|
|
|
|
I went to bed at like 10:15 last night, and I guess stuff started happening soon after? [citation: Reuters]
For months I've been drafting LJ update posts and not finishing them, but as many of you know, there were explosions near the finish line of the Boston Marathon this afternoon, so continued radio silence seemed inappropriate.
So, remember how I read some really awesome Darcy Lewis fic and then didn't wanna ruin my streak? I read a bunch of mediocre fic near the end of Break (and some good fic, don't get me wrong) and then
Tues. Jan. 1, 2013 Dear Human: You’ve got it all wrong. You didn’t come here to master unconditional love. That is where you came from and where you’ll return. You came here to learn personal love. Universal love. Messy love. Sweaty love. Crazy love. Broken love. Whole love. Infused with divinity. Lived through the grace of stumbling. Demonstrated through the beauty of… messing up. Often. You didn’t come here to be perfect. You already are. You came here to be gorgeously human. Flawed and fabulous. And then to rise again into remembering.Googling adds: But unconditional love? Stop telling that story.*** - YHWH God said to Moses, "Tell Aaron and Aaron's heirs: This is how you will bless the Israelites. Say to them,( joy sadhanaCollapse ) 1 spark of | knowledge
Mon. Dec. 31, 2012 Take pen in hand. Let God write you a love letter, a warning, a birth announcement.I didn't leave the house today, and it is unfortunately true that snow accumulation disincentives me from biking, but seeing the snow in the driveway from the kitchen window is a nice winter thing. At Coffee Hour on Sunday, Lisa C. mentioned missing book study, and I said Bobby had done lectio divina before Sunday morning service during Advent and we always do a Wednesday night Lenten thing, so we're unlikely to try to fit anything in between now and Lent, since that starts in late February/early March, though I didn't know offhand when exactly Lent starts this year. I looked it up while on the phone with Ari tonight and wow, Ash Wednesday is in like a month (Feb. 13). *** - 12Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never be in darkness but will have the light of life.”( joy sadhanaCollapse ) knowledge
[LJ kept refusing to let the update go through last night, so, posting this morning.] Unison Prayer of Confession*** - After three days, Mary and Joseph found Jesus in the Temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Jesus were amazed at Jesus' answers and understanding.( joy sadhanaCollapse ) 1 spark of | knowledge
Sat. Dec. 29, 2012 - 5 Thus says YHWH,My Revised Common Lectionary Daily Readings book says one of the assigned readings for December 29 [edit: I was accidentally looking in Year B rather than Year C -- but I like this reading better anyway] is: Isaiah 49:5-15+ when love comes to town posted: Reflections on the holy family...[NB: I have some answers to "Why do you think worshipping as a family is important? If dad - or mom or one partner - doesn’t go, what does that teach our children?" which are perhaps not exactly what he's looking for.] ( joy sadhanaCollapse ) 5 sparks of | knowledge
Fri. Dec. 28, 2012 Keith: Happy Lent!In other news, I am currently in a period of mixed feelings about Christmas (carols), identifying as a Christian (for me personally -- I'm not saying it's a bad self-identity for anyone else), etc., but: "Now that the mall has stopped playing them, the church can start singing them." *** I slept in this morning but not as much as I'd expected to given how late I was up last night (Housemate was digging through the recording of the Project for Awesome livestream for the "Hank's face" portion, and I got sucked in). I actually had energy/motivation to go out and deal with shopping stuff. My hair was still damp, so I walked to Davis rather than biking (which also enabled me to return my library book) 'cause a vanity, I has it. ( blah blah, shoppingCollapse ) I was starting to fade, so I headed out and texted Batshua (who I knew was in the Davis Square area this afternoon), and we hung out. *** - And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road. (Matthew 2:12) [Because it's Childermas.] ( joy sadhanaCollapse ) 5 sparks of | knowledge
:) knowledge
 "Original English text taken from the Scriptures by Charles Jennens (1700-1773)." -Program Text for Handel's Messiah, Handel and Haydn Society, 2007-2008 Season Aria (Bass) The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light. And they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined. (Isaiah IX, 2) knowledge
Tues. Dec. 4, 2012 Get more vertical: hike, climb to a high place, pogo or trampoline. Lift your chin to the sky and remember whose you are.The end of the workday yesterday, I was feeling kinda pissy, so coming home I kinda wanted to just bike for ages, but I also wanted to head home. (There isn't a nice bike path immediately near me, which is irritating -- my go-to is the Charles River, and while I remembered about the Minuteman Bike Path later, I'm not certain that would have been all that more convenient, requiring that I head into Arlington, since it was the whole "travel during rush hour after dark" that was disinclining me from heading out again -- well, that and various other factors.) I sometimes flirt with the idea of doing an hour bike ride along the River in the morning and doing strength training after work (I seem to get through it much more quickly when I'm not doing it first thing in the morning) rather than alternating morning routines. Days like today when I have extra time after my strength training routine and no time-sensitive plans after work, this seems like a good idea -- but I usually have evening plans (and don't love the "gym during lunchbreak" thing, though certainly I do it at times when I agree to be in the office early). At the gym this morning, a trainer was talking about classes she teaches e.g. a Cardio Chaos from 12:05-12:55 (Wednesdays), where you rotate 3 times through 10 stations (jumping jacks, kettlebell swing, etc.), which is sort of tempting. (I tend to forget that there are regular classes which I can attend for free as part of my gym membership since I'm not inherently interested in trainers/classes and thus only notice classes when there are fliers up for special pay-extra classes -- which I have done before.) (On the theme of Molly's calendar today, one of these days I'll go rock wall climbing again.) + At the gym this morning, a trainer and her client were like, "Yay, Christmas music!" and my first response was "Unrelenting War on Advent!" and then I realized the song playing on the radio was "Let It Snow," which isn't actually a Christmas song. (In contrast, at Trader Joe's on Sunday I heard "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" and cringed for multiple reasons.) The trainer said that one year it was like the last day before Break and barely anyone was in and she had Christmas music on and someone asked her to turn it off and she did but she thought, "Grinch." I did not say, "Unrelenting War on Advent!" She talked about some class she does where she plays holiday music and she really does try to be inclusive -- e.g., including the Chanukah song. (On reflection, I assume she means the Adam Sandler song -- which is trufax an amusing song, though, hi, I bet Jews have lots of songs they sing at Chanukah, because they're Jews and thus have lots of songs for every occasion.) Somewhere in here the client commented that there aren't really a lot of "Advent-y" songs, and in my head I was like: THANK YOU for acknowledging that the season of Advent even exists! -- Advent songs aren't peppy upbeat radio songs (like "Let It Snow") because they're about expectant waiting, and also they're explicitly religious so they're not radio songs and ugh, we mostly don't play explicitly religious songs on the radio period for obvious reasons (though, okay, I have a Josh Groban album (no, I don't remember why -- possibly a gift from Singspiration) which has actualfax Jesus songs on it, so probably so does every other album, of which there are many since apparently everyone needs to make a Christmas/holiday album [Edit: And on that subject, on Thursday night, someone I know from high school posted to fb: "How was I completely unaware that Sufjan Stevens released another amazing 58 song, 5 album Christmas extravaganza? So ridiculously excited right now! http://www.npr.org/2012/11/19/16547 I am not trying to take away anyone's holiday joy* but seriously, if you want joyful music in the darkness, go for it. If you want it to explicitly reference the cold/snow/dark of the season, go for it. [I have in fact crowdsourced "songs celebrating winter."] Please don't subject me to crappy music, and please respect my desire to observe my personal spiritual/religious practice of expectant waiting during the ~4 weeks of Advent and then celebration during the 12 Days of Christmas (see also: Lent and Eastertide); see also: my desire to not have "Christmas" cantatas or carol sings during Advent. [Later today, someone on facebook linked to: The Daily Show with John Stewart: "The War on Christmas: Friendly Fire Edition" (it gets good about 4 minutes in -- "Christmas is so big now it's eating other holidays").] * posts I have read recently include:
When I was thinking about secular radio not playing Advent songs I remembered that on Sunday, @OccupyAdvent shared their #adventplaylist:
I am debating including Ani DiFranco, "The Waiting Song" (or "Second Intermission" -- yes, I ran a lyrics search for "wait"). Edit: @OccupyAdvent added:And friends of mine suggested:
And after Wednesday's concert, possibly: Jenna Lindbo, "Angels on the Subway" /edit *** - Hail full of grace, the Lord is with you( joy sadhanaCollapse ) knowledge
Sun. Dec. 2, 2012 Having received a new name, Jacob bestows a new name: he names that place, that bend in the river, Peni'el, literally "the face of God," saying, "For I have seen God face-to-face, yet my life has been spared."(which is really interesting in and of itself, given the multi-vocality of Scripture on seeing the face of God -- e.g., God to Moses in Exodus 33:20 "you cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live.") and then talks about Jacob's encounter with Esau, where he says: No, please, if I have truly found favor in your sight, take the offering from my hand; for to see your face is like seeing the face of God.She closes with the bit from the Talmud about each individual human being being created in the image of God but each of us are unique -- unlike identical imperial coins each stamped with the mark of the secular leader. This all seemed quite a lovely connection to Molly's "Light Gets In" Advent theme. But then she closes the post with her 70 Faces Torah poem on this parsha, which ends with such a downer: For one impossible moment Jacob reached out.*** The theme for this year’s Advent is Light Gets In. No matter what walls we throw up, what boxes we climb in or that circumstances put us in—Light gets in. Light will have its way.To my mind, Advent is about the light slowly breaking in (we light first one candle and then a second, and so on), so I don't love this theme. (The Meditation in the bulletin was Robert Frost's "Mending Wall," so of course I was trying to remember what mt said about that poem. Allie?) + Pre-service lectio divina happened in the Parlor, and as a result we could hear the pre-service choir rehearsal. I heard "Emmanuel, Expected Jesus," and fell into Advent. ... To my surprise, 9am lectio divina was not just me and the facilitator (Bobby); Tom arrived before I did, and Leigh came a little late. We did Luke 1:5-25. I was struck by Gabriel's statement, "I stand in the presence of God." (The second round, when I read, I was struck by the piece about Zechariah being overcome by fear -- because of Reasons. And the third round, nothing struck me.) + Before service, I picked up a hardcopy of Molly's Advent calendar. December 2+ Unison Prayer of Confession... Molly preached on Jeremiah 33:14-16 -- and her Advent theme of walls and also touched on the theme of Recovery (it being a first Sunday of the month -- no, I had not realized we were continuing this theme after we'd been through the 12 Steps). She opened with talking about Israel and Palestine, but also talked about other walls -- the Mexico/USA border, gated communities (Trayvon Martin), and other walls we erect. She talked about healthy boundaries -- "calm contact works better than walls." She said that contrary to popular belief, prophets don't tell the future -- they tell the present. She said, "our God is not a safe God," which of course reminded me of "Aslan is not a tame lion." She said God "doesn't call us to safety but to radical love." ... During Prayers of the People, Missy lifted up prayers "for all those who feel restricted by the gender binary." ♥ At Coffee Hour, Jonathan told me about Tufts' Hamlet the Hip Hopera, which Cate and I tragically missed out on in our attend ALL the Shakespeare. FCS does a thing where you can pick a kid's name out of a hat and buy them a gift. Harold said that one of his friends at another church got a 10-year-old boy and she only daughters, so she asked what 10-year-old boys like. Harold's response: "When I was a ten-year-old boy, I liked Wonder Woman. Hope this helps." ♥ (And it's trufax. I mean, he also liked e.g. dinosaurs, but this makes it no less trufax.) + Jamie facilitated an Advent Devotional Workshop, which I attended. I was starting to investigate the art supplies when the horde of kids who had been playing war or something all came in and decided to do art (well, Simon was like, "Guys, can't we go back to what we were doing before?" and got ignored by all the kids wrapped up in doing art, so he compromised by making pictures of e.g. ninjas) so I stepped back from the chaos and worked on poetry. Sue D., to her husband, later: "I was looking for the kids, and I found a craft fair, so I sat down." Having ~skipped class last week and the next two sessions being review for the final and me being so checked out, I had been undecided about whether I wanted to bother going to the remaining class sessions, and in the Parlor this afternoon I definitely felt like I wanted to go to Art Night. ... Brandon asked if I'd seen Tongues United, apropos of World AIDS Day. I had not, but given that we barely acknowledged World AIDS Day at church (though in her sermon, Molly told a story she had recently learned of 25 years ago, when there was still so much fear and unknowing, this church volunteering to be the church to host a healing service) I loved that he brought it up. He also talked about Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (Christmas movie, what? see also: Batman Returns), The Avengers, and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (which fandom has been expecting for 5 years). *** I really liked the Call to Worship we used at CWM tonight: [One] How shall we prepare God's house for the coming of the Promised One?... Marla preached on Isaiah 11:1-9 and 1 Samuel 16:1-13. I was mostly meh, but she closed with talking about the fact that we ignore the parts of the Biblical stories that don't seem "proper" or "dignified" and inviting us to think about, if Jesus were to come as a baby a second time, what unexpected places that baby might show up in -- and her shocker suggestion was: born to a Wall Street executive (I thought of the Buddha). *** At 8-something this morning, it was 32F and a predicted high of 59F. I wore my sparkly purple short-sleeve shirt, because when am I gonna get to wear short sleeves during Advent? Except I basically never took my hoodie off. (Though Jeff B. did ask me whether an email had gone out about wearing purple or if we just knew 'cause Advent. I said I'd worn purple for Advent because I do and it's not like one is required to match the paraments or anything.) After I left morning church after 1pm, I went to Trader Joe's and it was hazy and still hoodie+gloves weather. When I left evening church at 6:30 or whatever, it seemed to have rained recently (20% chance of precipitation, this morning's forecast said) and now, hours after sunset, it felt warmer than it had all day. Weather, what is it? *** - Hail full of grace, the Lord is with you( joy sadhanaCollapse ) 2 sparks of | knowledge
Sat. Dec. 1, 2012 - Thus says God to these bones: "I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am God." (Ezekiel 37:5-6, NRSV, alt.) ( Read more...Collapse ) 1 spark of | knowledge
A couple weeks ago,
Sunday, I decided that my joy sadhana verse for Advent would be this from the Bob Franke concert I went to on Friday: Hail full of grace, the Lord is with youand then Monday afternoon this came up on my GoogleReader: The Angels of Advent are saying, "Do not be afraid" -- we bring good news of immigration reform.Although I vaguely registered the post title ("Been There, Bordered That. So Why Are We Still So Afraid?") when I first glanced at it on my GoogleReader, but my eyes didn't actually register the "we bring good news of immigration reform" portion when I glanced at the screen, so my entire takeaway was the reminder that the angels of Advent tell us "Do not be afraid." Yes, on reflection I remember that arguably one reason the angels routinely open with this declaration is that people were likely to be scared of the angels -- God often asks scary things of us, plus angels themselves are creatures of wind and fire Seraphs were in attendance above G!d; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew.Things I learned on Monday: "seraphim" literally means "burning ones." BUT. I still think the general message of, "Do not be afraid," is powerful and relevant. Or rather, "Feel the fear and do it anyway" (and now I can't find the Felix Baumgartner article I saw linked a while ago, alas). Insert DBT evangelism here or something. Which, yes, obvious caveats about legit danger &c. I'm actually not interested in the framing of being not afraid of what God Wills for us -- "I know God won't give me more than I can handle. I just wish He didn't trust me so much." -- but rather the general idea of actively moving through our lives less caged in by fear. Breathing through the fear. Feeling the fear and doing it anyway. 1 spark of | knowledge
From today's This Week at First Church: This year’s Stewardship theme is Creating the Kingdom of Heaven. What does Heaven look like to you? Who is there, and what are they doing? What are you willing to give up, and give, so you can live in that Heaven, here and now?As I said on facebook, "Creating the Kingdom of Heaven."Yeah, I spent one weekend at the 2012 Transcending Boundaries Conference and the next weekend at the 2012 Transgender Religious Leaders Summit and now I have a lot of energy to do educationy activisty type stuff. knowledge
A couple hours into bff phonecall today, I was thinking, "We were in the middle of talking when my phone died 6 hours in last week, but we've had lots of silences during phonecall thus far today -- maybe we wanna wrap soon?" I am a Roman Catholic; am I saved?Ari said she kept imagining "said no one ever" at the end of each of those sentences. In contrast to: "Am I saved? says every Calvinist ever." One of the FAQ answers mentioned "Unlimited atonement" and Ari said she thought that was part of TULIP and so I Googled and no, U is for "Unconditional election" -- and in fact Calvinists believe in "Limited atonement." I went to the CalvinistCorner.com cite for Limited atonement, and all the Bible verses they cite, one COULD interpret to support limited atonement ... but why would one want to? The Methodists have been apostate since John Wesley whose arguments with George Whitefield4 demonstrate that Wesley succumbed to Satan's appeal, "How could a God of love condemn anyone to Hades?" He lost sight of individual volition as the criterion for application of salvation to mankind. Translated into simple terms, "Why should anyone worry about salvation? That's God's problem."3 sparks of | knowledge
As has become my custom, reposting this from Amy: One of the big pieces of the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur is that you reflect over the past year, and you attempt to (A) accept and forgive anything that has been done to you, and (B) apologize and ask forgiveness for anything you have done to others.Pr. Lisa closed service today with reading Mary Oliver's poem "The Summer Day" ... "what will you do with your one wild and precious life?" knowledge
Fri. Sept. 14, 2012
Tara Sophia Mohr sent an email yesterday, "Heartgifts for July." It includes: “Every calling is great when greatly pursued.” ~Oliver Wendell Holmes2 sparks of | knowledge |
|
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
![[profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
