Alan Hommerding has been with World Library Publications (WLP) since 1991, most recently as Liturgical Publications Editor for the WLP division of GIA Publications. He is also a composer of numerous published choral and instrumental works, and is well-known as an author of hymn texts. Alan has served the North American Academy of Liturgy as convener of the liturgical music seminar, and as a member of the executive group for the Catholic Academy of Liturgy. He has been a regular contributor to the PrayTell blog since 2016.
Wherever, whenever, with whatever we do it, the psalmist’s command to sing the Lord, and Paul’s command to sing to Lord must lead us toward a song renewed and nourished by a deep and abiding spirit spiraling both inward and outward, toward a profound and enduring understanding.
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Numerous members of the heavenly host persevered, endured, and evangelized through far FAR worse. Quite likely they are having a good laugh at the luxury of my puffball persecutions.
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As with so many other matters, who we define as “the lost” can have numerous threads of racial supremacy, cultural colonialism, sacral imperialism, and other biases woven into its warp and woof.
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“And with that he breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’ ” (John 20:22). I recall hearing this verse on Easter II 2020, and how it tickled my ears in a new way; even moreso in 2021, with a year-plus under my belt of living and attempting to minister in the world of an airborne virus.
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Perhaps our real problem with grasping the topsy-turviness of the resurrection accounts is that we look at them as the final chapters of the gospels, and therefore we think that they are endings.
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Angels are—first and foremost, above all else—messengers of the working out of the will of God.
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As the Scottish poet Robert Burns observed, to see ourselves as others see us is God’s greatest gift, and the Simpson household has certainly helped me do that.
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Time and space are hallmarks in African American worship. The people gather to receive the Word and Sacrament. Movement from Khronos time (human time) to Kyros time (God time) occurs.
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If the Word matters, then words matter.
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It is our acting and working together in our liturgical prayer that ought to be mirrored in our acting and working together for justice.
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