Heard the quail this morning. To be honest they sound like they're sneezing. Best singers around here are the finches. They don't really "sing" unless they're courting but at least the day to day chirping is easier on the ears.
Monday, June 05, 2023
MORNING
June sun well up. Whispy white clouds moving slowly towards the east. Haze on the horizon. Inversion or smoke? Can't be sure. A couple of squacking scrub jays accompanied about half of my early morning excercise. With it getting light so early it's hopeless trying to get back to sleep, especially since the sun is coming through my window until at least six thirty this time of year. Might as well the first, longest, session out of the way.
Sunday, May 14, 2023
GOD IN A TREE
So the blog that got started and ignored rises again. My space to hopefully help me see more clearly.
There is a beutiful tree outside my window. God is in that tree, exists in the tree. If God ceased to exist in the tree the tree would cease to exist
Saturday, December 31, 2011
AT THE TIME OF THE END
"If they ever take away our radio, suspend our newspaper, silence us, put to death all of us priests-bishop included, and you are left alone-a people without priests-then each of you will have to be God's microphone. Each of you will have to be a messenger, a prophet. The church will always live as long as one baptized person is left alive."
Oscar Romero, quoted in Messengers to the Kingdom by Jon Sobrino S.J.
I begin to understand by Romero scared the bejeesus out of some of the Vatican Curia in the three years he was archbishop of San Salvador. And I wonder how closely Morris West, author of the Clowns of God, followed the persecution of the church in Central America. Because he echoes that message in the novel. When the time comes, the little people, the lay people will have to carry on the work and the sacraments of the church whether they are ordained or not. Imagine how well that went over with old men who had spent their lives climbing the ladders of power.
In the novel the pope believes he has received a vision of the coming end times, the parousia. And the encyclical he is preparing is discovered. The curia could probably take the middle part of the equation. After all the church believes that Christ will complete history at some point. It's the private revelation and the pope's prescription for dealing with the expected chaos. The idea that in a time with no ordained men or women available, the laypeople would have to carry on the mission of the church as best they could went over like the proverbial lead balloon.
Romero's problem was smaller in scope but no less pressing.
Oscar Romero, quoted in Messengers to the Kingdom by Jon Sobrino S.J.
I begin to understand by Romero scared the bejeesus out of some of the Vatican Curia in the three years he was archbishop of San Salvador. And I wonder how closely Morris West, author of the Clowns of God, followed the persecution of the church in Central America. Because he echoes that message in the novel. When the time comes, the little people, the lay people will have to carry on the work and the sacraments of the church whether they are ordained or not. Imagine how well that went over with old men who had spent their lives climbing the ladders of power.
In the novel the pope believes he has received a vision of the coming end times, the parousia. And the encyclical he is preparing is discovered. The curia could probably take the middle part of the equation. After all the church believes that Christ will complete history at some point. It's the private revelation and the pope's prescription for dealing with the expected chaos. The idea that in a time with no ordained men or women available, the laypeople would have to carry on the mission of the church as best they could went over like the proverbial lead balloon.
Romero's problem was smaller in scope but no less pressing.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
A CELTIC PRAYER
A CELTIC PRAYER
This is an adaptation of a Celtic prayer I found in the book KNITTING INTO T HE MYSTERY.
May the blessing of light be on you, light without and light within and light inside the darkness within.
May the blessed sunlight shine upon you and warm your heart ‘til it glows, like a great peat fire, so that strangers may come and warm themselves and that friends may come.
And may the light shine out of the eyes of you, like a candle set in the windows of a house, bidding the wanderer to come in out of the storm.
And may the blessing of the rain be on you – the soft, sweet rain.
May it fall upon your spirit so that the seedlings of light in you shadow may spring up, and shed their sweetness on the air.
And may the blessing of the great rains be on you, that they beat upon your spirit and wash it fair and clean, and leave there many a shining pool, and sometimes a star.
And may the blessing for the earth be on you – the great round earth who carries all; the great round earth whose suffering has already become radiant.
May you ever have a kindly greeting for people you pass as you are going along the roads.
And now may the Lord bless you, and bless you kindly, your kin and all creatures.
Blessed be
This is an adaptation of a Celtic prayer I found in the book KNITTING INTO T HE MYSTERY.
May the blessing of light be on you, light without and light within and light inside the darkness within.
May the blessed sunlight shine upon you and warm your heart ‘til it glows, like a great peat fire, so that strangers may come and warm themselves and that friends may come.
And may the light shine out of the eyes of you, like a candle set in the windows of a house, bidding the wanderer to come in out of the storm.
And may the blessing of the rain be on you – the soft, sweet rain.
May it fall upon your spirit so that the seedlings of light in you shadow may spring up, and shed their sweetness on the air.
And may the blessing of the great rains be on you, that they beat upon your spirit and wash it fair and clean, and leave there many a shining pool, and sometimes a star.
And may the blessing for the earth be on you – the great round earth who carries all; the great round earth whose suffering has already become radiant.
May you ever have a kindly greeting for people you pass as you are going along the roads.
And now may the Lord bless you, and bless you kindly, your kin and all creatures.
Blessed be
Sunday, December 04, 2011
THE UNIVERSE IS UNDER CONSTRUCTION
My brothers and sisters, our help is in the name of the eternal God,
who is making the heavens and the earth.
From the New Zealand prayer book.
Some of the folks down under have either been working with Creation Spirituality or there's a strong Celtic influence. The Irish, you see, have no creation myths. For them the universe has always existed. The closest some of the stories come to creation is the idea of shaping. Somehow the universe is being shaped, or brought into new shapes. The closest anyone can come to an answer is that the universe itself is doing the shaping and using itself to make new shapes. I know, it's enough to give you the feeling that the answer is out there. It's just out of reach and everytime you think you've caught it, it slips away.
The last line really struck me when I read it for the first time. The act of Creation isn't finished. The heavens and the earth (earths?) have been made, are being made will be made. Aging stars die, some in spectacular super novas. The blast creating and seeding the space around them with the heavy elements needed to create planets and moon. The shock of the stellar blasts forces gases to surrender to gravity and new stars are born. New universes being born: some assembly required.
who is making the heavens and the earth.
From the New Zealand prayer book.
Some of the folks down under have either been working with Creation Spirituality or there's a strong Celtic influence. The Irish, you see, have no creation myths. For them the universe has always existed. The closest some of the stories come to creation is the idea of shaping. Somehow the universe is being shaped, or brought into new shapes. The closest anyone can come to an answer is that the universe itself is doing the shaping and using itself to make new shapes. I know, it's enough to give you the feeling that the answer is out there. It's just out of reach and everytime you think you've caught it, it slips away.
The last line really struck me when I read it for the first time. The act of Creation isn't finished. The heavens and the earth (earths?) have been made, are being made will be made. Aging stars die, some in spectacular super novas. The blast creating and seeding the space around them with the heavy elements needed to create planets and moon. The shock of the stellar blasts forces gases to surrender to gravity and new stars are born. New universes being born: some assembly required.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
A WOOLY WORD OF GOD
Every single creature is full of God and is a book about God.
Every creature is a word of God.
If I spent enough time with the tiniest creature-
Even a caterpiller-
I would never have to prepare a sermon. So full of God is every creature.
Meister Eckhart
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
WHOSE GARDEN WAS THIS?
This poor neglected little corner of the blogoverse. Maybe it will get more attention now that I'm working through Original Blessing. But this song performed by John Denver beautifully sums up what is still at stake.
WHOSE GARDEN WAS THIS
Whose garden was this, it must have been lovely.
Did it have flowers?
I've seen pictures of flowers.
And I'd love to have smelled one.
Whose river was this, you say it ran freely.
Blue was its color.
And I've seen blue in some pictures.
And I'd love to have been there.
Tell me again I need to know.
The forest had trees, the meadows were green.
The oceans were blue and birds really flew.
Can you swear that it's true.
Whose grey sky was this?
Or was it a blue one?
You say there were breezes.
I've heard records of breezes.
And I'd love to have felt one.
Tell me again I need to know.
The forest had trees, the meadows were green.
The oceans were blue and birds really flew.
Can you swear that it's true.
Whose garden was this, it must have been lovely.
Did it have flowers?
I've seen pictures of flowers.
And I'd love to have smelled one.
Tell me again I need to know.
Tell me again I need to know.
Tell me again I need to know.
Tell me again I need to know.
Words and music by Tom Paxton. Covered by John Denver about 1970
I don’t really know what to make of these lyrics. But listening John Denver sing this song is enough to break your heart.
Is this a nightmare of now or the far future? God/dess knows we have enough nightmares in our own time. The dates suggest the song is pre EPA era. And here we have a concerted effort to gut the EPA. Supposedly this will create jobs. I’ve even run across comments that take the stand that given a choice between jobs and the environment, the environment comes dead last. And you can’t get through to them. If we destroy the environment the jobs aren’t going to matter very much.
So, what is the world in this song? Is it the remains a jungle in Viet Nam after Agent Orange was dropped on it? The remains of an equatorial rainforest? The spreading of the Sahara? The wrecked neighborhoods in the Bronx and Brooklyn?
Or is this a nightmare out of the finale of Soylant Green or the novel Stand on Zanzibar? A future when flowers, trees, blue skies, free flowing rivers, unspoiled oceans, and even birds are remembered in pictures and folk tale? Something your doddering great grandparents tell stories about? “I’ve seen pictures of flowers. And I’d loved to have smelled one.”
Goddess, may it never come to that.
WHOSE GARDEN WAS THIS
Whose garden was this, it must have been lovely.
Did it have flowers?
I've seen pictures of flowers.
And I'd love to have smelled one.
Whose river was this, you say it ran freely.
Blue was its color.
And I've seen blue in some pictures.
And I'd love to have been there.
Tell me again I need to know.
The forest had trees, the meadows were green.
The oceans were blue and birds really flew.
Can you swear that it's true.
Whose grey sky was this?
Or was it a blue one?
You say there were breezes.
I've heard records of breezes.
And I'd love to have felt one.
Tell me again I need to know.
The forest had trees, the meadows were green.
The oceans were blue and birds really flew.
Can you swear that it's true.
Whose garden was this, it must have been lovely.
Did it have flowers?
I've seen pictures of flowers.
And I'd love to have smelled one.
Tell me again I need to know.
Tell me again I need to know.
Tell me again I need to know.
Tell me again I need to know.
Words and music by Tom Paxton. Covered by John Denver about 1970
I don’t really know what to make of these lyrics. But listening John Denver sing this song is enough to break your heart.
Is this a nightmare of now or the far future? God/dess knows we have enough nightmares in our own time. The dates suggest the song is pre EPA era. And here we have a concerted effort to gut the EPA. Supposedly this will create jobs. I’ve even run across comments that take the stand that given a choice between jobs and the environment, the environment comes dead last. And you can’t get through to them. If we destroy the environment the jobs aren’t going to matter very much.
So, what is the world in this song? Is it the remains a jungle in Viet Nam after Agent Orange was dropped on it? The remains of an equatorial rainforest? The spreading of the Sahara? The wrecked neighborhoods in the Bronx and Brooklyn?
Or is this a nightmare out of the finale of Soylant Green or the novel Stand on Zanzibar? A future when flowers, trees, blue skies, free flowing rivers, unspoiled oceans, and even birds are remembered in pictures and folk tale? Something your doddering great grandparents tell stories about? “I’ve seen pictures of flowers. And I’d loved to have smelled one.”
Goddess, may it never come to that.
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