Palm Sunday: Art and Resonance

 







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Images of Jesus from Around the World

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  Here are artistic images of Jesus from places around the world. In the gospels, Jesus lives among the people, he meets them where they  dwell and work and share life together. He receives their hospitality and becomes the living Word of God among them.   The next-to-last image, which hangs in our church's upper lobby, is by American artist Warner Sallman (1940).  We are used to "seeing" Jesus this way. The stained-glass image after it is also American, but clearly very different.  The window is in the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, where in 1963 white supremacists  bombed the Sunday School of this African American congregation, killing four girls.  Imagine the meaning of a crucified Christ of color to this congregation. PScott has seen this one up close.   Rembrandt's Head of Christ,  which hangs in The Louvre, is included here.  There is a Byzantine image of Christ painted on a wall at St. Catherine's Monastery in Sinai.  Moving upward.
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Confirmation Promises

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The word confirm means "to make firmer or stronger." Through baptism you were welcomed into the worldwide community of the Christian Church. God's covenantal claim of love, from the very beginning and extending throughout your life journey in gracious ways, was celebrated.  Parents, family, and community made promises to nurture you in the faith and accompany you in your journey of growth until you made your own decisions of faith. Our promises were to God and to one another. Confirmation is the process through which you confirm your relationship with God and your growth in it, celebrating your God-given life and claiming your identity as a disciple of Jesus. You   confirm the essence of the promises once made on your behalf. A Confirmand considers giving her/himself wholeheartedly to God, seeking to know God's will for your life.  You acknowledge Jesus as your Lord and Savior to follow all the days of your life.  You seek the Holy Spirit's guidance in all you do
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The UCC Statement of Faith

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We believe in you, O God, Eternal Spirit, God of our Savior Jesus Christ and our God, and to your deeds we testify: You call the worlds into being, create persons in your own image, and set before each one the ways of life and death.  You seek in holy love to save all people from aimlessness and sin. You judge people and nations by your righteous will declared through prophets and apostles.  In Jesus Christ, the man of Nazareth, our crucified and risen Savior, you have come to us and shared our common lot, conquering sin and death and reconciling the world to yourself. You bestow upon us your Holy Spirit, creating and renewing the church of Jesus Christ, binding in covenant faithful people of all ages, tongues and races. You call us into your Church to accept the cost and joy of discipleship, to be your servants in the service of others, to proclaim the gospel to all the world and resist the powers of evil, to share in Christ's baptism and eat at his table, to join in the passion a
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