Sermon Preview for September 20th

September 20, 2026

Preacher: Rev. Anne J. Scalfaro

Sermon Title:

Intrinsic Goodness

Becoming the Beloved Community Series

Sermon Blurb:

This Sunday, we begin our journey of exploring a different quality of the Beloved Community each week. These qualities stand alone, and they also build upon one another, deepening our sense of what it means to be God’s beloved and shaping our sense of who we want to become as individuals, as Calvary, and as global citizens.

The first quality of the Beloved Community that we are exploring is Intrinsic Goodness, and central to this discussion is how the theology of ‘original goodness’ is a powerful and healing alternative to the theology of ‘original sin.’

We are beginning with this quality because it is foundational in understanding who we are as God’s beloveds and how we are to live in the world, and yet it is probably one of the most difficult things for so many of us to embrace. We are quick to focus on our faults, and we are often kinder and more forgiving to other people than we are to ourselves. As we often say here at Calvary: there is nothing we have done in our past that could make God love us less and there is nothing we can do in the future to make God love us more. God loves us. Period. And that love begins and ends with God creating us in God’s image and calling us not just good, but very good.

This is a great week to invite a friend to church, especially someone who may be struggling with questions of self worth or shame, or who uses a lot of negative self-talk.

Our scriptures assure us that the goodness with which God created us is the same goodness that flows through God’s love to all of creation…no exceptions!

Series Blurb: (longer description on website)

Becoming the Beloved Community – Our Focus for 2026-2027

This year we’re grounding ourselves in the theological conviction that all persons are beloved children of God—and as we live out our belovedness, together we come closer to becoming the “Beloved Community” that Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King envisioned, where all people are honored, cared for, and treated as equals.

The word Becoming embodies both what we already are and what God is yet creating us to be. We ourselves are “in process”—and as a community, the vision of the Beloved Community is something we will never quite actualize here on earth even as we strive to embody it more and more each day.

The word Beloved is also important. As Pastor Anne says, Calvary is a place where people come to be, be love and to be loved, and as we engage those three practices we grow as a beloved community.

For this series each week from Gathering Sunday through Pentecost, we’ll explore a different quality of the Beloved Community—qualities that stand alone, yet also build on one another, deepening our sense of what it means to be God’s beloved and shaping our sense of who we want to become as individuals, as Calvary, and as global citizens.

Centering Quotes:

“Our starting place was always original goodness, not original sin. This makes our ending place—

and everything in between—possessing an inherent capacity for goodness, truth, and beauty.”

“In the practical order, we find our Original Goodness when we

can discover and own these three attitudes or virtues deeply planted within us:

A trust in inner coherence itself. ‘It all means something!’ (Faith)

A trust that this coherence is positive and going somewhere good. (Hope)

A trust that this coherence includes me and even defines me. (Love)”

- Father Richard Rohr

Scriptures:

Genesis 1:26a;31a

26 Then God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness…”

31 God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good…”

Psalm 145:8-9; 13-16

8 The Lord is gracious and merciful,

slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

9 The Lord is good to all,

and his compassion is over all that he has made.

13 Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom,

and your dominion endures throughout all generations.

The Lord is faithful in all his words

and gracious in all his deeds.

14 The Lord upholds all who are falling

and raises up all who are bowed down.

15 The eyes of all look to you,

and you give them their food in due season.

16 You open your hand,

satisfying the desire of every living thing.

Micah 6:8

He has told you, O mortal, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you

but to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God?

Galatians 5:22-23

22 By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things.