waiting for the birth of the already born

I have never been a fan of Christmas. When I was home for Thanksgiving my mom asked me what my favorite Christmas tradition is. I replied honestly that I did not have a favorite tradition because I don’t really like Christmas. I don’t remember a time when I really liked Christmas and I don’t know why this is the case. Still, this part of my personality, personal taste, life etc. has always bothered me. Shouldn’t I be absolutely in love with a holiday that commemorates the birth of Christ? It really is absurd that I don’t like Christmas.

Yesterday marked the first day of the new liturgical year and the beginning of Advent, our anxious waiting for the birth of Christ. For four weeks the Church will be reading, praying, and singing our way to the birth of Christ. This is a pretty exciting time and I intend to get in on the action this year. I am determined to get excited.

A passage from today’s Old Testament reading stood out to me.

Wash yourselves;
make yourselves clean;
remove the evil of your doings
from before my eyes;
cease to do evil,
learn to do good;
seek justice,
rescue the oppressed,
defend the orphan,
plead for the widow.

I think this stands out to me because it implies action. Not only are we anxiously waiting for the birth of Christ but we are anxiously preparing for his arrival by learning to do what Christ does through loving othe

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xxy

Today I had one of my wisdom teeth pulled, in order to rest I watched this movie. It is a brilliant portrayal of hermaphroditism and a wonderful commentary on gender. I recommend it to anyone who is remotely interested in gender issues. Also, it is available for instant play on Netflix so you should definitely check it out.

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because i’m usually behind the times

My friend found this video this morning. I’m sure it is pretty popular but I am new to this artist so I am sharing it…

You can find more Oren Lavie stuff here

I might watch this a million more times…

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ugh

this is what I feel like today, no joke…

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the day has come

The publishing date of Tree of Codes that is… soon I will hold my beloved in my hands. The only sad thing about the fact that it is on amazon is that I could have paid half the amount I paid.

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dear raccoons,

you are not cute, we do not like you, we especially hate your taste for our garbage.

Sincerely,

Hometree

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for laura

in honor of your 22nd birthday… I wish I could have given you this schnooge.

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time signature genius

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bus stops

Dear King County Metro,

Thank you for the ride this morning. The cute old man and the schnoogie dogs were definitely a great start to my morning. I missed you last week.

Sincerely,

Adrianna

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which is the most beautiful

Aside from celebrating the Feast of All Saints, today at St. Paul’s we welcomed Simone, Adalee, and Caedmon into the Body of Christ through the Sacrament of Baptism. I love baptisms in the Episcopal church. Not only is this an occasion to welcome new individuals into the Body of Christ, we have a chance to renew our vows of Christianity and I am always reminded of the magnificence of this covenant I have entered into.

The Gospel reading for the day was from Luke 6:20-31.

“Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are you who hunger now,
for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when people hate you,
when they exclude you and insult you
and reject your name as evil,
because of the Son of Man.

As we contemplated the beatitudes today we were reminded that being a part of the Body of Christ is buying into a paradigm that is contrary to popular belief. Being a Christian means loving things that are true, fully beautiful, and good.

Upon winning the Nobel Prize for literature Pablo Neruda was asked a question: “Which is the most beautiful word?” I think this is a fitting question for a poet.

I’m going to reply in a fairly vulgar way, like in a radio song, wiht a word which is extremely hackneyed: the word love. The more you use it, the stronger it gets. And there’s no harm abusing the word either.

This was Neruda’s response.

My prayer this week is that I will learn to love the right things, that I will see true beauty, and that goodness will be readily apparent to me.

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