Come in! Come in!
"If you are a dreamer, come in. If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar, a Hope-er, a Pray-er, a Magic Bean buyer; if you're a pretender, come sit by my fire. For we have some flax-golden tales to spin. Come in! Come in!" -- Shel Silverstein
This is the 12th and final day of Christmas. This is the day when every true love gives their true love 12 Drummers Drumming, which is understood by some good Christian folk to symbolize the 12 points of the Apostle's Creed.
In the Bible, 12 is associated with the perfection of order and government. For example, God chose 12 tribes of Israel, and Jesus chose 12 apostles.
In ancient civilizations, 12 represented the completion and integrality of a thing. It's also associated with the heavens, such as the 12 months of the year, the 12 signs of the zodiac, and the 12 stations of the moon and sun.
In some religions, 12 expresses the Divine Mother.
The number 12 is also significant in other ways, including:
In Ancient Greece, the 12 Olympians were the principal gods of the pantheon.
A clock face is divided into 12 hours.
A dozen is a common unit of measurement for items like eggs.
The average human has 12 ribs.
A foot is made up of 12 inches.
Had enough? Yeah, me too.
I love all the symbolism but I also love what the Atlantic’s Olga Khazan dubbed “12 Days of Christmas Diet". She sums up:
"If you ate all of the birds in one day, including the pheasant pie, but not including all the trimmings for the other dishes, and subtracted the energy you expended milking, dancing, leaping, and drumming, you’d have consumed 2,384 net calories. That’s really not bad, considering the average American Thanksgiving dinner adds up to about 4,500 calories."
12th Night means that it's the eve of Epiphany, the official end of the Christmas holiday season, and the day on which many people take down their Christmas decorations or risk bad luck for the coming year.
Poet Robert Herrick wrote: "Down with the rosemary, and so / Down with the bays and mistletoe; / Down with the holly, ivy, all, / Wherewith ye dress'd the Christmas Hall."
There is, of course, Shakespeare's play Twelfth Night, which features many of the traditions of this day which involve pranks, role reversals, and general chaos. Servants dressed as masters, men dressed as women, and people roamed the streets in gangs, decked out in costumes and blackened faces.
In some parts of England, Twelfth Night was also traditionally associated with apples and apple trees. People would troop out to their fruit orchards bearing a hot, spiced mixture of cider and ale for the "wassailing of the trees."
English settlers in the Colonies brought the Twelfth Night tradition with them. In colonial Virginia, it was customary to hold a large and elegant ball. George and Martha Washington didn't usually do much for Christmas except attend church, but they often hosted elaborate Twelfth Night celebrations. It was also their anniversary; they'd been married on January 5, 1759.
It wasn't until the mid-1800s that Christmas became the primary holiday of the season in America, and at that point, Twelfth Night celebrations all but disappeared.
Pity, I think. Christmas Day has become a commercialized event, with the emphasis being on how much Americans spend on gifts for everyone.
Today, in church, we get to celebrate the Epiphany. I'm preaching at 8 AM but at 10 AM, the kids and those members of the congregation who are "young at heart" will present an Epiphany Pageant.
I love this bit of Christmastide best. Maybe because it's the last bit of Christmastide but I love that we get to remind ourselves one more time of the story on which all the other stories of our faith hinge: The Incarnation.
I mean, if we didn't believe that God - the Divine Cosmic Intelligence, the Creator of the Universe - deigned to robe Godself in human flesh and come among us so that we could learn about the Ways of God and God could learn more about the ways of being human, then, well, nothing else matters.
Not all the miracles - because then, Jesus would have just been a clever musician or, perhaps, a skilled physician.
Not all the wise sayings - because then, Jesus would have simply been yet another wise person or a prophet.
Not the resurrection - because then, that would have just been another magic show that lots of people claimed to be able to do at that age and time.
No, the key element in all of the stories of our faith rests right here, on the miracle of the Incarnation.
And, as the tag line goes, The Wise Still Seek Christ.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
Image: ‘Women with Birds’ by Emily Balivet, 2006
https://www.emilybalivet.com/Twelve_Women.html
"Eleven pipers piping" reportedly symbolize the eleven Apostles who remained faithful after the betrayal of Judas Iscariot. However, the number 11 has other significance.
In numerology, 11 is a master number, which means it has a high vibrational frequency and deep spiritual significance. It's considered a bridge between the physical and spiritual realms, and a symbol of intuition, enlightenment, and personal growth. People with 11 in their numerology charts are said to have a strong connection to the universe.
In China, 11 represents the union of the sky and the earth. In African esoteric traditions, it's related to the mysteries of fruitfulness.
Seeing the number 11 frequently is sometimes called an "angel number". It can be a sign from the universe or guardian angels to pay attention to your intuition and spiritual journey.
So, there it is, then. You get to pick the significance of the symbol when you sing it. Just please do try to remember that there are 12 whole days to Christmastide. So many of the same people who sing that song with enthusiasm still throw their Christmas tree to the curb on December 26th. Makes me so sad.
We take down our Christmas Tree on the Epiphany but we keep our house lights and multiple Creche (Nativity) Sets up through the Feast of the Presentation. Because, you know, that's just how we roll here at Llangollen.
We are fast approaching the Feast of the Epiphany - January 6th - when the "Three Intellectuals from the Orient" came to pay homage to the Newborn Jesus. I'm preaching at the 5 PM tonight and the 8 AM tomorrow but the Epiphany Pageant will be the sermon at the 10.
I understand that the children and a few adults who are young at heart will tell the story with word and song. And, costumes. There must be costumes. Lots of old, plush, earth-toned towels and colorful striped sheets. And, walking sticks, small boxes and Burger King crowns. There might even be a few tinfoil angel wings and tinsel halos.
I love Epiphany Pageants even more than Christmas Pageants.
We'll also have The Chalking of The Doors tomorrow which I think I love even more than Epiphany Pageants. The boss is away with his spouse on Christmastide break, so I'll be blessing the chalk and handing it out to folks, along with a copy of a liturgy they can do in their own homes.
There are lots of resources out there to guide you through it. Here's a lovely one from The Table, an Episcopal Church in Indianapolis, IN., which you can download https://www.thetableindy.org/epiphany-tradition-chalking-of-the-door/
If you don't have "blessed chalk" it's fine to use regular chalk. And if you chalked your door last year, you really should take a moment to wipe it down and start fresh. I think there's something symbolically important about that.
Here's a little something about The Epiphany which I learned years ago from Walter Brueggemann:
For centuries, noble scholars of Torah, Talmud and Mishnah thought that the prophecy of Isaiah 60 meant that the King of the Jews would be born in Jerusalem. However, there was another, smaller, less significant school of thought that remembered the prophecy of Micah 5:4 and thought it more accurate that Bethlehem would be the place.
Bethlehem is 9 miles south of Jerusalem and was as humble and lowly a town as Jerusalem was a large, busy city. Turns out, the elite scholars were off by only 9 miles but might have been worlds apart for what that meant in terms of expectations about The Savior - as well as the nature of that salvation.
I've been thinking that it is inherent in the very nature of epiphanies that we get to them by unexpected routes. I think we have to get lost a few times and we sometimes have to travel a few miles off a road well-traveled before we get to see or experience what it is we need to see or experience.
As my friend of blessed memory, Jonathan Haggar AKA "Mad Priest" used to say, "Of course, I could be wrong." But, I think that, too, is inherent in the very nature of epiphanies. You really don't know you're not wrong until you discover that, in fact, you're right.
Or, vise versa.
Problem is, that the process could take years. In the case of the Three Intellectuals from the Orient, it took approximately 33 years until the events unfolded in such a way that the ancient prophecies were revealed to be true. That's an entire generation. It took a few more generations for it to be revealed just what kind of Sovereign and salvation this particular Messiah would bring.
Meanwhile, we retell the story and chaulk our doors and wait expectantly for Jesus to return. In the process, it might do us well to look in unexpected places and listen to still, small voices and be very wary of directions given by people with great power who say they mean to do us good.
It's the seeking that's even more important than the finding. As Paulo Cohelo writes in The Alchemist, “The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.”
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
Today is the 10th Day of Christmas. It's the day when every true love brings their true love ten lords a-leaping. These are, reportedly, a symbol of the Ten Commandments given to Moses on Mount Sinai. Then again, to paraphrase Freud, maybe a leaping lord is just a leaping lord, unless, of course, you're a stereotypical gay man and then 10 leaping lords is a little glimpse of heaven.
Roman Catholics celebrate The Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus, which commemorates the naming of the child Jesus; as recounted in the Gospel read on that day, "at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb."
There are lots of things on today's calendar of note. Today is the birthday of women's rights reformer and abolitionist, Lucretia (Coffin) Mott, one of the organizers of the Seneca Falls (New York) Convention of 1848.
Martin Luther was excommunicated from the Catholic Church on this date in 1521. The church started formal proceedings against Luther in 1519 for his 95 Thesis. It took some time for the commission to agree on whether his writings were heretical or not. Eventually, they decided that Luther was indeed guilty of heresy, and Pope Leo X issued a bull giving him 60 days to recant. Luther reacted by throwing the bull on a bonfire, so the Pope excommunicated him.
I am amazed that no one has done more with that turn of phrase "throwing the bull on the bonfire". I like it almost as much as the British expression, which could have been said in response to Luther's throwing the bull on the bonfire, "Well, and that really set the cat amongst the pigeons." Watch for its appearance in a future sermon. You have been duly warned.
It was on this day in 1882 that the Irish playwright Oscar Wilde docked in New York. Customs asked him if he had anything to declare. Oscar Wilde replied, "Nothing but my genius."
Herman Melville, age 21, set sail aboard the whaling vessel Acushnet on this date in 1841 from the port of New Bedford, Massachusetts, bound for the Pacific Ocean. He was at sea for four years, and his experiences gave him material for Moby-Dick, which begins, "Call me Ishmael. Some years ago - never mind how long precisely - having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world."
Today is the birthday of J.R.R. (John Ronald Reuel) Tolkien (1892). Tolkien was a professor of Anglo-Saxon and, later, English Language and Literature at Oxford University. One day, while grading exams, he discovered that a student had left one whole page in his examination booklet blank. Tolkien, for reasons unknown even to him, wrote on the page, "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." This single line turned into a bedtime story that he told his children, and from there, a book: The Hobbit (1937).
Today, the New Congress will be sworn in which may take a while because the House of Representatives will first elect the Speaker of the House. The POTUS-elect has thrown his support behind the incumbent but gave him a lukewarm "Best of Luck!".
The math is complicated - he needs 218 votes but there are different possible scenarios as to how he might get there. The Democrats are 100% behind Hakeem Jeffries (that's 215 votes).
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) declared yesterday that he would not vote for House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) to serve another term under any circumstances, even if his fingernails were pulled out.
According to reports, there are at least 16 Republicans who have refused to commit to voting for Johnson. Massie, however, is the only Republican member in the House who has publicly stated that he will not vote for the current speaker.
The margin is so slim - reflecting the less than 1% win of the POTUS-elect (Note to the MAGA-DOGE faction: Definitely NOT a mandate) - that we could see a repeat of the 2023 Kevin McCarthy Show, which lasted 15 ballots over 4 days for 215 votes. McCarthy lasted 10 months.
Meanwhile, by practice, the House can conduct no business until it elects a Speaker, meaning the chamber will be paralyzed until it does so.
Welcome to The New Reality MAGA-DOGE Show, which features throwing bull on the fire and setting a cat amongst the pigeons.
See? Tole ya.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
It's the ninth day of Christmas when every true love gives their true love, nine ladies dancing. Someone has actually figured out that if you hired nine women to dance for your true love, it would cost $8,308.12 (+10%).
"Nine Ladies Dancing" is symbolic of the Nine Gifts of the Holy Spirit - or, as described in some places, "Nine life principles -(Love, Joy, Peace, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, Self-Control, and Patience.)
The Calendar of Lesser Feasts and Fasts is empty for TEC but the Roman Church celebrates the Feasts of St. Basil the Great and St. Gregory Nazianzen, both fourth-century bishops.
It is also traditional in some cultures to make a 9-day novena to Our Lady beginning on Christmas Day, so if you did that, your novena would be ending today.
And, the countdown begins. There are 4 days to the ratification of the election by the Electoral College, and 18 days before the inauguration.
We've already had two violent acts that have taken lives and destroyed property: the truck incident in NOLA, which injured 26 and killed 10, and now a TESLA cybertruck explosion in front of Trump Tower in Los Vegas, which left 1 dead and several injured. Both are being investigated as domestic terrorist attacks.
Violence begets violence. Project 2025 is a political platform with violence baked into every line. There is already a war between the racist MAGA and the elitist DOGE over the H1B visas. The MAGA folks are hoarse but still screaming "Mass Deportation" and the DOGE folks, immigrants themselves like Musk (Ramaswamy was born in Cincinnati, OH), argue that H1B visas help bring "smart" people to this country who work for lower wages and are grateful for the opportunity.
But, they aren't racist, they argue. Or, elitist. They're businessmen. Entrepreneurs who understand more about The Spirit of America than most people who were born here.
I don't think you need special glasses to see where this is going.
I've been meditating on the Nine Gifts of the Spirit this morning. I've also been thinking about the 18 days before the Inauguration. If I'm going to make it through the challenging days ahead, I think I need to get myself into a 9-day cycle of a Spiritual Novena that has a daily focus on one of those gifts.
If I lose sight of the gifts of life that are available to me, I am sure to lose my deep sense of gratitude. And, if I lose that, it's just a short drop down to sarcasm and cynicism during which a strange kind of darkness will begin to drape itself around my shoulders like an old, worn-out sweater. Hope will be harder to find. I've traveled that road before, which always leads to a bumpy ride down to the pit where despair awaits my arrival.
When that happens, I am certain to lose the essence of my relationship with God and the people of God. And, you know, if I've lost that, I might as well just pack it in.
If this is beginning to sound like that sappy old song, "Count your blessings, name them one by one," well, maybe that's not such a bad thing, eh?
No, counting one's blessings isn't going to dismantle MAGA or DOGE but it will change MY attitude about "Life in These (Barely) United States." And, if I can do that, and inspire others to do the same, violence has a far less chance of taking hold.
A wise person once said that, in this life, all you really need is love. And, a tiara. And, maybe a cupcake. But, most definitely a piece of dark chocolate.
It's all about attitude, which is always about choice. It has ever been thus. The greatest gift is choice, which is why so many people want to take it away or control it or explain why you can't have it.
For me, it starts with choosing gratitude. For me, that means being committed to living a sacramental, Eucharistic life - a life of sacrificing my tendencies toward arrogance and sense of entitlement for the humility of gratitude.
I am so grateful for this cup of coffee. I am so grateful that I live in a cozy, warm house, driving two dependable cars that we can afford, without debt, sharing it all with someone I love, who, for some wild and crazy nonsensical reason knows me well and loves me still.
And, two dogs who love nothing more than to cuddle and snuggle, when they aren't doing zoomies, and are so grateful to be loved - even though they are fed the same thing at almost the same time every single day of their lives - that they return that love unconditionally.
And, family and friends, some of whom drive me right 'round the bend as well as inspire me to be a better person - sometimes for not the best of reasons - and because some of them are so generous it takes my breath away.
And, I am so grateful for my ability to still find joy in the smallest things: White lights around the roof of our home in the darkness. The way a new home is coming together for friends who are homeowners for the very first time.
A slice of homemade apple pie lovingly made by a dear friend which helped celebrate the first day of the New Year. The new mint tea which my beloved found which we enjoy together almost every afternoon.
A huge bag of Ghirardelli chocolate which was a gift from friends I hadn't seen in six years, and from which I take one piece and enjoy as dessert every night. A Christmas present of two small homemade refrigerator magnets bearing the art of a dear cousin.
I'm feeling better about 2025 already. Cancer? Radiation? Chemotherapy? Okay, no, I'm not exactly ready but I can face them with the strength I'm going to need because I am filled with gratitude which allows me to know joy. And, with joy comes a commitment to justice
Justice and Joy are inseparable companions in the enterprise of being human in community.
I hope you are inspired to do the same. Oh, 2025 is not going to be easy. But it can be better. One day at a time. One Beatitude at a time. One Gratitude at a time. One joy at a time.
Together.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
Good Tuesday morning, good citizens of the Cosmos. Today is the seventh day of the miracle of light celebrated during Hanukkah. It is also the seventh day of Christmas.
The symbol of the seventh day of Christmas is the seven swans a-swimming, which represent the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit: Wisdom, Understanding, Counsel, Fortitude, Knowledge, Piety, and Fear of the Lord.
The seven swans are also said to represent the two great sacraments and five sacramental acts of faith, which are rites that signify the grace of God: Baptism, and Eucharist, Confirmation, Penance, Anointing of the Sick, Holy Orders, and Matrimony.
Swans are considered a symbol of spiritual gifts because they are graceful and beautiful.
Today is also the sixth day of Kwanzaa, when the sixth or Kuumba candle is lit. Kuumba is a Swahili word that means "creativity". It's a day to celebrate creativity and how it can be used to improve the community.
Meditating on the gifts of light and spirit and sacraments led me to consider church as a gift of Christmastide and the last day of the year 2024.
By noon on the 20th day of the year 2025, some of us will need to find a place to strengthen our spiritual core. Others will need to find one.
Some of the things we are about to witness, done in the name of some people's idea of Christianity, will make Jesus weep when it won't cause him to take out some whips and turn over a few tables.
Violence and cruelty so casual and commonplace, inflicted with impunity on the weak and the lowly, and anyone who dares to object to it, will become so commonplace that it will be greeted with a shrug of the shoulders because it will seem to have become "just the way things are" now.
Most of our present churches are not prepared to spiritually nourish much less sustain the souls of their flock for what is about to come.
We need a new vision of church for a new year. Indeed, we have needed a new vision of church for many years, but never have we needed one more than the church we'll need for the next four years.
Quinn G. Caldwell wrote this vision in 2014. We didn't listen then. I hope we listen now.
If we don't, well, we can light all the candles we want for whatever reason we want and sing lovely songs that cheer us with their familiar nostalgia, but who and what we will become will have nothing to do with the dream of God for us as human beings who are made in the image of God.
And that's the vision we have lost sight of - that we are all, each and every last one of us - made in the image of God. If we believed that, our vision of the world would surely change, and with it, our vision of church.
Here's that vision of church. If it makes you either uncomfortable or excited, then maybe lighting all those candles and remembering all those ancient stories and celebrating all those principles and symbols may have had the desired effect.
Let's dream of a new church for a new year.
"If you came to this place expecting a tame story,
you came to the wrong place.
If you came for a story that does not
threaten you,
you came for a different story than the one
we tell.
If you came to hear of the coming of a God
who only showed up so that you could have a
nice day
with your loved ones,
then you came for a God whom we do not
worship here.
For even a regular baby is not a tame thing.
And goodness that cannot threaten complacency
and evil
is not much good at all.
And a God who would choose to give up power
and invincibility
to become an infant for you,
certainly didn't do it just so you could have dinner.
But.
If you came because you think unwed teenage mothers
are some of the strongest people in the world.
If you came because you think that the kind of people who work third
shift doing stuff you'd rather not do might attract an angel's
attention before you, snoring comfortably in your bed, would.
If you came because you think there are wise men and women to be
found among undocumented travelers from far lands and
that they might be able to show you God.
If you came to hear a story of tyrants trembling
while heaven comes to peasants.
If you came because you believe that God loves the animals
as much as the people
and so made them the first witnesses to the saving of the world.
If you came for a story of reversals
that might end up reversing you.
If you came for a tale of adventure and bravery,
where strong and gentle people win,
and the powerful and violent go down to dust,
where the rich lose their money but find their lives
and the poor are raised up like kings.
If you came to be reminded that God loves you too much
to leave you unchanged.
If you came to follow the light
even if it blinds you.
If you came for salvation and not safety,
then, ah, my friends,
you are precisely in the right place.
So what are you here for?"
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
- Quinn G. Caldwell, All I Really Want: Readings for a Modern Christmas. Abingdon Press (2014) You may order it here:
https://www.abingdonpress.com/product/9781426790171.
Lord, have mercy!
It's the sixth day of Hanukkah and the sixth day of Christmas when every true love gives their true love six geese a-layin'. The number of geese—six—reportedly represents the number of days of creation. The goose was also seen as being a “sacred” bird. The expression “silly goose” is not slanderous, but pious in origin. It means blessed, happy, innocent, and gentle.
It's the fifth day of Kwanzaa, the day to observe and consider Nia, or purpose. "To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community to restore our people to their traditional greatness." It can mean the purpose for your own future, the financial purpose of your family, or the collective purpose of your economic community.
In my meditation this morning, I've been considering the gift of this day of Christmastide. I keep coming back to the gift of the life of former President Jimmy Carter.
Conservative political pundit, George Will, wrote a scathing review of Carter's life. It was, unfortunately, the first thing I read after I learned of his death, as if he had written the piece after Carter entered Hospice care two years ago in anticipation of Carter's imminent death. George seemed ready to pounce as soon as Jimmy Carter's death announcement was made.
The headline of his opinion piece should have been enough of a warning to me not to read it.
I blazed ahead anyway thinking, surely, George knows, despite what has happened in his not-so-grand anymore but still old party as well as in our culture, that one ought not speak ill of the dead.
George did, anyway. Here's that headline:
"Jimmy Carter was the president who made Ronald Reagan necessary: Richard Nixon made Jimmy Carter tempting; Carter made Ronald Reagan necessary."
What a jerk, right?
Never mind about the abysmal records of Nixon and Reagan. No, let's use the death of a 100-year-old man, the longest surviving former POTUS who was married for the longest time (77 years) to the same woman; a man who embodied and lived his life in the Christian values he purported to believe; the only former POTUS to win a Nobel Peace Prize; the Camp David Accords he brokered that reshaped the Middle East; the work he did to diversify the federal judiciary, including nominating a pioneering women’s rights activist and lawyer named Ruth Bader Ginsburg to the federal bench; the environmental reforms he put in place, becoming one of the first leaders in the world to recognize the problem of climate change - let's take all of that goodness and blame him for the necessity of electing a crook and a scam artist to the White House.
Some people have become so normalized to corruption and deceit that they wouldn't recognize integrity if it lived for 100 years in the same person.
Integrity is a spiritual gift. We are born with the seeds of it when we enter the world, red and yowling and shivering with anxiety, protesting the cold and the blinding light of our new reality.
For some of us, that will be our most honest reaction to the harshness of the world into which we are born. We are then carefully tamed to behave, to not make others uncomfortable with the truth, to adjust and acclimate and fit it.
Some of us never do and spend our lives as misfits and ne'er-do-well. Some try their whole lives to dull the pain of human existence and recreate with drugs or alcohol the serene happiness and comfort they knew in utero or as newborns.
Some become artists who do their truth-telling with the gift of their artistry using words or music, paint or sculpture, telling the stories of our lives with visual or audible or creative images and symbols. Some are activists and work to bring about cultural or political change and transformation.
Still others look around and are determined to improve the human condition, to change the world for the better - through science, medicine, the law, social sciences, and education, or through trades like carpentry, plumbing, and electricity.
And then, there are those who think that the only way to improve the world is to serve themselves - no matter the cost or who pays for it or who gets hurt.
Greed is one of the greatest tempters of integrity. Greed, I think, is an adaptive strategy to the anxiety with which we are born that never really leaves us.
We're about to see unprecedented levels of greed and avarice in the days ahead. The result will be that our individual and cultural anxiety levels will rise in direct proportion to the amount of the corruption and greed and cruel narcissism we will witness in our elected leaders and replicated in our employers, neighbors, friends, and family members.
In the days to come, it will be important to remember the gift of integrity that each of us is given as part of entering the enterprise of being human. It's a costly gift, one that needs attention and care and sacrifice in order to grow strong.
It will be good for us to remember the lives of Jimmy and Rosalind Carter, and the work they did together both while in office as well as after they left the White House.
In the years after their "retirement" the Carters were involved in monitoring more than 100 elections around the world; helping virtually eliminate Guinea worm disease, an infection that had haunted Africa for centuries; and building or repairing thousands of homes in more than a dozen countries as part of Habitat for Humanity.
Oh, and attending church and teaching Sunday School. Most every week. At their beloved place of worship, Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, Georgia.
History will probably not remember Jimmy Carter as the best POTUS. And, that may be fair enough. I think he will be remembered as a decent man who lived his life and led this country with integrity.
No small thing, these days.
As he lies in his grave, Jimmy Carter stands as a reminder of St. Paul's exhortation to the church in Philippi, that, "whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things. " (Phillippians 4:8-9)
In the days to come, as the normalcy of our lives becomes even more discombobulated than it does during "the holidays," we're going to need that reminder.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
Today is the fifth day of Hanukkah. It is also the 5th day of Christmas, wherein every true love gives their true love not one but five gold, not silver, rings. The rings are said to symbolize the first Five Books of the Old Testament, the “Pentateuch,” which gives the history of "humanity's fall from grace" in the Garden - well, that is if you believe in "original sin".
It's the fourth day of Kwanza which is devoted to Ujamaa, or Cooperative Economics, which urges Black communities to invest in themselves financially by operating or supporting Black establishments and creating ways to earn profits together.
Today is the feast day of the martyred St. Thomas Becket, the Archbishop of Canterbury, murdered in his own cathedral on this day in 1170 by four knights of King Henry II. When Henry said, "Will no one rid me of this troublesome cleric?" the knights believed it was Henry's wish that Becket should die.
It was also on this day in 1890 that federal troops killed almost 300 Lakota men, women, and children in the massacre at Wounded Knee.
One of the survivors was Black Elk, the famous medicine man, who was 27 years old at the time of the massacre. He wrote:
"I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people's dream died there. It was a beautiful dream. And I, to whom so great a vision was given in my youth, - you see me now a pitiful old man who has done nothing, for the nation's hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead."
Between all of that and John's Gospel for the First Sunday after Christmas, I've been thinking about the gift of Mystery.
The first verses of the first chapter of John's Gospel always make me wonder what was in the incense when he started to write down, "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God."
It's the Nativity Story - not of Jesus but the birth of Christ. It's a mystery because it is about the Nativity of Love Incarnate and love is the greatest mystery of all.
I'm not sure who said it, I only know it's true: "The mystery of Love is greater than the mystery." Love has nothing else to explain it. It often makes absolutely no sense.
It can be both sacrificial as well as jealous. It can lead people to amazing acts of courage but it has also been blamed for heinous acts of cruel, cowardly violence. "Love of country" has led some to do both in the same act.
Love can lead to acts of generosity but it can also be the impulse to hoard and covet. Love can set free and love can enslave.
It has been said that you will know the greatest love when you can stop waiting for a deserved apology that will never come and forgive a wrong that can never be made right.
I don't know where Broken Dreams go. I don't know where the dreams of the Lakota went after the blizzard stopped and the bloody mud dried. Neither do I know what was in the hearts of the four soldiers when they realized that they had killed Becket for naught.
Indeed, I don't understand why people - good, so-called Christian people who say they have read the Bible and know the Ten Commandments and love Jesus - kill other people - especially a whole nation of people - because they don't believe what they believe and they want what they have.
I'll never understand it. Not any of it.
All of those things are a Mystery to me, but the greatest Mystery is not the birth of Jesus but The Birth of the Christ.
Which is why John is right: the only way to tell the story is through great word clouds filled with poetry and metaphor.
I'm heading into church to deacon for the 8 AM Mass and then will stay for the 10 AM to be present for the Blessing of the 99th Birthday of my dear friend, Hendie. I'll meet up with Ms. Conroy and some dear brothers at church and then, after the service, we'll head on over to Bob Evans for breakfast.
Ah, the things we do for the Love of Jesus.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
In the song "The 12 Days of Christmas," the fourth day is remembered with four calling birds, which represent Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. (I always thought it should be John, Paul, George, and Ringo.)
Today is the Feast of the Holy Innocents also called Childermas or Innocent’s Day, which follows the feasts of St. Stephen, the first martyr, and St. John, the Beloved Disciple who died in exile.
Today is held in remembrance of the children who were put to death by King Herod following his decree that all male infants in Bethlehem aged two and under be killed (Matthew 2) This was Herod’s attempt to destroy the Christ child after the Wise Men seeking “the newborn king of the Jews” did not return to tell him where the child could be found.
The children are remembered during the Christmas season as they lost their lives because of Herod’s fear of the Christ child. They are considered martyrs.
Tradition has it as a day to bless your children for protection and intercede for the protection of all children especially those in danger. When I was a young Roman Catholic kid, we would get dressed up and trouped off to church, to receive a special blessing from the priest. Then, home again for a special lunch of Fish Stew and hot, crusty Portuguese bread.
I don't know if there was symbolism to the meal. It was tradition. At least, in my grandmother's house.
Finally, it was also on this day in 1945 that Congress officially recognized the Pledge of Allegiance. It was written in 1892 by a minister and Socialist named Francis Bellamy, who was eventually forced out of his position because he preached too many sermons about Jesus and socialism.
Another patriot and martyr for Jesus.
So, it's probably no surprise that I find myself meditating on the spiritual word and meaning of martyr. When I was a kid, the nuns would read us from The Book of Martyrs during lunch. That was to accomplish silence during lunch as well as a way to "strengthen your faith by the example of the martyrs."
I suspect the nuns maintained that practice in the convent and then just carried it over to us kids because "it's good for your soul." It didn't take too long to figure out that what was "good for my soul" was always, always, always going to be something that was at least unpleasant if not sacrificial.
It was years and years later, however, that I was able to figure out that, in an ancient, middle eastern culture that was shame-based, sacrifice was a logical and reasonable way to holiness.
Suffering in this life - especially that which was inexplicable and senseless and unmerited - was explained as an elevation of status in the life to come. I remember the nuns saying that those who earned a place closest to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in heaven were those who had suffered the most on earth.
That made absolutely no sense to me, especially when we were also carefully taught that God is love and those who know love know God. Then again, we were taught lots of contradicting things as Roman Catholic kids.
Like? Like "Sex is bad. Save it for someone you love." (This was code for celibacy outside of marriage.)
Like? Like "Holy Friendships are formed in God's love. Particular Friendships are of the Devil." (This was code for homosexuality.)
There was a lot of clarity in their contradiction. You just had to understand that it was all code - and usually code for something that had anything to do with sex.
The one thing I learned about martyrs is that they have a lot of power. I mean, some of the people who died a hideous, torturous death for their faith centuries and centuries before were still being remembered in readings and masses said in their name.
The strength of the martyrs is probably best summed up in the poetic saying used by Mexican activists to protest the previous administration's immigration policy regarding the separation of families, “They tried to bury us, they didn’t know we were seeds,”
Martyrs are sometimes considered fools because of the sacrifices they are willing to make/have made for what it is they believe. The POTUS-elect infamously noted that the soldiers who had died in battle were "suckers and losers". He also doesn't want to ever be photographed next to veterans who had lost limbs in battle. "It's a bad look," he said.
I have learned that there are martyrs who have not lost life or limb on the battlefield or for patriotic or religious purposes. There are "everyday martyrs" who are not willing to sacrifice their integrity for the benefit - usually financial but sometimes reputational or social advancement - of others.
There are those who stand up for what they believe is right in small, seemingly insignificant battles that will never make the Nightly News. Some people walk away from a battle because they want to win the war, setting their sights on the bigger picture, the longer-term goal.
And, there are those who are willing to sacrifice everything to achieve their passion in life, or for what or who they understand themselves to be, whose sacrifices are sometimes not understood until long after they have died.
I'm thinking now of artists as well as activists.
I pray for the strength to always be able to take a stand for what it is I believe - even if that means that I walk away from a lucrative opportunity.
I pray for the wisdom to know when to raise my voice or still it for a higher purpose, to help an individual someone, or a particular, greater cause.
I pray for the courage to do or say what's right; when it doesn't seem to matter, or when no one is looking, even if it means that I may tarnish or lose a friendship or an essential part of myself.
I think the greatest sacrifice is innocence, which is why the slaughter of the Innocents of Bethlehem feels so heinous.
Because it is.
It's important to remember especially now, four days after Christmas, during the inconvenient time when we'd rather wax romantic about a baby born in poverty to a teen mother who conceived out of wedlock and born to refugee parents who were unable to find hospitality and had to flee to a foreign country to save their lives and the life of their newborn from political unrest.
In the next four years, that scene will no doubt be repeating itself, played out on the TV screens in our very living rooms. It won't be anything approaching romantic. It will be heinous.
Will I be willing to stand up and speak out, even if it means being an "everyday martyr" with the potential to lose status or friendships or an essential part of myself?
I suspect many of us - many good, devout religious folk who love God and Jesus, our country, apple pie, and Chevrolet - will be asking the same question of ourselves.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
It is no small thing for me to say that I am still being transformed by the experience of being in his cell - a cave - high above the waters of the island of Patmos where he was exiled. I can't explain the experience, except to say this: Standing there, surrounded by the hard rock, there was no doubt in my mind that this was a "thin place" where he experienced the visions recounted in the Book of Revelation.
It is said that John probably died there, in that cave, an "extremely old" man, the only one of The Twelve who did not die a martyr’s death. Well, not on the cross. But, he was in exile and lived a very sparse existence, alone with his memories and his visions and, perhaps, his faithful scribe Prochorus.
To have been spared that suffering was a gift of sorts, as well as the gift his visions were to The Church. So, perhaps he was, indeed, the "Beloved Disciple," although it's hard for me to think of God doling out or withholding torture and suffering depending on one's status in the "inner circle" of the disciples of Jesus.
I've been thinking a lot, since Christmas Day, about gifts. I am overwhelmed by the generosity of my beloved as well as our friends and neighbors. I'm at a stage in life where I really don't need too many things. Material gifts are lovely and appreciated but my needs are fewer these days.
I'm remembering something Jack Spong repeated that a retired bishop had once said to him. "The older I get, the more deeply I believe but the fewer beliefs I have." That seems to apply to my faith life and lots of other things in my life, across the board.
The things I believe, I believe deeply and strongly and they sustain me. This is most especially true about the sacraments - not so much the sacramental rites but the Two Great Sacraments of Baptism and Eucharist.
It seems to be en vogue these days, in some circles, to play fast and loose theological games with The Sacraments. I am discovering that holding onto a mystery is a strange, wonderful gift that becomes more precious as one faces more nearly into the mystery of life and death.
It was a real gift to be able to visit with our guests and have a conversation at the Christmas table after dinner. That's because I planned a menu that was pretty basic and simple and didn't require too much tending. In the past, I've spent more time in the kitchen than in the living room and then felt resentful after everyone left, and Ms. Conroy filled me in on all the "news" from everyone that I missed because I was, well, in the kitchen.
Experience is a gift if you can learn from it and use it, and not let regret or anger or resentment cloud your ability to see with "the eyes of your heart". You can throw your hands up in the air and say, "Well, I'm done with that. Never again." Or you can ask, "What can I change that will make it better, so that doesn't happen again?"
I guess I'm a slow learner because I still make mistakes. I still get baited in conversations that should not happen. I don't stop them before they make me angry because (1) it's beyond being just a disagreement, it's stupidity and (2) it's not an appropriate conversation for a "mixed-church-non-church" gathering.
But, I'm learning to listen more carefully to my gut and not allow myself to get hooked by certain people who seem to love to bait an argument. I think those are the moments when I return to the kitchen for just a few moments to tend to the carrots or put the bread in to warm. Or, just change the subject.
I'm finally learning to be a responsible guest. How about that? It's a little gift I'm learning to give myself, which, like St. John's revelations, turns out to be a gift to others.
The thing about some gifts is that they don't often look like gifts when they first arrive. I'm sure St. John didn't consider his cave, deserted, sparse, bleak, desolate, and very high up on the windy hill, to be anything more than a place of punishment where he could live out his last days. Alone. Exiled. Not able to evangelize and tell The Greatest Story of Jesus and His Love to anyone.
Except, he turned his barren, isolated cave into a spiritual haven and was able to evangelize through his visions and words in print form in order to build up the church he could not see, which was yet to come, in part because of his visions.
As Carrie Fisher once said, “Sometimes you can only find Heaven by slowly backing away from Hell.”
She also said, "“Happy is one of the many things I'm likely to be over the course of a day and certainly over the course of a lifetime. But I think if you have the expectation that you're going to be happy throughout your life--more to the point, if you have a need to be comfortable all the time--well, among other things, you have the makings of a classic drug addict or alcoholic.”
I think Ms. Fisher's experience is a real gift. Someday, I'm going to grow up and be more like that. And, it will be a real gift.
Off I go then, into this beautiful, cold, crisp new day. I'm trying to ignore the sounds of the duck hunters off the marsh. I don't have any wisdom about what to do with my distress about that.
I'm choosing to rejoice that some of the ducks seem to be smarter than the hunters and have found refuge in some of the places in front of people's homes where they seem to know the hunters can't shoot.
It's a great gift of practical wisdom for the Third Day of Christmas, the Third Day of Hanukkah, and the Second Day of Kwanzaa. I suspect it even brings a smile to St. John's lips.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
And, of course, it was just five days ago that we celebrated the Solstice - the day the earth turns on its axis and we begin to celebrate the increasing presence of light.
Anyone notice a theme here? Bueller? Bueller? Anyone?
This is for Bueller: Christians celebrate the birth of The Light come into the world to overtake The Darkness. The White Christ candle is lit in the center of the three blue/purple and one pink Advent candles on the Advent wreath, celebrating the gifts that Jesus brings into the world: hope, peace, joy, and love.
Jews celebrate the Miracle of Light that lasted even though they thought there wouldn't be enough oil in the lamps. On each day, a branch of the nine-branch Hanukkah menorah is lit with the shamash ("helper" candle), which sits on the middle branch.
Hanukkah is the Hebrew word for dedication, and therefore Hanukkah is also called the Feast of Dedication. It celebrates the rededication of the temple by the Maccabees, but also the rededication of hearts to love and worship God.
Kwanza celebrates and honors the culture that had been erased by the slave trade and brings the light of the African heritage into the darkness of continuing, modern manifestations of racism. A candle is lit each day for each of the seven principles.
There are seven principles of Kwanzaa, known as Nguzo Saba:
Umoja (unity)
Kujichagulia (self-determination)
Ujima (collective work and responsibility)
Ujamaa (cooperative economics)
Nia (purpose)
Kuumba (creativity)
Imani (faith)
In faiths throughout the world, there’s power in the metaphor, the imagery, of light. Hindus have their own festival of light, called Diwali, celebrated on October 31st. On the night of the new moon, Hindus light diyas, which are small oil lamps made of earthenware, to welcome Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth. Homes, workplaces, and temples are cleaned and decorated with lights and candles. Devotees perform puja, or devotional offerings. Families share sweets and gifts at feasts
The Buddhist day of enlightenment is Bodhi Day, which was celebrated on December 8 this year. Fiscus trees are strung with beads and lights, to symbolize Buddha's enlightenment. Buddhists may spend time studying the Dharma and may perform acts of kindness and generosity to improve their karma.
Carl Jung spoke of the "collective unconscious," the part of the unconscious mind in every person that is derived from ancestral memory and experience and is common to all humankind, as distinct from the individual's unconscious.
Jung included in that collective unconscious dreams, archetypes, myths and legends, symbols and motifs, rituals and rites, art and expression, moral codes and ethics, along with phobias, instincts, and intuition.
I love that this time of year when things are cold and hard and dark, there is the warmth of a light that connects our common humanity.
If we allow it. If we are not blinded by our own light.
Each light has its own integrity. We ought not to reduce things to their lowest common denominator. That honors no one but the simplistic impulses of a lazy mind that has tricked itself into thinking it is being somehow kind.
There are universal truths and symbols to represent that truth but the unique understandings and expressions of those truths serve to deepen and enrich our individual and collective experiences as humans.
If we let them. If we don't let our competitive human impulses try to order them in rank of importance or significance. Let each one be true for each person and culture and time.
All too soon our life on this plane will be over and we will stand before The Truth which I imagine as the Unbearably Beautiful Light of Truth which expands the mind and warms the soul throughout Eternity.
I hope something good happens to you today.
Bom dia.
PS: Happy Boxing Day and Feast of St. Stephen to those who observe.
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