“This would be a very important small service. Though many people feel sad, angry or lonely during the holidays, not many wish to focus on it. But the ones who come to pray their heartbreak with other people really need the space a Blue Christmas service provides. So I was keen to get everything right….
It was not to be.”
“The most familiar verses of the prophecy of Haggai are 6-7b, which speak of the reward the faithful, but first, there would be warnings of the seas and lands of all nations. Every time I read these words, Jennens’ libretto and Handel’s solo for bass play in my ear.”
“When this is all over,
will we have the courage
to name our whitewashed tombs,
to heal the divides between us,
or will we choose to wallow in our self-righteousness,
whatever it happens to be,
Hold on to our outrage, whatever the source,
with ghostly white knuckles
and no room for reconciliation in our tightly clenched fists when this is all over?”
“Even though most of us stand in a position of privilege and power relative not only to the people to whom Zephaniah was speaking, but relative to the vast majority of the world population, we can rejoice that God’s promise is for all of us—for all nations and all peoples.”
“I am no less than I am, more human than I’d like to be. And I, too, wonder why God – if it is God at all – cycles me through the wilderness as though I require or deserve some sort of Lenten-tainted life. To change me? To remind me of my humanity? To teach me to love others? Sometimes – sometimes – it feels like more than I need and far more than I deserve.”
“I love wandering with the wisemen. I love watching the stars with the shepherds. I love seeing the mess and dirt of a manger, and knowing Jesus is born right in the middle of that mess.”
“Given the very difficult days that we and all our neighbors are all experiencing as the COVID pandemic, including the most recent new variant in South Africa, I suspect we would all benefit from not only longer seasons of Advent as we continue to journey into the troubled 2020s.”
“A religious icon is a window into the realm of heaven. When I write an icon, I often think of myself as the glass. The ego part of me creates all sorts of smudges, nicks and dust. It’s inevitable to the human condition that this would be so. I try to get as clear as possible by sitting in prayer, but I have to resign myself to never being completely transparent.”
“Some churches acknowledge that this season can be much different from how most people appear to feel. The churches deliberately draw in those who grieve, feel lost, or are alone. The usual date for such services is on the winter solstice, the “Longest Night” of the year. This year that date comes on December 22nd.”
“You came forth from the eternal God,
and you returned to that same source,…
With God the Father you are one,
and one with us in human flesh…”