Lo, we come with Pods descending
The masks we wear, no matter how glamorous, just get in the way of living life.
“The simple elegance of the service had been a good match for my head,” Livingston writes, “but the tangled mess of my heart longed for something else. ‘I need a statue of a saint,’ I joked, but [my husband and I] both understood that a statue was shorthand for many things.’”
“Jewish custom required that a male child be circumcised on his eighth day after birth. Everyone seemed to think the baby should be named Zechariah, after his father, but Elizabeth told them that the child’s name would be John. What a kerfluffle that made! Children were usually named after their father or at least a deceased relative so that the child would carry on the name, but there was no one called Yochanan in the family so why would they name him “Jehovah has been gracious” or “has shown great favor” (the meanings of the name in Hebrew)?”
It’s our weekly roundup of stories from around the church
“Scripture describes stinginess and oppressing others as “hardening our heart”–but in reality, we’ve hardened our brains. Brains too hard-wired can’t move very far in the direction of generosity.”
Judge Gergel confirms and expands September 19 injunction affirming The Episcopal Church in South Carolina as the historic Diocese of South Carolina, noting “The Defendants [the disassociated diocese] here clearly violated the terms of the Court’s Order and Injunction.”
“This tree preaches resurrection as quietly as resolutely as can be. Our redbud is a marvelous reminder of the wisdom of waiting, of watching, of being alert to the subtle signs of life that can suddenly come into focus before our eyes even in the dead of winter, the same beautiful message encapsulated by the season of Advent.”
The birth of the child was not without complications. It was the source of so much joy – angels sang out over the hillsides, in that other gospel, because heaven and earth could not contain the wonder of this birth; but it was not without complications.
From the Episcopal Church: [December 17, 2019] The Episcopal Church is offering two, digital Christmas Eve programs on December 24. Available on both the Episcopal