Category: Christmas

Christmas Eve~

12/24/2018

Christmas Eve. Many people out there are listening to Christmas music, wrapping Christmas presents, decorating Christmas cookies—Christmas, Christmas, Christmas. But very few admit to be Christian. I’m not judging, just observing.
I don’t need to announce publically that I am a Christian, but personally it makes all the difference in my life. Faith leads me toward humility and away from hubris. It is not me alone creating good thoughts, words and deeds, but God working through me. When I falter, I am forgiven and led to pick myself up
This Christmas Eve I will be listening to Christmas music, wrapping Christmas presents, and decorating Christmas cookies. God will be working through everyone, but I am blessed with the grace of knowing the mysterious benefit.

Advent hope

12/20/2018

Advent is a time of hope. We hope for Jesus’ saving grace. We know that his birth was just the beginning, that during his life he experienced satisfaction but then suffered and died a horrific death. The fulfillment of hope doesn’t come until Easter with his resurrection to new life.
    It is the cycle of all human experience; we sometimes we forget the good parts that hope carries for us.
    The following post was written for my cottage by the sea blog. As Christians, we can read the Advent hope into it.

Back home. Hiatus from posting as I catch up with all that’s going on here before we head to Lancaster on Saturday for Christmas. Tis the season to be grateful even among change and sadness.
      On Monday night my church went caroling to several of the people that I visit regularly; many young children and teenagers brought joy to the elderly who can’t get out anymore. ‘Shut-in’ may not be a PC term, but there’s some truth in it; for sure, however, they opened up their hearts and doors to those of us who can still get out and about.
     I had missed two weeks volunteering at Open Table, our local food pantry. I help on Tuesday, Senior Day. Many said they missed me and asked if I was okay. “Yes, I’m here today,” is all that I said, and then listened to their holiday stories. One woman admitted that the holidays weren’t joyful for her; two of her four adults sons had died of heart attacks during the year and the other two have heart conditions. Someone else admitted, “Christmas isn’t Tra-la-la-la-la for everyone.”
      But there was also joy and gratitude. A food supplier had donated frozen ham, turkey breast, or roast beef, a marvelous choice for each guest.

A baby's born~

12/27/2017

    Often I write a blog for aprayerdiary and then realize it can fit www.acottagebythesea as well. Before I post it here I add something more, for as you know, this blog is unabashedly about my journey as a Christian. I say journey, because I’m not there yet (I know there is no end) and often the road is bumpy and even disappears altogether.
    This year the Christmas schedule at my daughter's didn’t lend itself to attending a Christmas Eve church service. I could have gone, but I was very grateful to be home among the food, fire, lights and love.
Jesus can be born again within us wherever we are. Babies need years to grow in faith and wisdom, as did the fully human Jesus. Same thing with me; it’s just taking a long time. The fully divine part of me needs a lot of time, too. Again, I’m reminded that my journey toward faith, hope and love, doesn’t have a finish line. Its ending is Eternity.

    Regardless of one’s faith tradition, the story of the birth of Jesus touches us all. For me it is about starting again, especially since my birthday is five days after Christmas. New ideas, ways of being, routines, rituals, attitudes can be born in me, which means I have to let go of some of the old ones that are useful anymore.
    A baby is born with nothing, so a place to begin is to pare down possessions. Jesus wore bands of cloth; I have a closet full of things to wrap myself in. Baby Jesus was taken care of, and as he go older he took care of others by thought, word and deed. That is what we are born and reborn to do, regardless of faith tradition.

Faith and works at Christmas

12/22/2017

Is there faith without works? This theological question has been debated since mentioned in James 2:18: “Yes, a man may say, You have faith, and I have works: show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.”
Without a doubt, the Christmas seasons roots me in both faith and works. I can view the shopping, cooking, socializing, and traveling that fills my life as difficult, agonizing, and unwanted work, as something I have to get done. Or, I can consider it an opportunity to offer love, compassion, and service, as something to further God’s kingdom.
The faith piece is easy to grasp at Christmas. Without getting bogged down in Christian dogma and jargon, Jesus was born to show us that God is love.
Keep the holidays simple.

The birth of Mary~

12/9/2016

     Before I reflect some more on Mary I want to set the record strait. Last night while enjoying a glass of wine as we awaited the lighting of the Christmas tree by the Duomo, my Baptist friend informed me that this December 8th feast day was about Mary’s immaculate birth.
Here’s what Wikipedia tells us:
     “The Immaculate Conception, according to the teaching of the Catholic Church, was the conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the womb of her mother, Saint Anne, free from original sin by virtue of the foreseen merits of her son Jesus Christ.”
    Who knows the truth of Mary’s immaculate birth or the virgin birth of Jesus. From a spiritual perspective, there is no point in getting hung up about the truth of them. In fact, a scientific perspective would weigh on the side of ‘No.’ But the point is to offer through story the truths we are strive for, namely, ‘To love God with all our mind, heart and soul, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.’ These are the words of Jesus, born of a woman who started out with a pure mind, heart, and soul.
     The lighting of the tree was brilliant and Mary’s love permeated the crowds.

Faith, hope and love in Florence~

12/6/2016

Here I am, very grateful to be in warm and sunny Florence, among fewer tourists and less traffic that during other visits. The decorations in the city are all about Christmas. Preparations are being made to light the tree in front of Santa Maria dei Fiori on the 8th. What better day than on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception! A friend of mine and her husband know of a little out-of-the-way wine bar where we will watch and celebrate.
I am thinking a lot about Mary these days. I don’t have to believe in any literate understanding of an immaculate conception in order to strive for what Mary represents as bearing of God’s good, the Christ. Her acceptance symbolizes the faith, hope and love as the way to God’s kingdom on earth. Celebrating helps us renew our commitment.

Christianity isn't easy~

12/28/2015

I feel disconnected today. Yesterday I gave the sermon at church. In summary, my message was that in celebrating Christmas we learn to love Jesus before we learn that Jesus loves us. As we get older the two become intertwined.
Wouldn’t you think I would be feeling peaceful and faithful after that? Well, I’m not. All morning I’ve felt empty and purposeless. I know that’s the way it goes with faith, but I don’t like it. I want all the certainty and childlike ease that the nativity scene offers. But Jesus grows up quickly and then comes Lent before Easter. No one ever said Christianity was easy.

Loving Baby Jesus

12/17/2015

I’m offering the sermon at church on December 27, which needless to say is where I have been directing my writing energy—not on this blog. My sermon theme is God’s love. During advent and throughout the Twelve Days of Christmas we focus on loving Jesus, and then for the rest of the church year everything shifts to Jesus loving us. Of course God loved us first, from the beginning of creation, but as far as our human life is concerned one of the ways we learn of God’s love is by loving the baby Jesus. Maybe that’s why we love Christmas—who could not love an innocent baby in a manger?

Prayer of Invocation, December 28, 2014

12/30/2014

Dear God,

We are here, not knowing if it is the beginning or the end.

We can be quite certain, however, that we are coming to the end of 2014 and that the beginning of 2015 will follow in three days.

But beyond that, beginnings and endings are confusing. Advent embraces the beginning of Jesus’ life; a beginning that we don’t want to end because we know what Jesus will go through; and yet, after the Crucifixion, comes a new, more permanent beginning, the Resurrection, a beginning that never ends.

Our church is continually experiencing beginnings and endings, births and deaths. This year in the Christmas Pageant the designated Baby Jesus was about four months old at the beginning of her life; following close behind appeared an undesignated, un-costumed one and a half year old angel who wandered up and down the aisle looking for Jesus or perhaps being Jesus. And the rest of us in the pews, young, middling, and beyond, were doing the same thing. We were try to follow Jesus, and we were trying to be like Jesus—something we often do, never certain which stance to take at a given moment, and most of the time failing miserably.

Yesterday in this sanctuary we experienced another ending and beginning. We said goodbye a dear friend and member of our church. It was the end of her 96 year-long earthy life, but the beginning of her eternal life with God.

As we start the beginning of a new year, dear God, help us to live with the ambiguities of our own particular endings and beginnings; help us to wander up and down the aisles of life trying to following Jesus, trying to be like Him.

Amen

More lessons from Christmas~

12/26/2014

and Women.

More lessons from Christmas this year: too much chatter, not enough silent spaces. The nativity stories in Luke and Matthew seem to suggest that a balance surrounded Jesus’ birth. The Gospel message is one of both—conversation and activity, and silence and simplicity. Throughout his life Jesus called for both-- feed the poor and pray. He never suggests that more conversation the better but again and again he tells us to go off by ourselves and pray. In John’s Gospel he rebukes Martha for her excessive activity, while acknowledging that Mary has chosen the better part.

My Christmas had activity and silence, and for that I am very grateful; but sometimes I felt there was too much chatter. I understand that life out there in the world has to be active and conversational. Leaders must speak up and take action. Not everyone can retreat to Mt. Athos and lead a life of prayer. Feeding the poor takes planning, conversation and action. However, I wonder if we need the amount of chatter, gossip, critique, judgments that we all engage in in our personal lives? I wonder if we are adding to the negative energy out there in the world? What if everyone remained silent, for say a half hour? My Christmas lesson is to practice more of that.