Writing letters

This Sunday (the 21st of October) in worship we will be doing something different. Joining the Bread for the World organization we will participate in their anti-hunger initiative, joining their campaign  “offering of letters”.  Integral part of our worship will be dedicated to letter writing. That is actually a very Christian thing to do. Letters has been a formative part of our faith.
 

    The oldest part of the New Testament were the letters of apostle Paul. There are seven genuine letters of Paul (Romans, 1st  + 2nd Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1st Thessalonians, Philemon).
 

    Letters were so popular among early Christians that at least two different schools of Paul’s followers also wrote in Paul’s name. Thus in the Bible we also have seven so called Pseudo Pauline letters (Ephesians, Colossians, 2nd Thessalonians, 1+2 Timothy, Titus, Hebrews).
 

    And in addition there were further letters written even later, up to the second century, in the name of other apostles. Those are seven Pseudoepigraphic letters (which means falsely attributed letters - these are James, 1+2 Peter, 1+2+3 John, Jude).  
 

    Thus in the New Testament , out of 27 distinct writings there are 21 letters! Some are genuine, some are fake, some are only called letters, nevertheless 78% of NT books are labeled as letters. Letters were and remain an important part of our Christian faith.
 

    Join us this Sunday as we continue in our worship this long letter-writing tradition. This Sunday we will be writing to our elected representatives asking them, from the center of our faith to end, or at least limit, the scourge of Hunger.