Thursday, March 13, 2014
Friday, February 28, 2014
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
Pray and Dance and Heal and Comfort
What we did at church last Sunday: Sending out prayers and love and comfort to our dear friends who have not been able to attend church lately due to illness and healing and other struggles. Prayer through dancing.
Sometimes, prayer is not a pretty thing.
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
It Gets Better
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BjpS2YdR0s
Friday, January 31, 2014
Eclectia
“The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves, the resolution not to twist them to fit our own image. If in loving them we do not love what they are, but only their potential likeness to ourselves, then we do not love them: we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them”
~Thomas Merton
(Happy Birthday to Saint Thomas of Kentucky)
Thursday, January 23, 2014
Prayer Dance
When I see the sun
and feel her warm embrace
I am always grateful
But when the days have been cool
and the winter, long and gray,
on those days when the sun
breaks through and embraces me warmly,
On those days,
I dance like a whale breaching,
for joy like no other joy.
Friday, January 10, 2014
A faded and imperfect reflection
For now, we see as through a glass, darkly
but on our dark days, that seems such a small comfort
We hope for that which is not a dim reflection
but the original, whole, perfect, known fully,
even as we are fully known
In the end, we find no options but waiting, powerless.
But at least in this
this darkness,
this uncertainty
this dim reflection
at least in this
we try to take comfort that
we do not have to wait alone.
Wednesday, January 1, 2014
Greetings, New Year
One resolution for this blog, only one:
Be it resolved to end "debate."
I will almost certainly continue to offer an occasional opinion here, some of my ponderings and considerations and meditations on important and unimportant matters alike. But, I have simply lost the appetite for the back and forth sniping that happens to often in this ol' world.
If I offer an opinion, that is what it is. Take it for what it's worth. If you want to offer an opinion, please do so, AS an opinion, kindly offered for what it's worth.
If you have a different opinion than mine, you are still welcome to offer it, but I insist on respect and kindness and suggestions, not insistence. That is, if you disagree on matters of opinion, feel free to offer an alternative opinion, but begin it with, "...Interesting point, but have you considered..." or, "I see... but what about..."
Unless it is a verifiable fact, do not bother with posts that begin like, "You're WRONG. Here's the FACTS..."
That is, if I offer an opinion about Ben Franklin's birthday or how many years MASH was on TV or the molecular difference between blue birds and blue jays, at a species level (not likely to happen, since that is probably gibberish...), you can correct facts.
But if it's an opinion about your interpretation of a biblical passage or your hunch about what God wants or the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin or ANY opinion, do not proffer declarative statements when you are stating your opinion. You are always welcome to say, "It seems to me..." or "My opinion on that question is..." but not, "GOD SAYS you are wrong..."
If you are unclear as if your post that you'd like to make is opinion rather than fact, feel free to email me or consult a dictionary and ask.
I just don't think back and forth bickering about debatable (even IMPORTANT debatable) matters helps more than it harms. This is my opinion, to be sure, and I'm going to try to write and comment this year keeping that opinion in mind. If you'd like to post here, I'd kindly ask the same from you.
Have a wonderful new year.
May your feet walk (or "wheelchair roll...") many pleasant and thought-provoking miles and may we all live together in peace.
~Dan
Tuesday, December 24, 2013
Blessed Winter Holy Days
"I don't think it is enough appreciated how much an outdoor book the Bible is. It is a "hypaethral book," such as Thoreau talked about - a book open to the sky. It is best read and understood outdoors, and the farther outdoors the better. Or that has been my experience of it.
Passages that within walls seem improbable or incredible, outdoors seem merely natural. This is because outdoors we are confronted everywhere with wonders; we see that the miraculous is not extraordinary but the common mode of existence. It is our daily bread.
Whoever really has considered the lilies of the field or the birds of the air and pondered the improbability of their existence in this warm world within the cold and empty stellar distances will hardly balk at the turning of water into wine - which was, after all, a very small miracle. We forget the greater and still continuing miracle by which water (with soil and sunlight) is turned into grapes..."
"No matter how much one may love the world as a whole, one can live fully in it only by living responsibly in some small part of it.
Where we live and who we live there with define the terms of our relationship to the world and to humanity. We thus come again to the paradox that one can become whole only by the responsible acceptance of one's partiality..."
“There comes . . . a longing never to travel again except on foot...”
“I thought, [God] must forebear to reveal His power and glory by presenting Himself as Himself, and must be present only in the ordinary miracle of the existence of His creatures. Those who wish to see Him must see Him in the poor, the hungry, the hurt, the wordless creatures, the groaning and travailing beautiful world.”
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Blessed Winter Season!
Thursday, December 19, 2013
Disagreement is not an assault on the Gospel
Just a quick post to state the obvious.
Stan, over at his blog, noted today that the whole "Robertson crisis" comes down to whether we follow the Gospel. In speaking of the "Duck Dynasty" kerfluffle, over one of the Ducks saying he loves folk, whether they're gay, terrorists, drunks or practice bestiality, and his declaration that homosexuality is a sin, Stan concluded...
Remaining silent when the Gospel is under attack cannot be the right response. It's not Phil Robertson at issue here. It is sin, Scripture, and the Gospel on the chopping block. And for that I will not take a pass.
The problem with this reasoning (of course) it is conflating "The Gospel" NOT with a teaching of Jesus, but with a particular view on a particular behavior - as if you can't disagree about various behaviors and remain a Christian. Of course, this is almost certainly what many folk like Stan thinks - you CAN'T be mistaken on that particular behavior and be a Christian. They are wrong.
As I've said before, the Gospel is NOT a call to have perfect understanding in order to be saved (whether or not they're right on this topic - and they're not), it is a call to a salvation and a life of Grace and of the Love of God.
Conflating "the Gospel" to some particular opinion about a behavior's sin status is - as oft noted here - a mistake and is undermining of the actual Gospel, which is the Good News of Jesus, not the Bad News of the fundamentalists.
Just to repeat this point yet again.
Tuesday, December 17, 2013
Floating
My fall has been full of floating
from geese overhead
to water beneath my feet
to dragonflies and dandelion puffs
and golden autumn leaves...
Thursday, December 5, 2013
Peace: Mandela
Nelson Mandela died today. I think his Prisoner to President story is one of the most powerful of the 20th century. He certainly was not a perfect man, but I think he was a great man in a great movement. Some of his words...
"If you want to make peace with your enemy, you have to work with your enemy. Then he becomes your partner."
“As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.”
"There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop of our desires."
"We must use time wisely and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right."
"If there are dreams about a beautiful South Africa, there are also roads that lead to their goal. Two of these roads could be named Goodness and Forgiveness."
"In my country we go to prison first and then become President."
Rest in well-earned peace, sir.