We’re having a great week in Florida with my siblings and their families. We had the best (also longest) day at Magic Kingdom EVER, and have had lots of awesome hanging-out time.
As many of you know, my birthday is right after New Year’s, which means that this time of year is heavy on introspection and taking stock.
In the past I have made resolutions, set intentions, established goals, and more. Last year, for example, was a big bucket list year: I climbed the mountain, ran the race, finished the book (two actually) and lost almost 25 pounds (and counting).
I have a number of big projects in 2012, including getting the book released, leading a few conferences, pastoring Tiny Church into ever newer directions, and probably running another race or two. But those are scheduled and will happen without setting a particular intention in that direction.
Sometimes I think too much, plan too much, manage too much. So this year, my one and only intention is to cultivate joy in my life. That means cultivating laughter. Music. Beauty.
To keep that focus in the midst of all that other stuff is a worthy goal, no?
I send you into the weekend with just three links:
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Three Christmas Gifts — Faith and Leadership
My friend Sherry gives her kids three Christmas gifts, because “it was good enough for Jesus!” We’ve adopted that practice, although Santa helps us fudge things sometimes.
I like the way this author breaks it down:
At a retreat on Christian life, I heard Susan V. Vogt describe a wonderful tradition suggested in her book “Raising Kids Who Will Make a Difference: Helping Your Family Live with Integrity, Value, Simplicity, and Care for Others.” A parent of four kids herself and a counselor and family life educator, she had tried her own experiments with gift giving, eventually settling on a simple yet elegant plan: she and her husband give each of their children only three gifts for Christmas — a “heart’s desire,” a piece of clothing and “something to grow on.”
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Structure v. Interaction — Church as Art
Troy is one of my favorite people in the world. He recently wrote this post in response to a question I posed about how to move a traditional congregation into some creative directions in worship.
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In Africa, the Art of Listening — New York Times
Once again with the power of story.
May you have opportunity to hear and tell powerful stories in the days to come, and in the year that awaits us.
I wrote this six years ago when I was pregnant with Margaret.
talk to me about the waiting…
mostly I crouch, head bowed, eyes closed
against the soft black, safe in liquid suspense.
but even in the nothing there are constant somethings:
a fluid symphony, simmering, rolling, rushing past;
a metronome beating out the time,
world without end—and a voice:
hushed murmur, burbling laugh,
distant yet irresistible.
and then, at certain times,
I am bathed in thirsty, throaty songs:
o come, o come,
long-expected one;
rejoice, rejoice,
prepare the way;
comfort, comfort,
alleluia, amen.
and these reverberations of hope
shake the cradle that holds me,
and I stretch the kinks out of kneeling legs,
raise my arms in praise,
then bow and wait, again,
for that time when we will sing
Joy!
To the World!
together.
I’m still here, but dang it’s been nice to take a break from any and all writing. Aside from sermons.
I found out yesterday that I have strep. Boo. Glad it didn’t strike while I was finishing the manuscript, but… boo.
Let’s get to it:
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Triangle Letter How-to (Mail for Free) — Improvised Life
Love this way to fold a letter so it becomes its own envelope. And it apparently bests the post office scanners.
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Best Photos of 2011 — National Geographic
Some amazing stuff:
I can’t even make this image ‘real’ in my mind, yet it is.
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Why Internet Commenters Will Eventually End the World — Sh*t My Dad Says
Quoting:
“Doesn’t it bother you that people can go on the internet and call you a talentless piece of shit, and never have to say it to your face?,” he continued.
“I don’t know. Doesn’t really bother me. I got my break writing down things you say. I think just karmically speaking I deserve to hear that on occasion,” I said.
“I’m not talking about you. I’m speaking fucking globally. If you can’t handle some pissant writing something nasty about you, then I failed as a father. What I’m trying to say is, don’t it trouble you that there’s a whole generation of people growing up that just say whatever the fuck they want, without any consequences?”
I can’t disagree.
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How Doctors Die — Zocalo
This made the rounds on Facebook this week.
I cannot count the number of times fellow physicians have told me, in words that vary only slightly, “Promise me if you find me like this that you’ll kill me.” They mean it. Some medical personnel wear medallions stamped “NO CODE” to tell physicians not to perform CPR on them. I have even seen it as a tattoo.
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Stephen Colbert’s GOP Debate, and Other Political Jokes Turned Causes — Daily Beast
Can’t help slipping a little Colbert fanlove into this post.
I can’t hear that piece without crying (big sap), and there’s something exuberantly wonderful about what this little Alaskan village has done with it.
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Leonardo’s To-Do List — Robert Krulwich
Minds that break free, that are compelled to wander, can sometimes achieve more than those of us who are more inhibited, more orderly, the study suggests. Or, as Jonah chose to put it, there are “unexpected benefits of not being able to focus.”
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Ten Church Models for a New Generation — Carol Merritt
Neo-monastic communities, art churches, podcast churches… beautiful, generative stuff here. Love it.
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Waking Up Our Internal Teacher — Lines Ballet
This is just a really compelling video. Beautiful dance, interesting words about the creative process.
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Why the Second Mile Matters — Call and Response Blog
Thomas L. Day is an Iraq war veteran, a Catholic, a Penn State graduate and participated in Jerry Sandusky’s Second Mile program. In a recent op-ed in the Washington Post, Day names the Penn State fiasco as the final straw to his loss of faith. Age 31, Day has lost faith in the church, the banking system, the court system, the military, the government and all of their public leaders.
Jesus, somewhere around age 30, had a crisis of faith as well. We see his op-ed in Matthew 5:38-42…
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How Children’s ‘Play’ is Being Sneakily Re-defined — Alfie Kohn, Washington Post
The typical American kindergarten now resembles a really bad first-grade classroom. Even preschool teachers are told to sacrifice opportunities for imaginative play in favor of drilling young children until they master a defined set of skills.
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Be Thankful for Government — Daily Kos
A little late for Thanksgiving…
Thanks for the safety of the air we breathed. On Thanksgiving week in 1939, the area where I live was shrouded in a smog so thick that day and night were the same. Street lights glowed in the gloom of noon, and people passed out just walking along their sidewalks. This week we looked out on beautiful blue skies and the only smell in the air was the last autumnal hint of fallen leaves. For that I thank the Clean Air Act signed by John Kennedy in 1963 and the expansions of that law that came later, including the one Nixon had the sense to sign in 1970. I thank that same legislation for the beautiful woodlands out my window, woods that could easily have have died from pollution, acid rain, and disease were it not for the legislation that protects them.
Thankful for you all, dear readers and friends. Have a good weekend…
(Prepare away, but a little "Away in the Manger" never hurt anybody either.)
I got a comment yesterday on a post I wrote a year ago defending Christmas carols in Advent. Wow! These posts really do hang around forever.
I looked at them again and mostly stand by what I wrote. Here is the whole string of posts:
First, I detected a genuine longing for Christmas, beyond some grabby-greedy-gimme kind of consumerist thing, and wondered if other people were feeling that too. (For what it’s worth, I don’t feel that same urgency for the Christmas message that I did last year at this time… you?)
Next, I unpacked some of the tensions between Advent and Christmas hymns and mounted a theological defense for singing Christmas carols in December.
Finally, I looked at some non-theological reasons for the same… some of them more substantive than others.
Discuss…
Actually, you guys argue—I have a book to finish.
And if you’d like a soundtrack for your discussion, may I recommend Peter Mayer’s Midwinter—beautiful Adventy stuff there, with a bit of Christmas thrown in. These are all original songs—no chestnuts roasting on an open fire here.
Indeed, his song “Where is the Light?” is a perfect example of an Adventish song that has a celebratory, upbeat tone—which is something I talk about in my second post.
