Poem: Shadows

The winter solstice is passed.
The new year will find its way
on dreams we have not yet dreamed.

In spring's papery dawns
the living sky will return
with Sandhill cranes passing northward.
Their staggered lines

swoop down onto these meadows
graceful as shadows
that lie out behind the thing they love.

                Linda Hussa 

 

 

 

 

Poem: Flock

It has been calculated the each copy of the Gutenberg Bible...required the skins of 300 sheep.
-from an article on printing

I can see them squeezed into the holding pen
behind the stone building
where the printing press is housed,

all of them squirming around
to find a little room
and looking so much alike

it would be nearly impossible
to count them,
and there is no telling

which one will carry the news
that the Lord is a shepherd,
one of the few things they already know.

                        Billy Collins 

A beautiful and intentional paradox

Christmas is built upon a beautiful and intentional paradox;
that the birth of the homeless should be celebrated in every home.

                        G. K. Chesterton, Brave New Family

 

 

 

 

Poem: We grow accustomed to the Dark

We grow accustomed to the Dark -
When Light is put away -
As when the Neighbor holds the Lamp
To witness her Good bye -

A Moment - We Uncertain step
For newness of the night -
Then - fit our Vision to the Dark -
And meet the Road - erect -

And so of larger - Darknesses -
Those Evenings of the Brain -
When not a Moon disclose a sign -
Or Star - come out - within -

The Bravest - grope a little -
And sometimes hit a Tree
Directly in the Forehead -
But as they learn to see -

Either the Darkness alters -
Or something in the sight
Adjusts itself to Midnight -
And Life steps almost straight.

            Emily Dickinson

 

 

 

 

 

Endurance

No tribal rite has yet been recorded
       which attempts to keep winter from descending;
on the contrary:
the rites all prepare the community to endure,
       together with the rest of nature,
              the season of the terrible cold.

         Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You are what you create

The Devil doesn't make us do anything.
The Devil, for example, doesn't make us mean.
Rather, when we're mean, we make the Devil.
Literally.
Our actions create him.
Conversely, when we behave with
    compassion,
        generosity,
            and grace,
we create God in the world.

    Tom Robbins, Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alas, church isn't like this most places

A couple of Tuesdays ago, St. John's shopping cart lady, who has been semi-adopted and mostly tamed by a couple in the church, happened in to our clergy Eucharist in the chapel. She called me "Jimmy Baby" and gave me a pineapple hard candy.

I told her we were having church, and she could stay if she wanted. She did and did most of the responses of the people. We pass the bread and wine at that small service, so I passed the plate with communion wafers to her, said, 'The Body of Christ" and told her to pass it on to David. Well, instead, she decided to carry the plate around the room. When she got to one priest who hesitated, not used to such on-the-spot liturgical innovation, she said "Go on, Take one...."

I've decided the next revision of the Eucharist should change the words of distribution during communion to:

Priest: "Go on, take one...."
Communicant: "Thank you, I will...."

Church like this happens at St. John's all the time. I'm not sure it happens in 99.5% of other Episcopal Churches. I wish it did, but I doubt it....

Go on, take one...taste and see how sweet the Lord can be....

        Fr. Jim Bradley, Under the Castor Oil Tree blog, March 11, 2010
        https://castoroiltree.blogspot.com/