Happy New Year, Byzantium! It’s New Year’s for Greek Catholic and Orthodox Christians New Calendar!
May God bless you abundantly tonight with His love and grace through the prayers of His most pure Mother and of all the Saints and save you from the Evil One. Happy New Year!
We celebrate our freedom in the USA today. Thanks be to God.
The Lord bless us with peace, love, trust, and courage (among many other virtues).
Image: courtesy of David Donahue
Watch your back today. You just never know where your enemies lurk and what’s in their hands.
Earlier this evening coming home from an appointment Santa and Mrs Klaus jumped off the Branford, CT fire truck to meet this cute, beautiful family.
Don’t be shy!
Roger Sherman of Connecticut is remembered on this day in history 23 July 1793. He was one of the members of the Committee of Five to draft the Declaration of Independence. However, we ought to recall that he was the only person to sign all four great state papers of the United States: the Continental Association, the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution. It is said that Sherman’s state-craft was influenced by the isolationist politics of the time. That is, Connecticut was not very involved in the politics of the region.
A shoemaker educated in his father’s library became a civic leader. Married twice and father of 15. Sherman died of typhoid in New Haven, CT and is now buried in Grove Street Cemetery. Jonathan Edwards Jr. delivered the funeral sermon on July 25, 1793. Edwards recalled Sherman’s “contributions to his friends, family, town, and country, noting Sherman’s piety and excellence in study.”
Earlier today at the Sunday Angelus in Rome, Pope Francis announced World Day of Grandparents and the Elderly to be held on 4th Sunday of July, the Sunday closest to July 26th feast of Sts. Joachim and Anne, parents of Blessed Virgin Mary, grandparents of Jesus.
The first world day will be July 25, 2021. Eastern Christians, for example the Melkites liturgically recall St Anne’s memory on July 25th.
Earlier today a group of people of faith and culture that I frequently attend to had a cultural exchange where several shared poetry
Tell all the truth but tell it slant —
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth’s superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind —
Emily Dickinson is one of those poets that sometimes crosses over into the realm of theological reflection from time-to-time. Her poem, “Tell all the truth but tell it slant” for me is a lesson about one’s approach, one’s receptivity one has with the gift of divine revelation. It may turn dogmatic theologians on-end because they teach that revelation is full and complete and immediate. While I believe this formulation to be true on a high level, I do also think that the human experience takes more time to integrate.
The person who proposed Dickinson’s poem also recognized that the Church admits to a personal integration of God’s glory into our life when she says in the troparion for the feast of the Transfiguration: “… you [Christ] showed your friends as much of your glory as they could bear.” Slow and deliberate seems to be reasonable. I can only take so much glory at once. This seems to be recognized by the Lord Himself. The Liturgy is a superb teacher; the Liturgy knows her pupils.
Indeed, revelation is still unfolding.
Blessed US Independence Day –July 4th
The Prophet Amos had something to say about politics worth listening to today: “many of the religious leaders were corrupted and tied to political leaders more than to the Lord.” Are you tied to the Lord and His promises, or to political leaders and their vainglory? The Psalms also offer us great perspective.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAZ8QJgFHOg&fbclid=IwAR1sB1bAGt4T2Q1y3o-_cf-9rgQshdD1N1zLkmcDM9ohTUlQ-7ARMvbn7-I
“It’s like Buffy the Vampire Slayer got religion.”
Well, if you like comedy and religion, you likely will like the new Netflix series, Warrior Nun. The trailer is fun.
As a monk friend said,
The character “Ava is done very well and Beatrice too, and while I am not too keen on the nun aspect (the idea itself verges on the ludicrous), I think they do a good job of it; and the person who plays the priest in charge of them does a very good job also. The more one sees the better it gets I think. Like Buffy it shows the personal difficulty, isolation even, of dealing with supernatural evil that most people don’t believe in much less see. (All people want to be normal, and this kind of life is not normal. As Buffy once said, we want to be “destiny free.”) In the end, Buffy failed because the creator was not up to the vision, and if one really doesn’t believe in this sort of thing–at least in a general sense–it will fall flat no matter how funny, smart and witty one is since you cannot keep it up. Of course, these shows can never show the positive side of the supernatural (which I admit is harder to show visually), of which these darker elements are merely parasitic however scary and powerful they may be.”
