From Rev. Ben – I’m not sure congratulations are in order, but congratulations anyway: you have survived a complete year—52 weeks—of online celebration. I have a hard time believing that it’s been a full year since I have preached from a pulpit or passed the peace or enjoyed the sound of a congregation singing hymns together. MPC’s re-opening taskforce will be re-convening…

From Rev. Ben – Welcome to the third Sunday in the second Lent of the COVID-19 era. This week we will be reading and considering the story of Jesus cleansing the temple, and I will be using the story to preach about ways religion and spirituality can become toxic and unhealthy.  You can submit comments and prayer requests via our Comments Form…

From Rev. Ben – This Sunday marks the beginning of the second full week of Lent, the season of forty days that prepares us for Easter (actually Lent is 46 days long; to find out why, read what I write in next week’s Contact). You can submit comments and prayer requests via our Comments Form at mpcfamily.org/comments . We’d love to hear from you!…

From Rev. Talitha – Welcome to Lent. This is the first Sunday of the season and we will be working over the next forty days to “get ready to come close to the Mystery of Easter,” as we say with the children in Godly Play. It is a big mystery so it does take that long to get ready. Please join us…

From Rev. Ben – Laissez les bons temps rouler! I’ve never been to New Orleans, but I love the exclamation folks are rumored to shout on Mardi Gras, which, when translated from the Cajun French, means “let the good times roll!” I suspect that for many people, it is more of an aspiration than an actuality, and that turns the phrase into a…

From Rev. Ben – February is here, the daffodils and camellias are showing off their colors in my yard; it’s cold but the sky is blue. Only in California could such beautiful days make folks long for rain. Drought, of course, is only one of the worrying things about life these days. There is an ongoing pandemic, financial uncertainty, and a divided…

From Rev. Talitha – This week we are diving into a most important Bible passage, from Matthew 25, where Jesus makes an important promise: whatsoever you do to the least of these my siblings, you do to me. I know this is an extra-sacred passage to many MPCers who hold fast to this challenge in our work — especially our charity and…

From Rev. Ben – This is the week each year when, according to Presbyterian tradition, congregations reflect upon what it means to follow the various callings God places on our lives. Now that there seems to be a new era dawning in American life, this feels like particularly important spiritual work.  You can submit comments and prayer requests via our Comments Form…

From Rev. Ben – One of the things I’m learning, as we wade our way through the turbulent waters of 2021’s first three weeks, is that most American churches are not talking directly about what has happened in the United States since January 6th. Most American pastors don’t feel the freedom to speak out in condemnation of what transpired at the nation’s…

From Rev. Ben – In Celebration at the end of one of the strangest weeks in living memory (well, it was really only strange on Wednesday, but that was enough to set the whole week apart as strange), we will be looking at the story of Jesus’ baptism and what it means for us to belong to God’s Beloved Community alongside a…