Die Wette gilt.

Durch jede Schicht der Menschen,
zieht sich ein schwarzes Band.
Fragt man nach den Gründen,
hat man sich schnell verrannt.

Heutzutage, gar keine Frage,
soll jeder schnell flexibel sein.
Die Welt soll ein Zuhause, das Leben eine Jause.
Weshalb ich heute klage.

Vor Jahren einmal, oder zweimal,
sesshaft geworden auf der Welt,
gibt’s heute nur noch wenig,
was Menschen zusammen hält.

Schnelllebigkeit in allen Kreisen,
von Frau zu Mann und andersrum,
wer heute nicht vier Sprachen spricht,
findt’ keinen Job, gilt als dumm.

Überall einsetzbar und stets bereit,
von sozialer Bindung schon befreit,
sollen Menschen und Maschinen
dem Gott, dem Gelde, heute dienen.
Ein Gedicht über die heutige Schnelllebigkeit und wieso ich glaube, dass Menschen deshalb häufig ihre sozialen Bindungen verlieren bzw. einschränken müssen.

Do you ever have moments where you step back and reflect, “Wow, my kids are going to have memories of the holidays that are done this way, with me as the mother.” It sounds like a very obvious statement, but there is something really strange about it, when you allow yourself to fully inhabit this reality. We all grew up with our own family traditions, and we associate the holidays with how we were raised to celebrate them. But as adults, it is not always possible, or even desirable, to recreate or continue these family traditions when we now have in-laws, distance, divorce, or other factors that change the way we do things. So I stop this Thanksgiving and take a look around me: this is the way, so far at least, my kids will remember this holiday.

And I am the adult in this picture. Somehow when I think about Thanksgiving, I still picture myself as the child, sitting in the backseat for the long drive to my grandmother’s house, running around with my cousins and putting on plays, eating lots of dessert and passing out on the way home. I am lucky to have nice memories of this holiday, and I will always treasure them. But now it’s my kids’ turn. It is truly amazing to try to step into my children’s shoes– see the world through their eyes. Wow, I think, they are just taking this all in, going along with whatever plans we have made, finding their place in the way of things. What an incredible experience, to be a child. You never know what’s going to happen next, not really. You understand some, but not all, of what goes on around you, and while you can’t articulate exactly how you feel, you know when you feel complete and happy.

Maybe it’s not so different from being an adult after all.

The difference, though, is that now we do have some choices, which, of course, come with many responsibilities. My intent is to not get lost in all these responsibilities, but to still feel the wonder I felt as a child, realizing again and again that, wow, we are really the actors on somebody else’s stage, not only the central character of our own.

This is the first Thanksgiving I have spent alone in 29 years.

Thanksgiving when I was growing up was a quiet family affair.  Mother would cook a turkey, Daddy would make mashed potatoes, Mother would make gravy.  The vegetables were an afterthought.  Mother would make piecrusts and Daddy would make pies.  Sounds so equitable, doesn’t it?  We would have an early dinner, in our usual fashion, on our little low tables in  the living room.  Daddy would make a fire.  Football would be on the TV.  Every so often, one of our parents’ maiden lady friends would come over.  I don’t really recall it, but there are pictures as evidence, that one year E-Bro and I did some sort of little pageant for Doralyn and Damon.  Generally, it was just a cozy, loving relaxed time.  Very nice memories.  Warm and safe.

The first and, up until now, only Thanksgiving I ever spent alone was my first one away from home when I was 18.   Money was tight, so I decided to stay in Boston for the holiday.  I didn’t think it would be a big deal, as I had never found Thanksgiving to be a big deal.  As I wrote above, it was just a quiet holiday.  Because they closed the dorms, I was going to stay at my boyfriend’s apartment, even though he was going home to Pittsburgh. Well, we wound up breaking up shortly before Thanksgiving, but agreed that I could still stay in the apartment because he wouldn’t be there anyway.  I was really devastated by this break-up, even though we weren’t very serious, and so staying in his place was not a good idea.  I had bought myself some champagne and roses, woke up and watched the parades and drank champagne and cried.  A tradition was born.  (I also ate port wine cheese and crackers, but left that out of future reenactments of the tradition.)  I was miserable.  In the early afternoon, I pulled myself together and went to the movies to see My Brilliant Career.  It cheered me up a bit.  But then I went to Store 24 to buy myself a TV turkey dinner, and the East Indian man at the counter felt so sorry for me that he invited me to have Thanksgiving dinner with him and his family.  That was the nail in my feeling-better coffin.  I went back to the apartment, cooked my TV dinner – this was back when they came in the little three-compartment metallic trays – cried my way through dinner and the obligatory Christmas TV shows and went to bed early.  I was awfully glad that day was over.

The next Thanksgiving, I went home with my friend Elsa and spent the holiday at her house in Billerica.  I don’t recall it very well, but I remember woods, and that it was nice to be with a family, even if it wasn’t my own.

After that, I was in Boulder.  My Dad started what became a wonderful tradition.  He would come out to see me, all by himself, for Thanksgiving.  E-Bro would typically go home to see my Mother, although she spent a few Thanksgivings happily alone.  Thanksgivings with my father added to our already-close relationship.  He would usually stay at the University Inn, since I never lived anywhere large enough to have company.  We talked about everything under the sun. 

The first year, I didn’t have a kitchen, so after struggling to locate an open restaurant, we found ourselves having Thanksgiving dinner in a basement Chinese restaurant on the Pearl Street Mall.

For our second Thanksgiving, I cooked my first turkey.  I was living in my cold little upstairs apartment with the red shag carpeting that climbed the walls and the turquoise-tiled bathroom with the claw foot tub.  And the mice and faulty gas heater.  We ate on the floor, using a trunk covered with a lace shawl as our dining table.  I must have called my Mother ten times for turkey cooking advice.  He was so proud to have been there for my first bird.  It wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t bad.

Subsequent Thanksgivings were with Pat, but my Dad still came out.  We ate at the Red Lion the first year, and cooked in our triplex for the next two years, usually having CJ and Debbie for company.  As neurotic as Debbie was, my Dad was quite fond of her.  I believe Pat and I went back to North Carolina for one Thanksgiving, just after we got engaged. 

After that, almost everything Thanksgiving was spent at my brother-in-law/sister-in-law’s house, with their girls and friends.  It was always very nice, even though it was a larger crowd than I was generally comfortable with.  My Mother came with my Dad for a couple of Thanksgivings, and  Once my parents reached a certain age, though, they both stayed in Durham for Thanksgiving.  That’s when the champagne-parade-tears tradition started.  And so it continues.

Last year, I had just moved into the cottage.  I had company, a leg of lamb, my tearful tradition, and a nice day.  This year, it is just me.  Pat’s family has invited me to share their Thanksgiving, saying it’s not the same without me.  Of course it’s not – and that’s the whole point.  If I wanted it to be the same, I’d have stayed married.  I need to separate myself from that level of family, though certainly not from Kelsea.  I need to find my own family, whether that’s in my relationship with a lover, myself , or perhaps both.

It is time to find a new tradition.

Über Weihnachtstraditionen habe ich schon geschrieben. Ich tu’s nochmal:

Wie in vielen Schulen, steht auch unsere öffentliche Schule immer gerne bereit Pseudo-Christliche Traditionen zu feiern. Deswegen wird jedes Jahr bei uns ein großer, wunderschön geschmückter Weihnachtsbaum in unsere Pausenhalle gestellt.

Unser Weihnachtsbaum

Das wäre jetzt nichts bloggenswertes (was ein Wort), wenn nicht noch eine andere Tradition hinzu käme: Der Baum ist jedes Jahr zu groß für unsere Pausenhalle und jedes Jahr kümmert sich keiner darum. Das Ergebnis kann man schon auf dem Bild oben erkennen aber hier wird es nochmal deutlicher:

abgeknickt!

Was dazu zu sagen bleibt? Ein Kunde von Melanie hat es schon ganz passend formuliert, ich wandele es nur kurz ab:

Steht der Tann’baum schief im Garten,
Muss das Mädchen etwas warten.

naja oder so ähnlich.

This thanksgiving I am really sad that I cannot adopt a turkey. Being the poor college student that I am, I just can’t spend the extra dough. It’s really eating me up inside. I am going to do it over the summer, when the cash rolls in a bit steadier. I heard about the Adopt-A-Turkey Project when I was so young I didn’t have a debit card to even donate myself. Now, I remember each Thanksgiving, but because money is the worst thing in the world, I can’t adopt a turkey to be saved for Thanksgiving. Go adopt!

So for me today is a nice walnut salad (how autumny!) and some spinach lasagna my mum prepared for me. My Grandparents are coming to my house, and then afterwords my parents and I are going to go see A Christmas Carol to get in the Christmas spirit! Its a tradition of my family to go see a film after Thanksgiving dinner when all of the guests leave. We do the same on Christmas Night.

So have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Photo via Kitchen Project

Today freedom will taste like turkey, dressing, and pumpkin pie as we lift our forks in thanksgiving. We salute love of country, family, and friends. But at some point in history the liberty that America enjoys tasted like sacrifice, heartwrenching sacrifice…

I am thinking about a couple of things this morning. One is the Mayflower and the ships that brought the Pilgrims and Puritans to the New World. I’m pondering life and conditions on those ships in the 1600s. The courage that rose in their souls to venture out is admirable. Honestly, it is a wonder that most survived that journey.

As a missionary, I have tasted a little of the excitement, forlorn, and fear that accompany life-changing adventures. The thing that is different is that I always knew that we could return home at any moment. That was a huge safety net for our family, for me.

Those separatists from England didn’t think of safety nets or returning to the motherland. The journey homeward would be just as treacherous. Setting their faces like flint, they embraced the hardship and the unknown for the joy of something better just over the horizon. They entrusted the well-being of their lives, families, and future to the frailty of a wooden vessel and the navigational skills of the 1600s upon an uncertain ocean.

Can you imagine the smells of salt air, stench of dirty clothing and bodies, and sewage? Imagine toggling between hope and regret as the waves pounded them relentlessly for days on end? Imagine being pregnant upon those rolling waves? Imagine the food rations and the dwindling water supply? Imagine the unknown factors of a new and hostile land? Imagine primitively patching leak after leak, praying they would hold? Imagine surrendering their fears of sickness and death to an unseen God instead of driving it deep into their bellies.

When they sailed in 1620, fierce Atlantic storms battered the ship. They floated aimlessly for days like a piece of driftwood. The passengers lived in extremely overcrowded conditions, as the seawater soaked their bedding and clothes for weeks on end.

Here is an excerpt from William Bradford’s diary about the Mayflower voyage:

….and met with many fierce storms, with which the ship was shroudly shaken, and her upper works made very leaky; one of the main beams in the mid ships was bowed and cracked, which put them in some fear that the ship could not be able to perform the voage. In sundry of these storms, the winds were so fierce, and the seas so high, as they could not bear a knot of sail, but were forced to hull, for divers days together.

A tumultuous ocean wave swept one young man, John Howland, overboard. Amazingly he was rescued. Here is Bradford’s account:

”in a mighty storme, a lustie yonge man (called John Howland)coming upon some occasion above the grattings, was, with a seele of the shipe throwne in the sea; but it pleased God that he caught hould of the top-saile halliards, which hunge over board, and rane out at length; yet he held his hould (though he was sundrie fathomes under water) till he was hald up by the same rope to the brime of the water, and then with a boat hooke and other means got into the shipe againe, and his life saved; and though he was something ill with it, yet he lived many years after, and became a profitable member both in church and commone wealthe”

Interesting to note, both President Bushes are descendants of John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley.

On November 9, 1620, the Mayflower almost shipwrecked on the sandy beaches of Cape Cod. They sailed around to what is Provincetown, Massachessetts, and anchored two days later. They sent our expeditions to survey the land over the next month. They were 102 passengers and about 25 crew members and sailed almost 3,000 miles total in 66 days. One seaman died on the journey. In six months after landing 52 passengers died in an epidemic.

I am so thankful to those who made sacrifices for me, and right now I think freedom tastes like courage.

I wrote this poem the first time I visited Plymouth Rock.

Freedom’s Bells

I tasted the salt

sea at Plymouth and

smelled liberty’s sweet

fresh air. Rolling waves

lapped the shore.

With eyes closed, I imagined the pilgrim’s

faint images that moved weary in the rocking, creaking

Mayflower. Rolling hills and towering pines–

their first glimpse of land–

my heart swelled with theirs.

I felt the fire that

torched their hearts

and moved them to free spaces.

Proud to be a descendant,

I hollowed the 1620 rock

called Plymouth, feeble symbol of

new beginnings that grew

sweet and wide and deep.

My reverent heart

stood erect at their first grave,

bittersweet and wide and deep,

fifty-two dead and buried,

that first year.

In a new millennium in November, we remember their

journey, and we hold Election Day.

Some of us yawn and roll over in

our comfortable beds, pulling up our Ralph Lauren

sheets–magnifying our luxury–while the

bells of freedom ring and ring and ring

across the land that many only realized

in their dreams.

Well, I am off to get ready for turkey. Later, I wonder if I can draw the girls away from football to a Jane Austin movie… maybe…

It has been a year since the event happened…the memories are still fresh in our minds… But what has it yielded… People are making the day as if it’s a martyrs’ day.. and if it is what have we don’t to salute and grieve over those who lost their lives this day last year??

 Have you given them the justice..?? do you think only mourning helps??

 Some say wear white for peace…some say wear black for mourning..?? wat is this is this a fight against terrorism or one those innumerable days that cards industry like Archies market on..??

 The people responsible for this are yet to face the judgment… they are given a treatment that is definitely not befitting to what they have done… and wat is the response to all this??

We are a peace loving nation… this is our culture… patience, tolerance, submissive ness… blah blah blah…

 Cmon… you can’t pull off a Munna bhai act with these people – send them a bunch of flowers and say “Get Well Soon Mamu…!!!”

Fine wateva… these are a just few lines of moi explaining my inner tumult and anger… 2 cents of the hubbub in my mind…sorry if this sounds like a controversial piece,… but I’ve had it since morning…

It’s been a year

Some still in fear

For others its just

 another day, mere

They came they blew

They killed and slew

Yet they face no penalty

 Though many hearts bid Adieu

Exactly a year later

And we aint no better

He‘s but to face a sentence

Yet every whim of his we cater

Wen we ask the folks

For answers, we coax

Abt punishment we ask

To they who rule us poor blokes

Only facts do we portray

Law for all goes the same way

ut he’s a terrorist we protest

But now he’s in India, they say

Another year gone

And yet no judgment is drawn

We’re left to move on and on

Won’t we ever have a dawn??

How many more such events

How much more tolerance

Haven’t we learnt anythin frm the past

Why so much pretence

This is our so called tradition

No fights no ammunition

No aggression, just plain ol’

Patience and submission

Ordinarily, I’m not really that big a fan of Thanksgiving.  It’s just too much…too much family, too much food, too much noise.  In past years, I’ve always wanted to simply avoid the holiday completely and not be involved.  I’d prefer to simply sit silently in a corner somewhere and ignore the commotion.  Unfortunately, that was pretty much NEVER an option.  However, the last couple of years have slowly been turning the tide on my curmudgeonly ways.  Last year, as you may remember, we were blessed with family in Flagstaff and a wonderful meal to share.  This year, we’re spending the big day in Knoxville with family and by most advance signs, it promises to be yet another wonderful day. 

Last night, we relaxed by an outdoor fire beneath a beautiful starry sky.  This morning, after a wonderful evening of sleep, my daughter and I sat down to start our own tradition of watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Unfortunately, she did not share my desire to engage in this tradition and after being fussy for a few minutes, she decided to spend her parade time passed out in her bed.  Well, she is a little young to really enjoy the parade, so I’m hoping that maybe in a couple of years, we can really settle into this particular tradition.  As it is, our hosts, N. and H. have made everything perfect and the magnificent meals continue to appear as if by magic.

So, it seems that, slowly, I’m becoming more involved in the holiday spirit.  This can’t be all bad.  It would be nice to enjoy the holidays for a change.  But let’s not jump the gun…Christmas is the true test.  This is usually the downer of the holiday season…but I have a sneaking suspicion that this will be a different year as well.

See you in the funny papers!

My fondest memories of the Thanksgiving season comes from a family tradition of a “women’s baking day”. A few days before or after Thanksgiving (I was younger so I fail to recall the specifics of the date), all of the women in my family got together. If you know anything of my family, this is no small task, we could easily populate our own large island! For an entire day we made every type of cookie, cake and browny recipe known to man, in bulk! It was always such an awesome day full of laughter, learning and the most amazing smells that even if I were to write a million novels I don’t believe I could ever learn to properly put any of it into words. Sadly, people move, die, or get busy and over time, traditions get pushed off to “maybe next year” or simply fade away into the void.

I spent the better part of the morning yesterday lamenting the loss of this particular tradition. It’s always been one that has stuck with me over the years and one that I often miss the most. Then, with the power that is Facebook (everyone make that god-like “awwwwww” sound here) I got to see pictures of my two sisters and my mother having a seriously good time yesterday making cookies and pizelles. I must have cried for an hour afterward. What a miserable way to spend the day before Thanksgiving. I couldn’t get it out of my head. On the one hand, feeling depressed and home-sick, and on the other feeling angry at the life situations that prevented me from being with my family in the first place.

I shared this story with my husband last night and he was quick to point out that I have my very own family here with me (husband, two daughters, a son, a hyperactive lap dog) and he suggested that I keep that in mind when I’m missing those “family traditions”. I waved it off (the girls are simply too young still to partake in a baking marathon) while at the same time felt a sense of pride, “look at me! i’m the lucky chick with the most awesome husband on the planet!”

It’s Thanksgiving and you can’t help but stop and think about the things you are grateful for. How can you not? Every time I reload my browser I’m getting pushed 20 new blog posts about how I should stop and think about the things I’m grateful for. Sigh. So, yes, I stopped and thought about it. I’m homesick like I’ve never been before (stupid holidays do that to military families especially) but I have to remember that I do have a family here and it’s high time I stop crying about losing the past and start making memories for my own children. They’re going to need their own stories to tell their therapists about, amirite?

Rod Dreher makes several salient points about converts to Rome and Orthodoxy:

Yes, but in my personal experience, the Catholic Church in America has only a facade of unity. Every Catholic parish I’ve been a part of has been basically Protestant, insofar as most of the people seemed to believe that they had a right to believe whatever they wanted. The unity was fairly superficial. Mind you, I’m in no position to say to what extent the Orthodox Church in this country is any different, because my experience is relatively short and limited almost entirely to my own parish. But I would be surprised to learn that we Orthodox on the whole were much different in that regard.

I’ve said the same thing myself: Catholicism in the USA is just Protestantism with a different name. You have gay Jesuits, hardcore Trad Opus Dei types, the First Things crowd, EWTN, liberals like the Kennedys, and on and on. There is no unified, glorious Church. It’s an illusion in the mind of the convert who lives in the world of ideas. Dreher continues:

I keep telling Protestants I know who want to convert to Catholicism that I don’t want to get in the way of their decision — though I would like them to consider Orthodoxy — but that they should realize that they’re probably not going to find an escape from modernism in their local parish. The church of Pope Benedict and First Things magazine, and your favorite conservative Catholic bloggers, is not the church you’re likely to encounter down the street. If you’re convinced of the case for Catholicism, then you almost certainly have to become Catholic — but go in with your eyes open. Similarly with Orthodoxy, we have, like Catholicism, the institutional and historical tools for resisting modernism, but if the pastors and the people remain indifferent or hostile to them, Protestants searching for solid ground to stand on may be unpleasantly surprised.

Again, this is not an argument against becoming Catholic or Orthodox. But it is a warning that it’s impossible to escape modernity and its challenges to tradition and traditional faith. When Father Dwight says that the fissiparous nature of individualist modernist faith will eventually give way to disbelief, because it’s not anchored in communal experience, I agree with him in principle, but would ask him what his prediction is for Catholic parishes that are populated by individualists in religion? (N.B., Father Dwight recognizes in his post that modernist Catholic priests shouldn’t be surprised when people quit coming to mass.) Similarly, I am aware of several Protestant congregations who are far, far more unified in belief than any Catholic parish I’ve been a part of, no doubt because those Protestants who don’t share the core convictions of that congregation found another congregation to attend. Mind you, without a Magisterium (Catholic) or a high view of the authority of Tradition (Orthodox) to hold on to, I don’t know how those congregations over time will remain grounded in their particular judgments. But having the theological mechanism for stability, as the Catholics and the Orthodox do, is no guarantee either.

This makes lots of sense. Because Protestant churches in our day are usually based on shared convictions such as worship style or theology, we have much more unity (at the micro level) than Catholics do.

I have a friend who left the Greek Orthodox church to which he belonged, because he was desperate for a spiritual encounter with the living God, as opposed to the empty formalism of his home parish, which, as he puts it, was more interested in worshiping Greekness than in worshiping God. He became a born-again Evangelical. Despite all the legitimate criticism that can be leveled at American Evangelicalism re: its lack of stability and susceptibility to cultural trends, is it really the case that children raised in a traditional church that has valid sacraments but is spiritually dead are going to have a better chance of living as Christians there than they would in an Evangelical church that has all the trappings of modernity, and an essentially modernist, individualist theology, but that for whatever reason has chosen a theologically traditional set of principles around which to organize, and lives it out in a vigorous, vibrant way?

This is the rub. Tradition and liturgy are life to me and those like me who seek to escape the modern church wasteland, but they were death to my Mom who wanted relationship with God and wasn’t taught that in the Lutheran Church of her day (though she could have had it, had they rightly understood their own past). We can’t re-pristinate the past and create some perfect model that never existed. We can meld the best liturgy and tradition with our modern condition, all the while being bathed in the Scripture as the ultimate norm.

Choices are made,
The negation of what isn’t
Allowing what is.
This is also love
Emanating
For your protection.

I can’t believe I’ve been blogging for over a year now! I began with that first agonizing post on November 5, 2008. So much has happened since then. This is my 259th post! (How do you even say that number? Two-hundred-fifty-ninth? Whatta mouthful!)

Last November, I posted a list of ten things I’m thankful for. Maybe I’ll start a little blogging tradition and do the same thing today. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

1. My husband and the whirlwind of a year we’ve shared together.
2. The amazing community God has placed us in and the fellowship we enjoy.
3. The way God has been working in recent months to transform my heart.
4. Having a supportive family, which has more than doubled now that I’m married.
5. The opportunity to connect with new people through my job, Shared Life Group and Celebrate Recovery.
6. Seeing the magnificent, transforming work of God first-hand in the lives of those around me.
7. Two weeks exploring South Asia and hearing from God with two amazing new friends.
8. A new job, which I love, surrounded by wonderful coworkers. The way God opened this door and prepared me for this job over two years ago is simply amazing.
9. The ability to keep in touch with people I love through cell phones, Gmail, Gchat and texting.
10. The gift of expressing myself with the written word – through this blog and journaling.

What are you thankful for?

La suppression obstinée, par l’épiscopat français, des fêtes patronales de la France, est compensée, dans le Missel des dimanches, par l’arrivée en masse de fêtes que l’on n’avait jamais vues, avant la messe en français, s’introduire parmi les célébrations catholiques. Nous lisons dans ce « missel » :

Le 29 novembre 2009 : « Dans la communauté musulmane, Aid al Kabir, fête du sacrifice du bélier qu’Abraham a immolé en remplacement de son fils. »

Du 12 au 19 décembre : « Fête juive de Hanoukkah commémorant la victoire des Maccabées et la nouvelle dédicace de l’autel du temple de Jérusalem après sa profanation par les Grecs en 160 avant notre ère. »

Le 18 décembre : « Fête du nouvel an pour la communauté musulmane. »

Le 27 février 2010 : « Fête juive de Pourrim où la communauté fait mémoire du jeûne d’Esther, lorsque le peuple a été libéré du projet d’extermination des juifs exilés en Perse. »

Page 192 : « Il y a quatorze siècles, en 610, Mahomet, alors simple caravanier, commença à prêcher pour ramener le peuple de La Mecque à la religion du Dieu unique et lui enseigner la soumission à la volonté divine. »

Le 21 mars : « Collecte des dons pour le CCFD. »

Le 19 mai : « Fête juive de Chavouot, fête des moissons et du don de la Loi. »

Le 12 août « commence pour les musulmans le mois de jeûne du Ramadan ».

Le 18 septembre « la communauté juive célèbre le grand pardon, Yom Kippour, le jour le plus solennel de l’année, consacré à l’expiation des péchés ».

Du 23 septembre au 1er octobre, « dans la communauté juive, fête de Soukkot ou des Tentes, commémorant le séjour au désert lors de l’Exode ».

Dernier dimanche d’octobre : « Fête de la Réformation. »

Ce n’est plus un missel.

Un missel, dit le Littré, est le « livre ecclésiastique qui contient les messes propres aux différents jours et fêtes de l’année ». Selon le Grand Larousse, c’est le « livre qui contient les prières de la messe ». Selon le Grand et le Petit Robert, il s’agit bien du « livre liturgique qui contient les prières et les lectures nécessaires à la célébration de la messe pour l’année entière ». Et si l’on trouve ces références sémantiques trop exclusivement profanes, interrogeons le Dictionnaire de la foi chrétienne publié par les très catholiques Editions du Cerf, il confirme que le missel est bien un « livre liturgique contenant les textes et les rubriques pour la célébration de la messe ».

Je laisse à de plus savants le soin de décider quelle qualification juridique et morale mérite donc le (soi-disant) Missel des dimanches 2010 : « abus de confiance » ? « tromperie sur la marchandise » ? ou quelque autre ? En tout cas le fait est là : ce prétendu missel contient aussi d’autres choses que les « textes et rubriques pour la célébration de la messe ». Il serait plus honnête de lui donner désormais un autre titre que celui de « missel ». Simple suggestion à l’adresse de Mgr Robert Le Gall.

Aux plus savants je laisse aussi la charge d’examiner si les insuffisances théologiques de cette messe modernissime ont été réellement corrigées. Limitons-nous ici à quelques-unes des observations qui peuvent sauter aux yeux du simple laïc.

Par exemple, page 65, nous apprenons que dans la messe en français, ce sont « les fidèles qui vont donner la communion », sans aucune mention des supposées « circonstances exceptionnelles » qui avaient naguère servi de prétexte (provisoire) pour introduire cette communion laïcisée. Elle est devenue le rite ordinaire et obligatoire de la messe en français.

On remarquera aussi la suppression obstinée du « consubstantiel » dans le Credo. Cette suppression dans la messe en français est antérieure de plusieurs années à la promulgation d’une messe nouvelle par Paul VI : par quoi l’on voit qu’en France, le vrai problème n’est pas purement et simplement celui de la messe de Paul VI, mais en outre et surtout celui d’une messe particulière, et particulièrement inacceptable : la messe en français, la messe de notre épiscopat, à nulle autre pareille.

JEAN MADIRAN

Article extrait de Présent n° 6968 du samedi 14 novembre 2009

Source : La Porte Latine

I have heard that some people in the world are celebrating Thanksgiving today. Well, to be honest, I have no connection to this feast, but being friend with Susan and Bob Cornelis in the USA, and having worked on some ecards designs, it brought this event a little bit closer to me. Anyway, I have heard that Thanksgiving involves some turkey in the oven…

This card is especially dedicated to golfers… only they might understand the wit?

And now a thanksgiving card for the bullfight lovers… here we come to a most delicate part of my recent life. All my funny bullfight ecards -and it was quite a lot!- have been banned from the ecards company for which I create designs, because a particular organisation in Europe called Irish Council Against Blood Sports has complained to the cgretings cards company for promoting BullFighting cards since its a cruelty against animals. They have expressed their displeasure that this blood sport is used to convey feelings of Christmas and Thanksgiving etc …

In their own website, they have described my art as “entirely inappropriate and utterly distasteful”

This was yesterday. I must admit that I am very upset and went into some deeper thinking state to find out how I want to proceed now. If I can find the time, I might write a post explaining my feelings, but at the end, the fight against the fanatic anti bullfight crusaders has become very boring for me and I am not sure that I want to waste any further second of my life with them. we shall see.

Anyway, here is my “utterly distasteful” thanksgiving piece for bullfight fans, and yes: they still exist, and there are many of them around the world!

Une catherinette au musée des arts décoratifs!

Vingt cinq novembre. Une très forte envie de voir l’exposition consacrée à Madeleine Vionnet. Nous nous replongeons dans les années 20 et trente. Mais inlassablement, quelques apparitions aux couleurs vertes me rappelaient que nous étions le 25 novembre, jour de la Sainte Catherine.

Les photos sont interdites au musée. Mais l’envie d’immortaliser ne serait-ce qu’une de ces têtes chapeautées me taraudait. J’ai armé mon petit Kodak, prête à le faire crépiter aussi vite qu’un éclair.

Le temps de m’approcher de Christelle, d’obtenir son accord et clac, clac, deux poses rapides, avant de me faire intercepter par un gardien.

Christelle était au musée avec quelques autres catherinettes et même un Katharos. Eh oui, il n’y a pas que les catherine. Les coeurs à prendre sont des deux sexes.  Les jeunes gens sont là, protecteurs des catherinettes mais n’en démeurent pas moins des coeurs à prendre.

Le 25 novembre, on célèbre les Catherine mais aussi les Catherinette, une tradition du XVIème siècle.

La catherinette est une jeune femme qui à 25 ans, n’est toujours pas mariée. Katharos, le prénom qui remonte de la grèce antique, est symbole de pureté. Ce jour là, les Catherinettes et les Katharos arborent un chapeau couleur verte et jaune.

La tradition est perpétrée aujourd’hui par les modistes. Et j’espère que cela ne s’arrêtera jamais!

Merci Kristal, d’avoir posé pour moi.

Glädjen vi upplevde, när vi upptäckte, när vi flyttade hit till Wales mer än 40 år sedan, att det fanns en svensk kyrka inom räckhåll i Liverpool! Här fanns alltså samma chans att uppleva kontakt med allting svenskt, som vi vant oss vid i Hull, där det likaledes fanns en svensk kyrka. Även i Liverpool skulle det alltså finnas stöd och hjälp för de tre barnen att uppleva svenska traditioner. Kanske det mest betydelsefulla i det sammanhanget var Luciafirandet. De fick alla uppleva det magiska ögonblick, när man först hör Luciatåget på väg uppför trappan och därefter gör sitt intåg i kyrkan med sina tända ljus. Så småningom var de förstås med i Lucia-tåget själva och gissa sedan hur modershjärtat klappade den gången dottern var Lucia!

Så gick några år och det blev dags för de första barnbarnen att ha chansen att uppleva denna svenska tradition. Det blev en så stor del av den unga familjens julförberedelser, att son nr.1 och hans två äldsta söner i ett par år var med i Luciatåget som den största och de två minsta stjärngossarna!

I fjol kom dottern, Lucia från 1986 och nu bosatt i Yorkshire, till Luciafirandet i Gustaf-Adolfskyrkan, då hon kände att hennes två barn, som ju är ¼ svenskar, skulle få dela hennes unikt svenska upplevelse. I år kommer de alla tillbaka!

Låt oss få behålla vår kyrka, där pågår så mycket av värde. Dessutom är de regelbundna gudstjänsterna betydligt mer välbesökta än många kyrkor i Sverige.

—–

The joy we felt when we discovered on our arrival in Wales more than 40 years ago, that there was Swedish church in Liverpool! Thereby a chance to stay in touch with what still felt like home, and there was help available to give the three children a taste of Swedish traditions. Thus they all experienced the wonder of the approaching Lucia procession, and by and by they took part themselves, even to the moment when the daughter was Lucia one year!

Moving on a few years and it was the turn of the first grandchildren to enjoy the wonder of the occasion. It became so much part of the Christmas preparation for the young family, that no.1 son and his two older sons took part as the tallest and the two shortest “starboys” for a couple of years.

Last year the daughter, Lucia 1986 and now living in Yorkshire, came with her two children to give them this very Swedish experience, just like they see it every year at home on this day. They are coming back this year.

Leave our church to carry on its vibrant life in Liverpool. Not only that, I have noticed that there are considerably more parishioners for an average Sunday service in Gustaf Adolf’s Church than in many a church in Sweden!

(Posted by Birgitta Ireland)

Die südafrikanische Zeitung The Times titelt „Tierrechtsgruppe packt den Bullen bei den Hörnern“ und trifft damit das Thema ziemlich genau. Die Organisation Animal Rights Africa versucht zurzeit das Ukweshwama-Ritual zu unterbinden.  Es soll am 5. Dezember stattfinden. Die Independent Online schreibt zum Ritual: „Ukweshwama ist ein symbolischer Weg Gott für die erste Ernte der Saison zu danken.“ Weiter beschreibt die Zeitung auch den Grund des Unmutes: „Es wird behauptet, dass während des Ukweshwama-Rituals Männer Bullen an der Zunge ziehen, in ihr Maul Sand stopfen und versuchen ihren Penis zu verknoten.“ Die Tierrechtsorganisation beanstandet die brutale Tötung der Tiere und möchte den Zulu-König Zwelithini zur Absage bewegen. An diesem  Dienstag fand die erste kurze Anhörung am Gericht statt.

The Mercury zitiert zu diesem Anlass den Ministerpräsidenten von KwaZulu-Natal, der Provinz, in der das Ritual stattfinden soll: „Angelegenheiten, die mit Kultur zusammenhängen, wie das Ukweshwama-Ritual, in welcher ein Bulle durch die bloßen Hände von Zulu-Kriegern getötet wird, sind sensibel und sollten mit dem größtmöglichen Respekt behandelt werden.“. Animal Rights Africa argumentiert, dass Südafrika sich an die Regeln der Weltorganisation für Tiergesundheit halten will. Eine der Regeln bezieht sich auch auf die Schlachtung von Tieren und besagt, dass Tiere nicht unter unnötigen Stress getötet werden sollten. Ein Leser der Independent Online argumentiert dagegen: „Diese Tradition ist ein sehr wichtiger Teil des afrikanischen Lebens und wir werden nicht aufhören Afrikaner zu sein, weil einige Siedler denken es ist barbarisch oder primitiv. […] Dies ist eine heilige Zulu-Tradition und wir schulden niemanden eine Entschuldigung über ihre Bedeutung.“ The Mercury zitiert einen ehemaligen Geschichtsprofessor der University of Zululand: „Was wir sehen sind Restposten jener Leute, die immer noch Groll gegen die AmaZulu hegen, dafür, dass sie die Britische Armee bei Isandlwana 1879 ausgelöscht haben. Es gab andauernde Versuche den Zulu-König zu verunglimpfen […]. Somit ist dieser Versuch die Zulu-Kultur anzugreifen nicht überraschend.“.

Dass das Thema kein allein Südafrika- oder gar Zulu-spezifisches ist bringt ein Leser des Independent Online in die Diskussion ein: „Ich schätze Bullenrennen und Matador-Praktiken sollten auch in Spanien verboten werden. Amerika sollte Rodeos abschaffen. Kann es sein, dass es nur barbarisch genannt wird, wenn es Afrikaner betrifft?“.

Die Verhandlung wurde nun erstmal auf den 1. Dezember verschoben, um König Zwelithini und den anderen Antragsgegnern Zeit zu geben sich vorzubereiten.

_____________________________________________________

Hören kann man diesen Beitrag und Beiträge über Israel und Brasilien heute gegen 12 Uhr und Freitag gegen 20 Uhr auf multicult 2.0.

And therein lay
The silent authority
That would eclipse one
Over the other,
The decision taken
On account of itself.

In the future the holiday season will continue to start earlier and earlier. Eventually it will take place in four parts over the course of the entire year. Each quarter will have entirely new traditions and consumer expectations. Santa now comes four times a year. In each quarter he has a different helper.

Winter: The season of light, in which electricity is celebrated. In this season people stock up on lights, video games, movies, and appliances. People decorate their homes with elaborate light displays. Santa’s helper is Jesus.

Spring: The season of sex, in which chocolate, baked goods, flowers, contraception and intimate toys are all the rage. People decorate their homes with music and genetically engineered flowers that glow in the dark. Santa’s helper is the playboy easter bunny.

Summer: The season of fire, in which flames and fireworks are endlessly exploding. People decorate their homes with torches and flame-throwers then go to monster truck rallies, demolition derbies, and rocket launches. Santa’s helper is a cutified Satan.

Autumn: The season of death, in which candy and meat are gobbled up in massive quantities. People decorate their homes with carcasses and wear costumes for the entire season wherever they go. Santa’s helper is a zombie turkey.

Gradually, over the course of the next centuries these holidays are decomercialized as individuals begin to band together and effectively compete with corporate sponsorships of the major Christmas seasons. Homemade goods replace store-bought ones and society becomes more environmentally conscious. Corporations are forced to move off-world where they will take Christmas to other planets and make tons of money off of them.

Father Christmas will be immortal, adapting from culture to culture (much like Horace became incorporated into some of Jesus’s traits).

The direction of its movement
Is nought but illusion and
Though it may last forever
It in fact exists
For but a moment.

The dragon’s tail.
Do not hold on
For longer than
You have to.

[New York, 3 October 1789]

By the President of the United States of America. a Proclamation.

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor–and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me “to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.”

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be–That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks–for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation–for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in thecourse and conclusion of the late war–for the great degree of tranquillity, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed–for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted–for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions–to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually–to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed–to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness onto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord–To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us–and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand at the City of New-York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.

[Source]

Imagine if the American President read this each November.  Imagine if each American citizen responded to it sincerely.

God’s blessings to any who read this, and may your heart be as filled with gratitude as your stomach is with food!