Words From Silence: Contemplation in a World of Action

A Sermon Preached at the Cathedral Church of St. Mark Isaiah 52: 7-10; Psalm 2: 7-10; Ephesians 4: 7-8, 11-6; Mark 1: 1-15 The Reverend Tyler B. Doherty, Priest-in-Charge Feast of St. Mark—Living from the Lion’s Roar On this Feast of St. Mark the Evangelist, our patron saint here at the Cathedral, I want to think with you about how the Evangelist might show us who as are a worshipping community, a family of followers of Jesus, and we who are called to be—not just for one another but for the city of Salt Lake, this nation, and the world. That might sound, at first blush, to be a rather grand task—isn’t it a little presumptuous to think that what we, gathered together in this place, might change the world?             Mark’s Gospel is often compared to a lion’s roar. Indeed, the lion features prominently on our banner. Up on its back legs, fiery mane flowing behind, wings spread wide, the lion throws its head back and ro...

A Meditation for Choral Evensong John 10: 11-18 The Reverend Tyler B. Doherty, Priest-in-Charge Since we are gathered together in worship this evening and listening to so many beautiful voices singing the likes of Tallis, Rutter, and Bach, I wanted to think with you about the role slightly different voices play in our lives. In our Gospel for this evening, we hear that there are those who “know that they are known” and listen to the voice of the Good Shepherd, and those whose are lead astray, duped, tricked by the voices of the hired hand and the snarl of the wolf. We could think of the voice of the wolf as the voice of division, the voice that scatters, isolates, and keeps us trapped in the feedback loop of fear. It’s the voice that frightens children at night when they read the story of the Three Little Pigs—“I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow the house down!” Our lives are dominated by the voices of fear and division—cable news, social media, a political system that has...

A Sermon Preached at the Cathedral Church of St. Mark Easter 4B: Acts 4:5-12; Psalm 23; 1 John 3:16-24; John 10:11-18 The Reverend Tyler B. Doherty, Priest-in-Charge Part of what we are up to in these fifty days after Easter is to really understand and learn to live from the gift of the resurrection. Easter is a season, not a day, a movement, not a moment and that’s because it takes us while to see and embody what it means to be an Easter people. It’s the work of discipleship and it lasts a lifetime. You may have noticed that our first reading—usually from the Old Testament—has been replaced during Eastertide by a series of readings from the Acts of the Apostles. That’s because Acts documents how the early Church lives, loves, struggles, and argues with one another after Jesus’ resurrection. Acts might not be the best history or geography lesson in the world (it was never intended to be), but it has lots to tell us about what it might mean to be an Easter people—people who liv...

A Sermon Preached at the Cathedral Church of St. Mark Easter 3, Year B-- Acts 3:12-19; Psalm 4; 1 John 3:1-7; Luke 24:36b-48 The Reverend Tyler B. Doherty, Priest-in-Charge Becoming Human—Broiled Fish, John Rambo, and Banquo’s Ghost Sometime before Holy Week I was scrolling through the new movie releases on Netflix and was struck by how many of the films were all about revenge. There’s Tarantino’s Kill Bill diptych, Old Boy by Chan-wook Park, Gladiator , Mel Gibson’s Payback … the list goes on and on. It’s fair to say that the revenge flick is a genre unto itself with particular moves that we’ve all come to expect—the protagonist has something horrible happen to him or her, she plots her revenge, at some point all seems hopelessly lost, and finally she gets even with person who wronged her in a moment of delicious and (usually) bloody triumph. I remember being at a birthday party as a kid where we were all taken to see Rambo . I can’t remember the ins and outs of the plot...

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ-- In the hopes that you'll join us for as much of the various Holy Week liturgies as you can, I thought I'd give you a brief thumbnail of the basic arc of the liturgical drama we enact this week as followers of Jesus down the path of discipleship--knowing ourselves to be loved unconditionally by God in Christ and learning to be that love in the world. This evening (Wednesday) we will have  Tenebrae  at 8:00 p.m. The most conspicuous feature of the service is the gradual extinguishing of candles and other lights in the church until only a single candle, considered a symbol of our Lord, remains. Toward the end of the service this candle is hidden, typifying the apparent victory of the forces of evil. At the very end, a loud noise is made, symbolizing the earthquake at the time of the resurrection (Matthew 28:2), the hidden candle is restored to its place, and by its light all depart in silence. This service provides an extended medita...

A Sermon Preached at the Cathedral Church of St. Mark Easter Vigil, Year B—Romans 6:3-11; Psalm 114; Mark 16:1-8 The Reverend Tyler B. Doherty, Priest-in-Charge Alleluia! Christ is Risen! This evening, the entire sweep of the Holy Week liturgies comes to joyful climax with the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior. I’ve been preaching all week that the Holy Week liturgies, in their various guises, and emphases, all reveal to us a single startling fact that changes literally everything—God’s undying and unconditional love for each of us, no matter who we are, or where we’ve come from. On Maundy Thursday we saw how the way of discipleship, of following Jesus, is the way of stripping off our robes, tying a towel around our waist, and kneeling to wash the feet of the last, the least, the lost, and the left behind. Washed by Jesus and fed at his table, we lean into our identity as a sent people booted out the door by the deacon’s dismissal, to be water to wash, oil to heal, and brea...