exilic Judaism). Then the message is neither clear nor compelling. How

Isaiah makes a very upfront demand for social justice, non-aggression, taking our feet off the necks of the oppressed, sharing our bread with the hungry, clothing the naked, letting go of our sense of entitlement, malicious speech, and sheltering the homeless. He says very clearly this is the real fast God wants!

New beginnings invariably come from old false things that are allowed to die.

It is not that we pray and God answers. It is that our praying is already God answering within us and through us.

God loves them both. Saint Teresa of Avila summed it up when she said, “We find God in ourselves, and we find ourselves in God.”

Jesus has come to transform people, not to exclude them. He has come for the seeming losers, and not to create a country club for the supposed winners.

Allow yourself to be fully known, and you will know what you need to know.

Isaiah says explicitly that God prefers another kind of fasting which changes our actual lifestyle and not just punishes our body.