Dear Church Family,
At the recommendation of one of our Jewish neighbors, I have been reading a book by the recently deceased chief rabbi of Great Britain, Jonathan Sacks.  It is called Morality. Restoring the Common Good in Divided Times.  It is a thought provoking, balanced analysis of what ails modern society. I would commend it to you. 
The core theme is that we have abandoned a comprehensive moral fabric which in earlier generations held society together.  He explores several factors that have contributed to this, including widespread income inequality, the distrust of institutions, increased expressions of intolerance, and the role of social media in creating a “self-oriented” world instead of one which transcends self for the sake of the common good.
He suggests “where there is no shared morality, there is no society.  Instead, there are subgroups, and identity politics.  The world is divided into the people like us and the people not like us, and what is lost is the notion of the common good.  When the ‘I’ takes precedence over the ‘we’ the result is weakened relationships, marriages, families, communities, neighborhoods, congregations, charities, regions, and entire societies.”
Of course, the analysis is always easier than the remedies.  But the church must keep pushing back against the forces that would divide us, and press toward a vision of the common good.  It is never easy, but always essential. 
In this season of Eastertide, we continue to reflect in worship on the meaning of resurrection.  The texts this Sunday are Acts 2:22-24, 29-32 and Luke 24:13-35, the disciples’ encounter with the risen Christ on the Emmaus Road. The sermon is “When Our Hearts Burn.” 
See you in church.
Rich