Showing posts with label good news. Show all posts

The necessary obligations which we feel we must meet grow overnight, like Jack's beanstalk, and before we know it we are bowed down with burdens, crushed under committees, strained, breathless and hurried, panting through a never-ending program of appointments. We are too busy to be good wives to our husbands, good homemakers, good companions of our children, good friends to our friends, and with no time at all to be friends of the friendless.

But if we withdraw from public engagements and interests, in order to spend quiet hours with the family, the guilty calls of citizenship whisper disquieting claims in our ears. Our children's schools should receive our interest, the civic problems of our community need our attention, the wider issues of the nation and of the world are heavy upon us. Our professional status, our social obligations, our membership in this or that very important organization, puts claims upon us.

We're weary and breathless. And we know and regret that our life is slipping away, with our having tasted so little of the peace and joy and serenity we are persuaded it should yield to a soul of wide caliber. The times for the deeps of the silences of the heart seem so few. And in guilty regret we must postpone till next week that deeper life of unshaken composure in the holy Presence, where we sincerely know our true home is.

from inward\outward

This weekend was a full one at camp, with a number of different groups. One of the groups is a humanist community. They found us after the camp they stayed at previously changed their rules to only serve Christian groups. While that camp is completely within their rights, I'm glad that this group has come our way, because they have been a lot of fun.

So, at breakfast this morning, a guy comes in wearing a black t-shirt with a large A over the front of the shirt. My mind immediately came up with a scarlet letter joke, and wondered, due to the shape of the letter, if it was a t-shirt for the nerdly anticipated Avengers movie. For both reasons, I looked closer and saw that it was a Richard Dawkins t-shirt. For those of you who don't know, Richard Dawkins is an adamant atheist and secular humanist.

This shirt made me smile, especially on Memorial Day. As a person of faith, I'm glad I work in a place that can be so welcoming. As a citizen of the United States of America, it doubly reminds me of our First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

So, thanks to all those who fought and died for our country to preserve the rights that we hold dear. I hope that on Memorial Day, we can be reminded of why these lives were given; because "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by theirCreator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." And the right to wear a big, bright A.

(This post was going to segue into my thoughts that we need to establish a Bill of Responsibilities, as many who protest against the Government fail to own up to their complicity in letting the government become this way, but I just don't feel that cynical right now.)

Last night, I went to a play of Charles Dicken's A Christmas Carol that was performed by a local theatre company. I was really moved by the production. Though I'd heard the story many times before, this time I was struck by Scrooge's lovelessness. His alienation from humanity began when we loved money more than his fiancee. Perhaps what emphasized this more than in previous years was the following quote that was printed on the program guide. The actor who has played Scrooge for over 20 years announced his engagement in the program guide, using this quote:

There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket — safe, dark, motionless, airless — it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.I believe that the most lawless and inordinate loves are less contrary to God’s will than a self-invited and self-protective lovelessness…We shall draw nearer to God, not by trying to avoid the sufferings inherent in all loves, but by accepting them and offering them to Him; throwing away all defensive armour. If our hearts need to be broken, and if He chooses this as a way in which they should break, so be it.What I know about love and believe about love and giving ones heart began in this. - C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

I can see a young businessman like Scrooge (or really any of us), looking at the potential losses that are present in love, and deciding for a safer investment. Perhaps as we continue to tighten our fiscal belts during this recession, we can loosen the belts that bind our hearts and give more of ourselves.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

One of the special responsibilities I have at the camp is to tend to God's Mailbox, a mailbox that is in the south woods. It is always stocked with paper and writing utensils, so anyone at any time can write to God.

The letters had accumulated in God's mailbox in the interim between the departure of the previous site manager and my arrival. Tonight I mailed the letters to God by using the pentecostal power of fire. I began by praying a decade's worth of Our Father's, and offering incense. I used a bit of sage at the beginning for cleansing, then frankincense, both for the Biblical connotation and to honor the frankness that I hoped was contained in these letters.

I offered a few words of prayer, then I added cedar and pine to the fire. I would add the letters one by one. Occasionally, I would pray while adding them, or express my well wishes for the author, especially if they signed their name. I was leaving space for the spirit, wondering what prayers and thoughts would come through.

I continued to add more cedar and pine during the course of the burning. The cedar I offered in hope that the faith of those who wrote the letters would become as strong as the cedars of Lebanon. The pine I offered as a reminder of place. These were pine needles from Tower Hill and had been blown down in a recent rain. I was reminded of Ezekiel (?) looking for God and sheltering from a storm in a cave. It wasn't in the storm that he heard God, but in the silence, just as these letters were written and delivered in silence.

It was moving adding the letters one by one to the fire. They were written on all kinds of paper and in all kinds of writing. Some of the letters were sealed in envelopes, others were folded tightly, and others were left exposed for all to read. Some were written on construction paper, others on pages ripped from a spiral notebook. Some were cards, some were sealed in heavy weight legal envelopes. Some were on index cards, and one was written on a used dryer sheet.

Though I resisted the urge to read the letters, there were some phrases that were revealed. Those that I recall covered a broad range of topics, including wishing to have God more present in their day to day lives, and one wishing for cotton candy. Some of the pages would appear blank until I added them to the fire, then the ink would become clear. One paper simply said "Dear Go," as if the writer had been distracted and hadn't come back to finish talking to God, something we've all had happen to us. I found some of the cards most interesting, as the envelope would burn away before the cards did, almost as if God was opening them like a gift. Some of the letters were drawings made for God. At the end, I offered more cedar, pine and frankincense, then extinguished the fire with water, washing the remains of the letters back into the soil.

All in all, I was reminded again and again that we are to all be like children to enter into the kin-dom of God.

I think next time I'll need to write my own letter too.

This blog is to fill a gap in internet knowledge.

Back in 1974, Julia Child was on Mr. Roger's Neighborhood. During her visit she gave the recipe for a casserole. I can remember my mother hearing the recipe on the television and scrambling for a pen and paper. She missed the recipe, and watched Mr. Roger's Neighborhood with us religiously until they re-ran the episode and she could copy it down. My family has taken that recipe and made it into one of our favorite dinners. I can't find the recipe anywhere on the internet, and so I'm adding it for posterity.

Here's the recipe:

Mr. Roger's Casserole

One small can of tuna, drained
3-4 green onions, chopped
one handful of grated Swiss cheese
one handful of chopped black olives
one handful of dried parsley
one handful of walnuts
one box (8 oz?) of spaghetti
leaves of lettuce - iceberg, greenleaf or your choice

serves 3-4

1. Prepare spaghetti noodles

2. Combine all other ingredients except the lettuce.

3. When spaghetti is finished, drain and combine in the cooking pot with the other ingredients. Stir until the cheese is melted and the casserole is mixed thoroughly.

4. Make a bed of lettuce and place mix on the lettuce.

5. Salt and pepper to taste

My family has always adored this recipe for it's simplicity and it's tastiness. It is fairly open to modification. I've changed the recipe in my own household to use whole grain pasta and a variety of leaf lettuces. Though there were rarely leftovers, they are good either re-heated or served cold.

Once again, I steal any good thoughts from illdoctrine.com

Much love to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the flawed, real human beings that fought and struggled to increase justice and mercy in our world. Society does no favor to King's legacy by reducing it to one speech, or one issue and it does no favor to the rest of humanity to elevate King above his humanity. Dr. King worked to end poverty, bring about reparations for slavery, and an end to war.

Dr. King was a person who was a creature of his time. He may or may not have supported LGBT rights when he was alive, and he may or may not have supported LGBT rights if he were alive today. This is not to minimize the struggles and necessity of LGBT rights, but to emphasize that Dr. King may have had his vision limited by prejudices that are apparant to us today as racism was apparant to Dr. King in his day. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was and is a great man, a person to emulate. But let us not lose sight of the fact that he was also a man, and that what he did and who he became is achievable not just by a select few, but by all of us.

Dr. King was inspired in his own day by Jesus, Mahatma Ghandi, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and many others. Today, Dr. King continues to exist as an inspiration for those of us alive today and those yet to come. Let us not "white wash" his legacy and our memories of him, thereby making him and what he did for us all unattainable by those who continue the struggle today. Let us see the full spectrum of his character and soul. Knowing that he had flaws, just as the rest of us do, should not be considered scandalous but a reminder that great things can come from any of us, despite of or maybe even as a result of our flaws or weaknesses.

There will always be those that will attempt character assassination of anyone they don't agree with. It is only by embracing the whole person of who Dr. King was will we be able to move beyond this increasing polarization. Just as it is patriotic to say when our country is wrong, so also is respecting the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by remembering that no one is above sin or is perfect.

I had the great pleasure of attending the Presidential Rally for Barack Obama in Grant Park, Chicago Il. It was historic, energizing, and above all, inspiring. The energy in the park was electric, and the emotions ranged from raucous celebration to quite tearfulness as the magnitude of what was happening would sink in.

What struck me the most was actually after the rally. As we took to the streets and walked up Michigan Ave., it felt like a parade. Everyone was joyous, people were sitting on every ledge and stair along the street and applauding, and these cheers would come rushing down the street, drawing us all in. The leaves falling off the trees were like confetti. It felt like we took the city and the entire country back. A positive version of the anti-war protests and the REM video "Everybody Hurts." We were ecstatic and so we got out and walked.

Being in the rally was a time to remember. While the results were coming in, there was the ebb and flow with every announcement. Once the election was called for Obama, we went crazy. Throughout the evening, occasionally someone would come on the PA system to do a sound check. After the announcement for Obama, there was another sound check, with the person saying, "this is the final sound check for the next President of the United States." And we roared. As he would count, he'd say, " one two, one two, Obama one two," and again we roared.

Before President Obama (typing that made my eyes water) spoke, we were led in prayer. I will try and find that prayer to keep for the future. We were led in the Pledge of Allegiance, which meant more to me than at any other point in my life. The crowd sang along to the Star Spangled Banner. McCain's concession speech was broadcast, and it was a wonderful and heartfelt speech. When his named was first announced, some people booed, just as we booed when a state went to McCain. However, we quickly shushed them and applauded McCain. If only his campaign could have been like his speech, we would have had a very different campaign.

When Obama spoke, the crowd was not as energetic as I'd imagined. We were jubilant, but not raucous. I think that was because of his tone. We heard that we had only passed the first hurdle, and had much more to go. With that, we took to the streets.

On Metaefficent, there's a report about a solar startup company called Envision Solar that's developing solar canopies for mall parking lots. It is a genius idea, and I wish I'd thought of it. Parking lots are essentially wastelands, environmentally speaking, and this system seems to have the potential to address many of the issues of parking lots: heat island effect, light pollution, and collection of runoff water.

I applaud Envision Solar for their unique thinking. While the business speak words of "innovation" and "creativity" are often diluted, this is a unique effort to address multiple environmental issues at the same time. Now, if they'd only add on recharging ports for electric cars......