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liturgical year

liturgical yearspirituality

Austerity Measures

Bare pots of dirt: that’s my preferred symbol this Advent. Bare trees, dead leaves, winter stillness. It occurred to me the other day, stopping and starting in dense holiday traffic, that we could opt out of Christmas completely. Some people do. We could just skip…
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December 23, 2017
liturgical yearspirituality

Zechariah’s Dream

One night, I dreamed it wasn’t just me. Every other old codger had gone silent. It seemed that any man over about age 50 could no longer speak or write or even type. Not the women, just the men. So weird. Us older guys shuffled…
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November 18, 2017
liturgical yearspirituality

Bewildered in the Wilderness

I wonder if that is the true definition of wilderness: places where we find ourselves unprepared and bewildered. No solution seems obvious or forthcoming. Sometimes we can’t even name the problems. We wander like those other wilderness-dwellers, the Israelites, disorganized and ill-equipped, chasing after some…
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March 10, 2017
liturgical yearmemoirspirituality

A Lenten Update

Dear Jesus, Just thought I’d send a quick note and let you know how things are going this Lent. Actually, not so good tbh. I don’t know. I just wasn’t feeling it this year, you know? I didn’t give up chocolate or carbs or anything.…
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March 18, 2016
liturgical yearspirituality

No Words Fall

It must begin with Zechariah’s silence. Nothing against poor old Zechariah. Who can blame him for asking a decent question? The text tells us that both he and Elizabeth were upright and blameless before the Lord. So even if Gabriel comes off as a little…
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December 11, 2015