The Esther Effect...book review summary by Dianna BooherShare
"WHO KNOWS WHETHER YOU HAVE NOT COME TO THIS KINGDOM FOR SUCH A ATIME AS THIS?
-Mordecai to Esther, Esther 4:14
Every woman wields influence- for either good or bad. And each of us faces situations in which our actions can mean the difference between a tragic or miraculous outcome. In this lively and timely book, popular author Dianna Booher reveals that like the biblical Queen Esther who saved her nation from certain annihiliation, Christian woman are called to pivotal decision-making and bold behavior.
In these pages, meet modern Esthers such as Nadia, who modeled patience, prayer, and love despite heart-wrenching circumstances; Susan and Fran, who spoke out against unethical activity in their workplaces; and Margaret, who taught giggling preteens how to serve. And meet the original Esther as well to discover her seven secrets for becoming a "high-impact woman"- someone who dynamically affects others with her courage, confidence, control, communication, character, connections, and calmness.
The need for caring, proactive women in our country has never been greater. Booher contends, "God's provision for others is not in care packages falling from the sky, but in the hands and hearts of believers on earth. When God provides those opportunities, it's our privelege to be the delivery gals." Come meet some of God's best examples and find out how to start your own Esther Effect.
"The Esther Effect is the impact you have when God places you in a situation in which you can encourage or influence others or change the course of events."
The Esther Effect: The Seven Secrets of Self- Confidence and Influence
Secret #1: Self- Confidence-Generating Passion about Your Purpose/ Self-Confidence generates passion about your purpose and expands your influence on others.
"There is no end to the influence of women on our life. It is at the bottom of everything that happens to us."-Benjamin Disraeli
"If I can put one touch of a rosy sunset into the life of any man or woman, I shall feel that I have worked with God."- George MacDonald
"The people who influence us are those who have stood unconsciously for the right thing; they are like the stars and the lilies, and the joy of God flows through them all the time."-Oswald Chambers
"It is better to light a canlde than to curse the darkness."-Eleanor Roosevelt
"God's provisions for others come not in care packages falling from the sky, but through the hands and hearts of believers on earth. It's our privilege to be God's delivery guy or gal."
"The only difference between biblical Queen Esther an us or our friends is the unique situations God places us in and the actions we take."
"To have an impact on others, you have to believe you can have an impact on others."
"Modern-day Esthers base their self-confidence not on their past, but on their faith that God is in control of their future."
"Be humble, that's not just good childhood advice; it's biblical."
"Confidence creates more than charisma. It cracks open our future."
"Passion pushes us to contribute to others' lives, to change situations, to champion causes, to make believers."
"Being emotional may actually be one of the best things a woman has going for her."
"To have an Esther effect, both of your confidence and your emotional energy have to kick in."
Secret #2:Self-Control- Timing As You Prepare to Take the Turnpike of Life/Exercise Self-Control to plan your Esther Effect, then patiently wait on God's perfect timing. No day or year of your life is trivial; its' simply preparation for your next opportunity."
"Patient waiting is often the highest way of doing God's will."- Robert Collier
"Our grand business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand."
-Thomas Carlye
"Patiently waiting on God's timing can make the difference between a welcome response, and prayed for outcome and loads of frustration."
"God doesn't waste our time, experiences, relationships, or education. He has plans for us to put into practice."
Secret #3 Courage-Facing Risk and Making Decisions by Design, Not Default/ Courage means acting decisively, even while taking risk, in whatever way God directs you. Make decisions by design rather than default.
"Courage is the ladder on which all the other virtues mount." -Clare Boothe Luce
"If God is for us, who can be against us?"- Romans 8:31
"Wisdom is knowning what to do next, skill is knowing how to do it, and virtue is doing it."
-David Starr Jordan
"When praying, do not give God instructions-report for duty."-Anonymous
"Courage is not the absence of fear. Courage comes in the face of fear."
"Courage grows when stretched."
"Sometimes, the bigger the Esther Effect you want to have, the bigger the fear."
"What if you do not feel courageous? Pretend to. No one but God can tell the difference. And He doesn't care. Just act."
"Sometimes even our smallest acts of courage spur others into action. And their courageous acts, in turn, have an even larger impact on others."
Secret #4 Communication-Encouraging and Influencing through Conversation/ When you listen first and then speak your heart with clarity and courtesy, you can lead others to change attitudes, behaviors, and situations.
"Not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment." -Sala
"A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver." -Proverbs 25:11
"Correction does much, but encouragment does more. Encouragment after censure is as the sun after a shower."-Johanna Wolfgang Von Goethe
"A single conversation across the table with a wise man is owrth a mont's study of books."
- Chinese Proverb
"A helping word to one in trouble is often like a switch on a railroad track-but one inch between a wreck and smooth rolling prosperity."-Harriet Ward Beecher
"Listening is the shortest route ot the nonbeliever's heart."
"Negative, antagonistic people provoke nonbelievers to resist them, not to follow them. Positive people attract others to God."
"The Esther Effect demands truth said in love and with respect."
Secret #5 Character-Passion under Pressure for Moral Impact/Character dictates our attitudes and actions under pressure. And strong character influences others more than clever words, wealth, or wisdom ever could.
"If I take care of my character, my repuation will take care of itself."-Dwight L. Moody
"Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds."-George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans)
"If you would create something, you must be something."-Johann Wolfgagn Von Goethe
"A crisis does not make character; a crisis reveals character."-Oswald Chambers
"Your character influences others far more than your clever words, wealth, or wisdom ever could."
"Your biggest opportunity to have the Esther Effect could be your strong character in handling adversity, hurt, and disappointments in your life."
"In today's culture, some people think moral responsibility means picking up their munchies mess at the movies."
"When you see wrong running rampant in your sphere of influence, its' a question worth asking often: Has God placed me here for "such a time as this"?
Secret #6 Connection- Standing Together for Strength and Impact/ Emotional connection-to those in need, our support group, non believers, and those around us- helps us take courageous action for Christ.
"You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late."-Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Kind looks, kind words, kind acts, and warm handshakes- these are secondary means of grace when men are in troubleand are fighting their unseen battles."-John Hall
"Encouragment is oxygen to the soul."-George A. Adams
"During our tough times, Esther friends in our support group urge us to make the right, though difficult, decisions that we might not be able or willing to make on our own."
"Emotional connection gives people ears to hear what a disconnected mind might not."
"No place is too confining, no platform too small, and no calendartoo full to have The Esther Effect."
Secret #7 Calm Assurance- The Quiet before the Alarm/ Calm Assurance in the face of injustice comes from knowing that God is in control of the future.
"Actions are ours; their consequences belong to heaven."-Sir P. Francis
"Cast your bread upon the waters, for after many days you will find it again." -Ecclesiastes 11:1
"Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?"- Genesis 18:25
"The problem is our impatience."
"Injustice feels like an itch you can't scratch."
"We often get angry at God for not getting in the boat with us in the middle of the storm."
"God has a vested interest in meeting our needs- He wants to use us to accomplish His purposes."
"Queen Esther's legacy is a Godly woman's impact on those around her!
"Who Has Been an Esther in Your Life?"
"It is good for us to think no grace or blessing truly ours til we are aware that God has blessed someone else with it through us.""-Phillip Brooks
"Blessed is the influence of one ture loving soul on another."-George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans)
An ironic thing about women who have the Esther Effect on others is this: They often don't know it. (Their humility is yet another reflection of their strong character.)
I pray you've had the opporutunity to recall those who've had the Esther Effect in your life and to let them know it: a teacher, a neighbor, a parent, a friend, a co-worker, a politician, a coach, a church leader, a sister, a boss, a doctor, a nurse, an aunt.
Finally, my prayer is that you'll be aware when God provides you the opportunity to encourage or influence others or to change the course of events in your home, your workplace, or your community.
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Metro-West Women's Connections...
March
I recently attended a Metro-West Women's Connections Sat morning Breakfast with my friend Janel. I enjoyed a nice brunch & irsih step dancers & a christian lady shared her life story & singing songs that she had written. It was a great time of fellowship with other women & inspiration.
April 11th "Fashion Show"
I was asked to play the piano! I am excited & will blog the review otherwise if anyone women are intereseted in attending April 11th please let me know so I can fill you in on the details!
I need to come back to fill in the link/website or contact info for this...
I recently attended a Metro-West Women's Connections Sat morning Breakfast with my friend Janel. I enjoyed a nice brunch & irsih step dancers & a christian lady shared her life story & singing songs that she had written. It was a great time of fellowship with other women & inspiration.
April 11th "Fashion Show"
I was asked to play the piano! I am excited & will blog the review otherwise if anyone women are intereseted in attending April 11th please let me know so I can fill you in on the details!
I need to come back to fill in the link/website or contact info for this...
April Fools tradition popularized....
My thoughts of April's fools...
So I was wondering where & who thoguht of April fool's day & how did it come about???
I thought it would be interesting to look up because it seems so random to have such a weird holiday without having a great purpose or recognition behind it. Joking & humor is a great part of life to celebrate but how did it get to be holiday is to my surprise. So I found some info on the history, so here it is.. On that note, I personally don't need a holiday to play a joke on someone or make a fool of myself because I am capable of doing both on a regular basis! lol!
History of April Fool's Day...
On this day in 1700, English pranksters begin popularizing the annual tradition of April Fools' Day by playing practical jokes on each other.
Although the day, also called All Fools' Day, has been celebrated for several centuries by different cultures, its exact origins remain a mystery. Some historians speculate that April Fools' Day dates back to 1582, when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, as called for by the Council of Trent in 1563. People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1 and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1 became the butt of jokes and hoaxes. These included having paper fish placed on their backs and being referred to as "poisson d'avril" (April fish), said to symbolize a young, easily caught fish and a gullible person.
Historians have also linked April Fools' Day to ancient festivals such as Hilaria, which was celebrated in Rome at the end of March and involved people dressing up in disguises. There's also speculation that April Fools' Day was tied to the vernal equinox, or first day of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, when Mother Nature fooled people with changing, unpredictable weather.
April Fools' Day spread throughout Britain during the 18th century. In Scotland, the tradition became a two-day event, starting with "hunting the gowk," in which people were sent on phony errands (gowk is a word for cuckoo bird, a symbol for fool) and followed by Tailie Day, which involved pranks played on people's derrieres, such as pinning fake tails or "kick me" signs on them.
In modern times, people have gone to great lengths to create elaborate April Fools' Day hoaxes. Newspapers, radio and TV stations and Web sites have participated in the April 1 tradition of reporting outrageous fictional claims that have fooled their audiences. In 1957, the BBC reported that Swiss farmers were experiencing a record spaghetti crop and showed footage of people harvesting noodles from trees; numerous viewers were fooled. In 1985, Sports Illustrated tricked many of its readers when it ran a made-up article about a rookie pitcher named Sidd Finch who could throw a fastball over 168 miles per hour. In 1996, Taco Bell, the fast-food restaurant chain, duped people when it announced it had agreed to purchase Philadelphia's Liberty Bell and intended to rename it the Taco Liberty Bell. In 1998, after Burger King advertised a "Left-Handed Whopper," scores of clueless customers requested the fake sandwich.
Here is a few stories of personal jokes I was involved in! Lol!
well i think the jokes started @ home with my two older brothers! They were always fooling around and getting into some kind of trouble & are family had a lot of laughs with funny imitations of characters on TV to imidating relatives, teachers, and celebrities. As I grew up over the years my family started a tradition for several years that we would play a Christmas yankee swap on my Uncle Ralph! We did that for many years. Each Christmas we would wrap up gag gifts such as seashells, a urinal, and cans of soup! Then one Christmas my brother played a joke on my papa & gave him a fake winning lottery ticket! It was so funny because my nanny & Papa thought it was real 1st and the reaction & the things they said were so funny we were dying laughing on the floor!lol!
I played some great jokes on some of my friends over the years as well. I remember playing a joke on one of my ex boyfriends when I was 22. We had recently broken up & I was wondering what he was doing because he had missed bible study that night. So my friend Bethany & I were driving home from bible study on a friday night with not much going on one summer night. We were both curious of what Jerry was up to, so we stopped by his apt and saw that his car was there. So we went to Walmart & bought ice water & filled up my Super Soaker Water Guns & went back to his apt parking lot!
I called him & he answered & I told him that my car broke down on Rt.28 and needed his help to change my flat tire! lol! So of course, he said he would be right there to help and to sit tight. So after we hung up, Bethany & I got out of the car with our Super Soaker Guns and hid behind the dumpster. Jerry walked out of his apt building and we totally got him by surprise & Super Soaked him! Although He stole my gun & soaked me as well, but it was a super fun memory on a hot fun summer night!
I admit that I lied to him but it was soooo worth it!
Another joke I played was on my friend Dena! Dena would always come over my house but always forget something at my house. She had forgotten her watch, sweater, hat, jewelry,sunglasses, etc.. you name it she forgot it at my house. I always tried to remind her to come by & get her things. But she would forget and keep leaving things at my house by accident. So I got fed up & put all her things in a box that she had forgot at my house & wrapped it up as a Christmas present that year and had her open it up! lol~! It was great, and she laughed so hard!
This was an unplanned joke, I promise honest! I was hanging out with Mark W one night and he was saying that he felt fat and ugly. So I said things like well I don't think that. I think you are smart & sexy! I was trying to build him up in his insecurities so he would be more confident. I told him he sounded like an 8th grade girl. So then then next day, I was playing piano at Mark's house one day while we were dating. He had to do an errand and on his way back I text him that I wanted a small decaf coffee. So he did not hesitate to stop by Dunkins to bring me back a coffee. I was not hungry then & don't want to eat donuts because they are not good for me. So he comes back with my coffee & a small donut bag. So I take a break from piano and look on the kitchen counter and say, "oh what's this?" And he says,"a donut", "a boston cream," because he has been good all week!lol! So I was like okay. Then I took and held the bag, and said, you can't eat this. And he was like why? So I say it again, you can't eat this, because remember last night you were complaining like an 8th grade girl that you were fat & ugly?? So I said, Dr. Phil would say, is this working for you???? Obviously not, so you need to make a change! I told Mark don't not eat it because of me, don't eat it because you want to make a healthier change for yourself! I told him I already liked him the way he was but wanted him to feel better about himself. So I think he got the point, so he said, ok, your right. Then he grabbed the bag & opened the trash & said here's making history! So the freshly made boston cream donut in the bag was just thrown in the trash. Then Mark had to go run another quick errand, so I said I would play a little more piano and then be on my way home and would see him another day. So I play some piano and then get hungry and all I could think or crave was that boston cream donut that was just thrown in the trash! So no word of a lie, I went in the trash & got the bag out & ate the donut and could not even believe my own despiseful behavior! I could not even believe myself because honestly that was not my plan or intention at all. Then I felt so incredibly guilty so I thought I would empty the trash and bring it outside & put a new bag in the barrel to make it look like I did something good & helpful and then it covered up my crime so there would be no evidence! I drove home thinking how could I have done that, I felt like it was murder in the donut dating world!!!lol! So two days go by and Mark & I are at his house watching American Idol & talking & I randomly had said that I have a "secret" and then he wanted to tickle it out of me but I kept quiet to save my life & my relationship. So 20 minutes later, I blurt out my secret out of guilt & thought there would be some humor to it, so here goes nothing... I blurt out to Him my confession... "I ate your Boston cream donut out of the trash the other day after you left" do you want to break up with me???honestly that was not my plan or intention!!! Do you want to bring me to confession???He looked raging mad, like he could not and would not trust me! ugh... so anyways i think he was definitely mad at me but I told him I would make it up to him and I did!But for me at least I have such a funny story & memory to look back on and laugh!
My college roommate Brook also always played jokes on me! She was famous for sprinkling water over public bathroom stalls to make me hurry up! But what goes around comes around because she was trying to mix up & steal cafeteria plates @ a college we were staying at on a mission trip & she accidentally took a girl's tray she did not know and felt so bad. Then she thought she was throwing water over my bathroom stall at an amusement park in california and she mistakenly missed my stall for a little girl's stall and felt terrible... so Brook felt awful & stopped her jokes for just a short time. But luckily right before I moved back home on the east coast we had stayed in a hotel in Portland, OR with her mom & friends to attend a woman of faith conference and I was able to return the favlor or sprinkling her with a shower over the bathroom stall!lol! It was soooo great! And whenever we have a reunion, I can't wait to do it again! I love you Brook! Thanks for making my college memories last a lifetime!
I love jokes & I love surprises! As long as they are nice & in good fun! Bring it on!Laughter is the best medicine! : )
So I was wondering where & who thoguht of April fool's day & how did it come about???
I thought it would be interesting to look up because it seems so random to have such a weird holiday without having a great purpose or recognition behind it. Joking & humor is a great part of life to celebrate but how did it get to be holiday is to my surprise. So I found some info on the history, so here it is.. On that note, I personally don't need a holiday to play a joke on someone or make a fool of myself because I am capable of doing both on a regular basis! lol!
History of April Fool's Day...
On this day in 1700, English pranksters begin popularizing the annual tradition of April Fools' Day by playing practical jokes on each other.
Although the day, also called All Fools' Day, has been celebrated for several centuries by different cultures, its exact origins remain a mystery. Some historians speculate that April Fools' Day dates back to 1582, when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, as called for by the Council of Trent in 1563. People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1 and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1 became the butt of jokes and hoaxes. These included having paper fish placed on their backs and being referred to as "poisson d'avril" (April fish), said to symbolize a young, easily caught fish and a gullible person.
Historians have also linked April Fools' Day to ancient festivals such as Hilaria, which was celebrated in Rome at the end of March and involved people dressing up in disguises. There's also speculation that April Fools' Day was tied to the vernal equinox, or first day of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, when Mother Nature fooled people with changing, unpredictable weather.
April Fools' Day spread throughout Britain during the 18th century. In Scotland, the tradition became a two-day event, starting with "hunting the gowk," in which people were sent on phony errands (gowk is a word for cuckoo bird, a symbol for fool) and followed by Tailie Day, which involved pranks played on people's derrieres, such as pinning fake tails or "kick me" signs on them.
In modern times, people have gone to great lengths to create elaborate April Fools' Day hoaxes. Newspapers, radio and TV stations and Web sites have participated in the April 1 tradition of reporting outrageous fictional claims that have fooled their audiences. In 1957, the BBC reported that Swiss farmers were experiencing a record spaghetti crop and showed footage of people harvesting noodles from trees; numerous viewers were fooled. In 1985, Sports Illustrated tricked many of its readers when it ran a made-up article about a rookie pitcher named Sidd Finch who could throw a fastball over 168 miles per hour. In 1996, Taco Bell, the fast-food restaurant chain, duped people when it announced it had agreed to purchase Philadelphia's Liberty Bell and intended to rename it the Taco Liberty Bell. In 1998, after Burger King advertised a "Left-Handed Whopper," scores of clueless customers requested the fake sandwich.
Here is a few stories of personal jokes I was involved in! Lol!
well i think the jokes started @ home with my two older brothers! They were always fooling around and getting into some kind of trouble & are family had a lot of laughs with funny imitations of characters on TV to imidating relatives, teachers, and celebrities. As I grew up over the years my family started a tradition for several years that we would play a Christmas yankee swap on my Uncle Ralph! We did that for many years. Each Christmas we would wrap up gag gifts such as seashells, a urinal, and cans of soup! Then one Christmas my brother played a joke on my papa & gave him a fake winning lottery ticket! It was so funny because my nanny & Papa thought it was real 1st and the reaction & the things they said were so funny we were dying laughing on the floor!lol!
I played some great jokes on some of my friends over the years as well. I remember playing a joke on one of my ex boyfriends when I was 22. We had recently broken up & I was wondering what he was doing because he had missed bible study that night. So my friend Bethany & I were driving home from bible study on a friday night with not much going on one summer night. We were both curious of what Jerry was up to, so we stopped by his apt and saw that his car was there. So we went to Walmart & bought ice water & filled up my Super Soaker Water Guns & went back to his apt parking lot!
I called him & he answered & I told him that my car broke down on Rt.28 and needed his help to change my flat tire! lol! So of course, he said he would be right there to help and to sit tight. So after we hung up, Bethany & I got out of the car with our Super Soaker Guns and hid behind the dumpster. Jerry walked out of his apt building and we totally got him by surprise & Super Soaked him! Although He stole my gun & soaked me as well, but it was a super fun memory on a hot fun summer night!
I admit that I lied to him but it was soooo worth it!
Another joke I played was on my friend Dena! Dena would always come over my house but always forget something at my house. She had forgotten her watch, sweater, hat, jewelry,sunglasses, etc.. you name it she forgot it at my house. I always tried to remind her to come by & get her things. But she would forget and keep leaving things at my house by accident. So I got fed up & put all her things in a box that she had forgot at my house & wrapped it up as a Christmas present that year and had her open it up! lol~! It was great, and she laughed so hard!
This was an unplanned joke, I promise honest! I was hanging out with Mark W one night and he was saying that he felt fat and ugly. So I said things like well I don't think that. I think you are smart & sexy! I was trying to build him up in his insecurities so he would be more confident. I told him he sounded like an 8th grade girl. So then then next day, I was playing piano at Mark's house one day while we were dating. He had to do an errand and on his way back I text him that I wanted a small decaf coffee. So he did not hesitate to stop by Dunkins to bring me back a coffee. I was not hungry then & don't want to eat donuts because they are not good for me. So he comes back with my coffee & a small donut bag. So I take a break from piano and look on the kitchen counter and say, "oh what's this?" And he says,"a donut", "a boston cream," because he has been good all week!lol! So I was like okay. Then I took and held the bag, and said, you can't eat this. And he was like why? So I say it again, you can't eat this, because remember last night you were complaining like an 8th grade girl that you were fat & ugly?? So I said, Dr. Phil would say, is this working for you???? Obviously not, so you need to make a change! I told Mark don't not eat it because of me, don't eat it because you want to make a healthier change for yourself! I told him I already liked him the way he was but wanted him to feel better about himself. So I think he got the point, so he said, ok, your right. Then he grabbed the bag & opened the trash & said here's making history! So the freshly made boston cream donut in the bag was just thrown in the trash. Then Mark had to go run another quick errand, so I said I would play a little more piano and then be on my way home and would see him another day. So I play some piano and then get hungry and all I could think or crave was that boston cream donut that was just thrown in the trash! So no word of a lie, I went in the trash & got the bag out & ate the donut and could not even believe my own despiseful behavior! I could not even believe myself because honestly that was not my plan or intention at all. Then I felt so incredibly guilty so I thought I would empty the trash and bring it outside & put a new bag in the barrel to make it look like I did something good & helpful and then it covered up my crime so there would be no evidence! I drove home thinking how could I have done that, I felt like it was murder in the donut dating world!!!lol! So two days go by and Mark & I are at his house watching American Idol & talking & I randomly had said that I have a "secret" and then he wanted to tickle it out of me but I kept quiet to save my life & my relationship. So 20 minutes later, I blurt out my secret out of guilt & thought there would be some humor to it, so here goes nothing... I blurt out to Him my confession... "I ate your Boston cream donut out of the trash the other day after you left" do you want to break up with me???honestly that was not my plan or intention!!! Do you want to bring me to confession???He looked raging mad, like he could not and would not trust me! ugh... so anyways i think he was definitely mad at me but I told him I would make it up to him and I did!But for me at least I have such a funny story & memory to look back on and laugh!
My college roommate Brook also always played jokes on me! She was famous for sprinkling water over public bathroom stalls to make me hurry up! But what goes around comes around because she was trying to mix up & steal cafeteria plates @ a college we were staying at on a mission trip & she accidentally took a girl's tray she did not know and felt so bad. Then she thought she was throwing water over my bathroom stall at an amusement park in california and she mistakenly missed my stall for a little girl's stall and felt terrible... so Brook felt awful & stopped her jokes for just a short time. But luckily right before I moved back home on the east coast we had stayed in a hotel in Portland, OR with her mom & friends to attend a woman of faith conference and I was able to return the favlor or sprinkling her with a shower over the bathroom stall!lol! It was soooo great! And whenever we have a reunion, I can't wait to do it again! I love you Brook! Thanks for making my college memories last a lifetime!
I love jokes & I love surprises! As long as they are nice & in good fun! Bring it on!Laughter is the best medicine! : )
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
The History & meaning of St. Patrick's Day
Who Was St. Patrick?
St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, is one of Christianity's most widely known figures. But for all his celebrity, his life remains somewhat of a mystery. Many of the stories traditionally associated with St. Patrick, including the famous account of his banishing all the snakes from Ireland, are false, the products of hundreds of years of exaggerated storytelling.
Taken Prisoner By Irish Raiders
It is known that St. Patrick was born in Britain to wealthy parents near the end of the fourth century. He is believed to have died on March 17, around 460 A.D. Although his father was a Christian deacon, it has been suggested that he probably took on the role because of tax incentives and there is no evidence that Patrick came from a particularly religious family. At the age of sixteen, Patrick was taken prisoner by a group of Irish raiders who were attacking his family's estate. They transported him to Ireland where he spent six years in captivity. (There is some dispute over where this captivity took place. Although many believe he was taken to live in Mount Slemish in County Antrim, it is more likely that he was held in County Mayo near Killala.) During this time, he worked as a shepherd, outdoors and away from people. Lonely and afraid, he turned to his religion for solace, becoming a devout Christian. (It is also believed that Patrick first began to dream of converting the Irish people to Christianity during his captivity.)
Guided By Visions
After more than six years as a prisoner, Patrick escaped. According to his writing, a voice-which he believed to be God's-spoke to him in a dream, telling him it was time to leave Ireland.
To do so, Patrick walked nearly 200 miles from County Mayo, where it is believed he was held, to the Irish coast. After escaping to Britain, Patrick reported that he experienced a second revelation-an angel in a dream tells him to return to Ireland as a missionary. Soon after, Patrick began religious training, a course of study that lasted more than fifteen years. After his ordination as a priest, he was sent to Ireland with a dual mission-to minister to Christians already living in Ireland and to begin to convert the Irish. (Interestingly, this mission contradicts the widely held notion that Patrick introduced Christianity to Ireland.)
Bonfires and Crosses
Familiar with the Irish language and culture, Patrick chose to incorporate traditional ritual into his lessons of Christianity instead of attempting to eradicate native Irish beliefs. For instance, he used bonfires to celebrate Easter since the Irish were used to honoring their gods with fire. He also superimposed a sun, a powerful Irish symbol, onto the Christian cross to create what is now called a Celtic cross, so that veneration of the symbol would seem more natural to the Irish. (Although there were a small number of Christians on the island when Patrick arrived, most Irish practiced a nature-based pagan religion. The Irish culture centered around a rich tradition of oral legend and myth. When this is considered, it is no surprise that the story of Patrick's life became exaggerated over the centuries-spinning exciting tales to remember history has always been a part of the Irish way of life.)
The History of the Holiday
St. Patrick's Day is celebrated on March 17, his religious feast day and the anniversary of his death in the fifth century. The Irish have observed this day as a religious holiday for over a thousand years.
On St. Patrick's Day, which falls during the Christian season of Lent, Irish families would traditionally attend church in the morning and celebrate in the afternoon. Lenten prohibitions against the consumption of meat were waived and people would dance, drink, and feast—on the traditional meal of Irish bacon and cabbage.
The First Parade
The first St. Patrick's Day parade took place not in Ireland, but in the United States. Irish soldiers serving in the English military marched through New York City on March 17, 1762. Along with their music, the parade helped the soldiers to reconnect with their Irish roots, as well as fellow Irishmen serving in the English army.
Over the next thirty-five years, Irish patriotism among American immigrants flourished, prompting the rise of so-called "Irish Aid" societies, like the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick and the Hibernian Society. Each group would hold annual parades featuring bagpipes (which actually first became popular in the Scottish and British armies) and drums.
In 1848, several New York Irish aid societies decided to unite their parades to form one New York City St. Patrick's Day Parade. Today, that parade is the world 's oldest civilian parade and the largest in the United States, with over 150,000 participants.
Each year, nearly three million people line the one-and-a-half mile parade route to watch the procession, which takes more than five hours. Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Savannah also celebrate the day with parades including between 10,000 to 20,000 participants.
History of St. Patrick's Day
Watch video about the history of the holiday.
No Irish Need Apply
Up until the mid-nineteenth century, most Irish immigrants in America were members of the Protestant middle class. When the Great Potato Famine hit Ireland in 1845, close to a million poor, uneducated, Catholic Irish began to pour into America to escape starvation. Despised for their religious beliefs and funny accents by the American Protestant majority, the immigrants had trouble finding even menial jobs. When Irish Americans in the country's cities took to the streets on St. Patrick's Day to celebrate their heritage, newspapers portrayed them in cartoons as drunk, violent monkeys.
However, the Irish soon began to realize that their great numbers endowed them with a political power that had yet to be exploited. They started to organize, and their voting block, known as the "green machine," became an important swing vote for political hopefuls. Suddenly, annual St. Patrick's Day parades became a show of strength for Irish Americans, as well as a must-attend event for a slew of political candidates. In 1948, President Truman attended New York City 's St. Patrick's Day parade, a proud moment for the many Irish whose ancestors had to fight stereotypes and racial prejudice to find acceptance in America.
Wearing of the Green Goes Global
Today, St. Patrick's Day is celebrated by people of all backgrounds in the United States, Canada, and Australia. Although North America is home to the largest productions, St. Patrick's Day has been celebrated in other locations far from Ireland, including Japan, Singapore, and Russia.
In modern-day Ireland, St. Patrick's Day has traditionally been a religious occasion. In fact, up until the 1970s, Irish laws mandated that pubs be closed on March 17. Beginning in 1995, however, the Irish government began a national campaign to use St. Patrick's Day as an opportunity to drive tourism and showcase Ireland to the rest of the world. Last year, close to one million people took part in Ireland 's St. Patrick's Festival in Dublin, a multi-day celebration featuring parades, concerts, outdoor theater productions, and fireworks shows.
The Chicago River
Chicago is also famous for a somewhat peculiar annual event: dyeing the Chicago River green. The tradition started in 1962, when city pollution-control workers used dyes to trace illegal sewage discharges and realized that the green dye might provide a unique way to celebrate the holiday. That year, they released 100 pounds of green vegetable dye into the river—enough to keep it green for a week!
Today, in order to minimize environmental damage, only forty pounds of dye are used, making the river green for only several hours. Although Chicago historians claim their city 's idea for a river of green was original, some Savannah natives believe the idea originated in their town.
They point out that 1961, Savannah mayor Tom Woolley had plans for a green river, but due to rough water on March 17, the experiment didn 't work and Savannah never attempted to dye its river again.
Symbols and Traditions
The Shamrock
The shamrock, which was also called the "seamroy" by the Celts, was a sacred plant in ancient Ireland because it symbolized the rebirth of spring. By the seventeenth century, the shamrock had become a symbol of emerging Irish nationalism. As the English began to seize Irish land and make laws against the use of the Irish language and the practice of Catholicism, many Irish began to wear the shamrock as a symbol of their pride in their heritage and their displeasure with English rule.
Irish Music
Music is often associated with St. Patrick's Day—and Irish culture in general. From ancient days of the Celts, music has always been an important part of Irish life. The Celts had an oral culture, where religion, legend, and history were passed from one generation to the next by way of stories and songs.
After being conquered by the English, and forbidden to speak their own language, the Irish, like other oppressed peoples, turned to music to help them remember important events and hold on to their heritage and history. As it often stirred emotion and helped to galvanize people, music was outlawed by the English. During her reign,Queen Elizabeth I even decreed that all artists and pipers were to be arrested and hanged on the spot.
Today, traditional Irish bands like The Chieftains, the Clancy Brothers, and Tommy Makem are gaining worldwide popularity. Their music is produced with instruments that have been used for centuries, including the fiddle, the uilleann pipes (a sort of elaborate bagpipe), the tin whistle (a sort of flute that is actually made of nickel-silver, brass, or aluminum), and the bodhran (an ancient type of framedrum that was traditionally used in warfare rather than music).
The Snake
It has long been recounted that, during his mission in Ireland, St. Patrick once stood on a hilltop (which is now called Croagh Patrick), and with only a wooden staff by his side, banished all the snakes from Ireland.
In fact, the island nation was never home to any snakes. The "banishing of the snakes" was really a metaphor for the eradication of pagan ideology from Ireland and the triumph of Christianity. Within two hundred years of Patrick's arrival, Ireland was completely Christianized.
Corned Beef
Each year, thousands of Irish Americans gather with their loved ones on St. Patrick's Day to share a "traditional" meal of corned beef and cabbage.
Though cabbage has long been an Irish food, corned beef only began to be associated with St. Patrick's Day at the turn of the century.
Irish immigrants living on New York City's Lower East Side substituted corned beef for their traditional dish of Irish bacon to save money. They learned about the cheaper alternative from their Jewish neighbors.
The Leprechaun
The original Irish name for these figures of folklore is "lobaircin," meaning "small-bodied fellow."
Belief in leprechauns probably stems from Celtic belief in fairies, tiny men and women who could use their magical powers to serve good or evil. In Celtic folktales, leprechauns were cranky souls, responsible for mending the shoes of the other fairies. Though only minor figures in Celtic folklore, leprechauns were known for their trickery, which they often used to protect their much-fabled treasure.
Leprechauns had nothing to do with St. Patrick or the celebration of St. Patrick's Day, a Catholic holy day. In 1959, Walt Disney released a film called Darby O'Gill & the Little People, which introduced America to a very different sort of leprechaun than the cantankerous little man of Irish folklore. This cheerful, friendly leprechaun is a purely American invention, but has quickly evolved into an easily recognizable symbol of both St. Patrick's Day and Ireland in general.
St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, is one of Christianity's most widely known figures. But for all his celebrity, his life remains somewhat of a mystery. Many of the stories traditionally associated with St. Patrick, including the famous account of his banishing all the snakes from Ireland, are false, the products of hundreds of years of exaggerated storytelling.
Taken Prisoner By Irish Raiders
It is known that St. Patrick was born in Britain to wealthy parents near the end of the fourth century. He is believed to have died on March 17, around 460 A.D. Although his father was a Christian deacon, it has been suggested that he probably took on the role because of tax incentives and there is no evidence that Patrick came from a particularly religious family. At the age of sixteen, Patrick was taken prisoner by a group of Irish raiders who were attacking his family's estate. They transported him to Ireland where he spent six years in captivity. (There is some dispute over where this captivity took place. Although many believe he was taken to live in Mount Slemish in County Antrim, it is more likely that he was held in County Mayo near Killala.) During this time, he worked as a shepherd, outdoors and away from people. Lonely and afraid, he turned to his religion for solace, becoming a devout Christian. (It is also believed that Patrick first began to dream of converting the Irish people to Christianity during his captivity.)
Guided By Visions
After more than six years as a prisoner, Patrick escaped. According to his writing, a voice-which he believed to be God's-spoke to him in a dream, telling him it was time to leave Ireland.
To do so, Patrick walked nearly 200 miles from County Mayo, where it is believed he was held, to the Irish coast. After escaping to Britain, Patrick reported that he experienced a second revelation-an angel in a dream tells him to return to Ireland as a missionary. Soon after, Patrick began religious training, a course of study that lasted more than fifteen years. After his ordination as a priest, he was sent to Ireland with a dual mission-to minister to Christians already living in Ireland and to begin to convert the Irish. (Interestingly, this mission contradicts the widely held notion that Patrick introduced Christianity to Ireland.)
Bonfires and Crosses
Familiar with the Irish language and culture, Patrick chose to incorporate traditional ritual into his lessons of Christianity instead of attempting to eradicate native Irish beliefs. For instance, he used bonfires to celebrate Easter since the Irish were used to honoring their gods with fire. He also superimposed a sun, a powerful Irish symbol, onto the Christian cross to create what is now called a Celtic cross, so that veneration of the symbol would seem more natural to the Irish. (Although there were a small number of Christians on the island when Patrick arrived, most Irish practiced a nature-based pagan religion. The Irish culture centered around a rich tradition of oral legend and myth. When this is considered, it is no surprise that the story of Patrick's life became exaggerated over the centuries-spinning exciting tales to remember history has always been a part of the Irish way of life.)
The History of the Holiday
St. Patrick's Day is celebrated on March 17, his religious feast day and the anniversary of his death in the fifth century. The Irish have observed this day as a religious holiday for over a thousand years.
On St. Patrick's Day, which falls during the Christian season of Lent, Irish families would traditionally attend church in the morning and celebrate in the afternoon. Lenten prohibitions against the consumption of meat were waived and people would dance, drink, and feast—on the traditional meal of Irish bacon and cabbage.
The First Parade
The first St. Patrick's Day parade took place not in Ireland, but in the United States. Irish soldiers serving in the English military marched through New York City on March 17, 1762. Along with their music, the parade helped the soldiers to reconnect with their Irish roots, as well as fellow Irishmen serving in the English army.
Over the next thirty-five years, Irish patriotism among American immigrants flourished, prompting the rise of so-called "Irish Aid" societies, like the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick and the Hibernian Society. Each group would hold annual parades featuring bagpipes (which actually first became popular in the Scottish and British armies) and drums.
In 1848, several New York Irish aid societies decided to unite their parades to form one New York City St. Patrick's Day Parade. Today, that parade is the world 's oldest civilian parade and the largest in the United States, with over 150,000 participants.
Each year, nearly three million people line the one-and-a-half mile parade route to watch the procession, which takes more than five hours. Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Savannah also celebrate the day with parades including between 10,000 to 20,000 participants.
History of St. Patrick's Day
Watch video about the history of the holiday.
No Irish Need Apply
Up until the mid-nineteenth century, most Irish immigrants in America were members of the Protestant middle class. When the Great Potato Famine hit Ireland in 1845, close to a million poor, uneducated, Catholic Irish began to pour into America to escape starvation. Despised for their religious beliefs and funny accents by the American Protestant majority, the immigrants had trouble finding even menial jobs. When Irish Americans in the country's cities took to the streets on St. Patrick's Day to celebrate their heritage, newspapers portrayed them in cartoons as drunk, violent monkeys.
However, the Irish soon began to realize that their great numbers endowed them with a political power that had yet to be exploited. They started to organize, and their voting block, known as the "green machine," became an important swing vote for political hopefuls. Suddenly, annual St. Patrick's Day parades became a show of strength for Irish Americans, as well as a must-attend event for a slew of political candidates. In 1948, President Truman attended New York City 's St. Patrick's Day parade, a proud moment for the many Irish whose ancestors had to fight stereotypes and racial prejudice to find acceptance in America.
Wearing of the Green Goes Global
Today, St. Patrick's Day is celebrated by people of all backgrounds in the United States, Canada, and Australia. Although North America is home to the largest productions, St. Patrick's Day has been celebrated in other locations far from Ireland, including Japan, Singapore, and Russia.
In modern-day Ireland, St. Patrick's Day has traditionally been a religious occasion. In fact, up until the 1970s, Irish laws mandated that pubs be closed on March 17. Beginning in 1995, however, the Irish government began a national campaign to use St. Patrick's Day as an opportunity to drive tourism and showcase Ireland to the rest of the world. Last year, close to one million people took part in Ireland 's St. Patrick's Festival in Dublin, a multi-day celebration featuring parades, concerts, outdoor theater productions, and fireworks shows.
The Chicago River
Chicago is also famous for a somewhat peculiar annual event: dyeing the Chicago River green. The tradition started in 1962, when city pollution-control workers used dyes to trace illegal sewage discharges and realized that the green dye might provide a unique way to celebrate the holiday. That year, they released 100 pounds of green vegetable dye into the river—enough to keep it green for a week!
Today, in order to minimize environmental damage, only forty pounds of dye are used, making the river green for only several hours. Although Chicago historians claim their city 's idea for a river of green was original, some Savannah natives believe the idea originated in their town.
They point out that 1961, Savannah mayor Tom Woolley had plans for a green river, but due to rough water on March 17, the experiment didn 't work and Savannah never attempted to dye its river again.
Symbols and Traditions
The Shamrock
The shamrock, which was also called the "seamroy" by the Celts, was a sacred plant in ancient Ireland because it symbolized the rebirth of spring. By the seventeenth century, the shamrock had become a symbol of emerging Irish nationalism. As the English began to seize Irish land and make laws against the use of the Irish language and the practice of Catholicism, many Irish began to wear the shamrock as a symbol of their pride in their heritage and their displeasure with English rule.
Irish Music
Music is often associated with St. Patrick's Day—and Irish culture in general. From ancient days of the Celts, music has always been an important part of Irish life. The Celts had an oral culture, where religion, legend, and history were passed from one generation to the next by way of stories and songs.
After being conquered by the English, and forbidden to speak their own language, the Irish, like other oppressed peoples, turned to music to help them remember important events and hold on to their heritage and history. As it often stirred emotion and helped to galvanize people, music was outlawed by the English. During her reign,Queen Elizabeth I even decreed that all artists and pipers were to be arrested and hanged on the spot.
Today, traditional Irish bands like The Chieftains, the Clancy Brothers, and Tommy Makem are gaining worldwide popularity. Their music is produced with instruments that have been used for centuries, including the fiddle, the uilleann pipes (a sort of elaborate bagpipe), the tin whistle (a sort of flute that is actually made of nickel-silver, brass, or aluminum), and the bodhran (an ancient type of framedrum that was traditionally used in warfare rather than music).
The Snake
It has long been recounted that, during his mission in Ireland, St. Patrick once stood on a hilltop (which is now called Croagh Patrick), and with only a wooden staff by his side, banished all the snakes from Ireland.
In fact, the island nation was never home to any snakes. The "banishing of the snakes" was really a metaphor for the eradication of pagan ideology from Ireland and the triumph of Christianity. Within two hundred years of Patrick's arrival, Ireland was completely Christianized.
Corned Beef
Each year, thousands of Irish Americans gather with their loved ones on St. Patrick's Day to share a "traditional" meal of corned beef and cabbage.
Though cabbage has long been an Irish food, corned beef only began to be associated with St. Patrick's Day at the turn of the century.
Irish immigrants living on New York City's Lower East Side substituted corned beef for their traditional dish of Irish bacon to save money. They learned about the cheaper alternative from their Jewish neighbors.
The Leprechaun
The original Irish name for these figures of folklore is "lobaircin," meaning "small-bodied fellow."
Belief in leprechauns probably stems from Celtic belief in fairies, tiny men and women who could use their magical powers to serve good or evil. In Celtic folktales, leprechauns were cranky souls, responsible for mending the shoes of the other fairies. Though only minor figures in Celtic folklore, leprechauns were known for their trickery, which they often used to protect their much-fabled treasure.
Leprechauns had nothing to do with St. Patrick or the celebration of St. Patrick's Day, a Catholic holy day. In 1959, Walt Disney released a film called Darby O'Gill & the Little People, which introduced America to a very different sort of leprechaun than the cantankerous little man of Irish folklore. This cheerful, friendly leprechaun is a purely American invention, but has quickly evolved into an easily recognizable symbol of both St. Patrick's Day and Ireland in general.
St. Valentine (history & meaning of our holiday)
The History of Valentine's Day
Every February, across the country, candy, flowers, and gifts are exchanged between loved ones, all in the name of St. Valentine. But who is this mysterious saint and why do we celebrate this holiday? The history of Valentine's Day — and its patron saint — is shrouded in mystery. But we do know that February has long been a month of romance. St. Valentine's Day, as we know it today, contains vestiges of both Christian and ancient Roman tradition. So, who was Saint Valentine and how did he become associated with this ancient rite? Today, the Catholic Church recognizes at least three different saints named Valentine or Valentinus, all of whom were martyred.
One legend contends that Valentine was a priest who served during the third century in Rome. When Emperor Claudius II decided that single men made better soldiers than those with wives and families, he outlawed marriage for young men — his crop of potential soldiers. Valentine, realizing the injustice of the decree, defied Claudius and continued to perform marriages for young lovers in secret. When Valentine's actions were discovered, Claudius ordered that he be put to death.
Other stories suggest that Valentine may have been killed for attempting to help Christians escape harsh Roman prisons where they were often beaten and tortured.
According to one legend, Valentine actually sent the first 'valentine' greeting himself. While in prison, it is believed that Valentine fell in love with a young girl — who may have been his jailor's daughter — who visited him during his confinement. Before his death, it is alleged that he wrote her a letter, which he signed 'From your Valentine,' an expression that is still in use today. Although the truth behind the Valentine legends is murky, the stories certainly emphasize his appeal as a sympathetic, heroic, and, most importantly, romantic figure. It's no surprise that by the Middle Ages, Valentine was one of the most popular saints in England and France.
While some believe that Valentine's Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine's death or burial — which probably occurred around 270 A.D — others claim that the Christian church may have decided to celebrate Valentine's feast day in the middle of February in an effort to 'christianize' celebrations of the pagan Lupercalia festival. In ancient Rome, February was the official beginning of spring and was considered a time for purification. Houses were ritually cleansed by sweeping them out and then sprinkling salt and a type of wheat called spelt throughout their interiors. Lupercalia, which began at the ides of February, February 15, was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus.
To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.
The boys then sliced the goat's hide into strips, dipped them in the sacrificial blood and took to the streets, gently slapping both women and fields of crops with the goathide strips. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed being touched with the hides because it was believed the strips would make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would then each choose a name out of the urn and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. Pope Gelasius declared February 14 St. Valentine's Day around 498 A.D. The Roman 'lottery' system for romantic pairing was deemed un-Christian and outlawed. Later, during the Middle Ages, it was commonly believed in France and England that February 14 was the beginning of birds' mating season, which added to the idea that the middle of February — Valentine's Day — should be a day for romance. The oldest known valentine still in existence today was a poem written by Charles, Duke of Orleans to his wife while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt. The greeting, which was written in 1415, is part of the manuscript collection of the British Library in London, England. Several years later, it is believed that King Henry V hired a writer named John Lydgate to compose a valentine note to Catherine of Valois.
In Great Britain, Valentine's Day began to be popularly celebrated around the seventeenth century. By the middle of the eighteenth century, it was common for friends and lovers in all social classes to exchange small tokens of affection or handwritten notes. By the end of the century, printed cards began to replace written letters due to improvements in printing technology. Ready-made cards were an easy way for people to express their emotions in a time when direct expression of one's feelings was discouraged. Cheaper postage rates also contributed to an increase in the popularity of sending Valentine's Day greetings. Americans probably began exchanging hand-made valentines in the early 1700s. In the 1840s, Esther A. Howland began to sell the first mass-produced valentines in America.
According to the Greeting Card Association, an estimated one billion valentine cards are sent each year, making Valentine's Day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year. (An estimated 2.6 billion cards are sent for Christmas.)
Approximately 85 percent of all valentines are purchased by women. In addition to the United States, Valentine's Day is celebrated in Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, France, and Australia.
Valentine greetings were popular as far back as the Middle Ages (written Valentine's didn't begin to appear until after 1400), and the oldest known Valentine card is on display at the British Museum. The first commercial Valentine's Day greeting cards produced in the U.S. were created in the 1840s by Esther A. Howland. Howland, known as the Mother of the Valentine, made elaborate creations with real lace, ribbons and colorful pictures known as "scrap".Cupid, another symbol of the holiday, became associated with it because he was the son of Venus, the Roman god of love and beauty. Cupid often appears on Valentine cards.
Valentine's Day: Quotations
"Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies."
- Aristotle
"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage."
- Lao Tzu
"My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite."
- William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways."
- Elizabeth Barrett Browning
"Young love is a flame; very pretty, often very hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. The love of the older and disciplined heart is as coals, deep-burning, unquenchable."
- Henry Ward Beecher
"Age does not protect you from love. But love, to some extent, protects you from age."
- Anais Nin
"Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward in the same direction."
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."
-Helen Keller
"Love does not dominate; it cultivates."
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
"Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place."
- Zora Neale Hurston
"Love is life. All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists, only because I love."
- Leo Tolstoy
"Love is like quicksilver in the hand. Leave the fingers open and it stays. Clutch it, and it darts away."
- Dorothy Parker
"I have learned not to worry about love; but to honor its coming with all my heart."
- Alice Walker
"I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way
than this: where I does not exist nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep."
- Pablo Neruda, "Love Sonnet XVII"
Poetry.com Greatest Love Poems...
Every February, across the country, candy, flowers, and gifts are exchanged between loved ones, all in the name of St. Valentine. But who is this mysterious saint and why do we celebrate this holiday? The history of Valentine's Day — and its patron saint — is shrouded in mystery. But we do know that February has long been a month of romance. St. Valentine's Day, as we know it today, contains vestiges of both Christian and ancient Roman tradition. So, who was Saint Valentine and how did he become associated with this ancient rite? Today, the Catholic Church recognizes at least three different saints named Valentine or Valentinus, all of whom were martyred.
One legend contends that Valentine was a priest who served during the third century in Rome. When Emperor Claudius II decided that single men made better soldiers than those with wives and families, he outlawed marriage for young men — his crop of potential soldiers. Valentine, realizing the injustice of the decree, defied Claudius and continued to perform marriages for young lovers in secret. When Valentine's actions were discovered, Claudius ordered that he be put to death.
Other stories suggest that Valentine may have been killed for attempting to help Christians escape harsh Roman prisons where they were often beaten and tortured.
According to one legend, Valentine actually sent the first 'valentine' greeting himself. While in prison, it is believed that Valentine fell in love with a young girl — who may have been his jailor's daughter — who visited him during his confinement. Before his death, it is alleged that he wrote her a letter, which he signed 'From your Valentine,' an expression that is still in use today. Although the truth behind the Valentine legends is murky, the stories certainly emphasize his appeal as a sympathetic, heroic, and, most importantly, romantic figure. It's no surprise that by the Middle Ages, Valentine was one of the most popular saints in England and France.
While some believe that Valentine's Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine's death or burial — which probably occurred around 270 A.D — others claim that the Christian church may have decided to celebrate Valentine's feast day in the middle of February in an effort to 'christianize' celebrations of the pagan Lupercalia festival. In ancient Rome, February was the official beginning of spring and was considered a time for purification. Houses were ritually cleansed by sweeping them out and then sprinkling salt and a type of wheat called spelt throughout their interiors. Lupercalia, which began at the ides of February, February 15, was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus.
To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.
The boys then sliced the goat's hide into strips, dipped them in the sacrificial blood and took to the streets, gently slapping both women and fields of crops with the goathide strips. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed being touched with the hides because it was believed the strips would make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would then each choose a name out of the urn and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. Pope Gelasius declared February 14 St. Valentine's Day around 498 A.D. The Roman 'lottery' system for romantic pairing was deemed un-Christian and outlawed. Later, during the Middle Ages, it was commonly believed in France and England that February 14 was the beginning of birds' mating season, which added to the idea that the middle of February — Valentine's Day — should be a day for romance. The oldest known valentine still in existence today was a poem written by Charles, Duke of Orleans to his wife while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt. The greeting, which was written in 1415, is part of the manuscript collection of the British Library in London, England. Several years later, it is believed that King Henry V hired a writer named John Lydgate to compose a valentine note to Catherine of Valois.
In Great Britain, Valentine's Day began to be popularly celebrated around the seventeenth century. By the middle of the eighteenth century, it was common for friends and lovers in all social classes to exchange small tokens of affection or handwritten notes. By the end of the century, printed cards began to replace written letters due to improvements in printing technology. Ready-made cards were an easy way for people to express their emotions in a time when direct expression of one's feelings was discouraged. Cheaper postage rates also contributed to an increase in the popularity of sending Valentine's Day greetings. Americans probably began exchanging hand-made valentines in the early 1700s. In the 1840s, Esther A. Howland began to sell the first mass-produced valentines in America.
According to the Greeting Card Association, an estimated one billion valentine cards are sent each year, making Valentine's Day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year. (An estimated 2.6 billion cards are sent for Christmas.)
Approximately 85 percent of all valentines are purchased by women. In addition to the United States, Valentine's Day is celebrated in Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, France, and Australia.
Valentine greetings were popular as far back as the Middle Ages (written Valentine's didn't begin to appear until after 1400), and the oldest known Valentine card is on display at the British Museum. The first commercial Valentine's Day greeting cards produced in the U.S. were created in the 1840s by Esther A. Howland. Howland, known as the Mother of the Valentine, made elaborate creations with real lace, ribbons and colorful pictures known as "scrap".Cupid, another symbol of the holiday, became associated with it because he was the son of Venus, the Roman god of love and beauty. Cupid often appears on Valentine cards.
Valentine's Day: Quotations
"Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies."
- Aristotle
"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage."
- Lao Tzu
"My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite."
- William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways."
- Elizabeth Barrett Browning
"Young love is a flame; very pretty, often very hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. The love of the older and disciplined heart is as coals, deep-burning, unquenchable."
- Henry Ward Beecher
"Age does not protect you from love. But love, to some extent, protects you from age."
- Anais Nin
"Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward in the same direction."
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."
-Helen Keller
"Love does not dominate; it cultivates."
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
"Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place."
- Zora Neale Hurston
"Love is life. All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists, only because I love."
- Leo Tolstoy
"Love is like quicksilver in the hand. Leave the fingers open and it stays. Clutch it, and it darts away."
- Dorothy Parker
"I have learned not to worry about love; but to honor its coming with all my heart."
- Alice Walker
"I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way
than this: where I does not exist nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep."
- Pablo Neruda, "Love Sonnet XVII"
Poetry.com Greatest Love Poems...
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Gratitude, Economy, Creation Event @ Park St. Church w/speaker Shane Claiborne
Sat night on February 21st some friends and I attended this event at Park St. Church.
Gratitude & Creation with Shane Claiborne - Saturday, Feb 21
Category: news, Events, Fair Trade, Creation
Climate change. Toxic trash. The earth’s budget overstretched. What would our relationship to the environment look like if rooted in gratitude to God?
On the eve of Lent, learn about and undertake a creation commitment together with Christians from all traditions at Gratitude & Creation on Saturday, February 21, 4:30-9:00pm at Park Street Church, Boston.
4:30-6:00
Prayer with Shane Claiborne, Jubilee Sessions sharing practical ways to respect God’s creation.
* Feast without Injustice: fill a Fair Trade cupboard
* Water without Waste: resisting commercialization of water resources
* Beauty without Contamination: clearing out toxics from your household
* Energy without excess: reducing your carbon footprint beyond the light bulb
6:00-7:00
Community Dinner
7:00-9:00
Worship and Message with Shane Claiborne. Music led by bluegrass band featuring local musicians.
Shane Claiborne is the author of the Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical and founding partner in the neo-monastic community, the Simple Way.
A $10 donation to defray costs is suggested but not required. All are welcome to attend.
Sponsors include the Massachusetts Council of Churches, the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, Massachusetts Interfaith Power & Light.
This event was pretty intriguing and inspiring. I missed the seminars due to arriving late with friends, but still enjoyed the night immensely.The author & speaker Shane Claiborne was down to earth, real, pssionate, and captivatingly humorous as he delivered his message to us. I love and live to be inspired to live for Christ and that is exaclty what Shane's message did for all that attended.
They asked us to commit to giving something up for lent in a way that would help our environment such as stop using a clothes dryer, or stop purchasing bottled water, and or remove toxic household cleaning and beauty products from your home.
It made us think of making wise decisions on what we buy and to the extent of the purpose behind our purchase. Do we need it, is it good for our envirnment, ect..
This was an event that was quite different from the normal church event I am used to but was refreshing that now is the time for the church to make a stand on our social resposibility to care for God's creation.
We are the generation that must be the change!
Excerpts from The www.bosonfaithjustice.org website for more check out their website!
A Pre-Consumption Prayer
November 29th, 2008 | Category: Fair Trade, Consumption
Posted on God’s Politics
“Consumption” isn’t a bad word. Even as we watch the excesses of the consumer economy crumble and collapse around us, we should remember that the word “consume” also means “to eat.”
This season, many of us consume to excess as eaters; on “Black Friday,” many also consume to excess as shoppers. But as pastor Eugene Cho has pointed out, buying stuff at low prices isn’t by itself a mark of shame or weakness. It is, in our post-agrarian, post-industrial society, a necessity. The issue isn’t whether we buy or not buy things. It is whether we do so with appreciation for all of God’s creation.
Before we eat, we say a prayer to acknowledge our gratitude for God’s bounty. Through prayer, we express both humility and appreciation. If we pray mindfully (rather than out of rote habit), we simultaneously acknowledge our joy at what we have while also feeling compassion for those who have not.
What if we said a prayer each time we bought something – each time we “consumed”?
For most of our history, getting enough to eat has been our primary preoccupation. Praying before we ate ensured a direct connection between our livelihoods and God. But for those of us lucky enough to live in a modern, developed nation, the idea of “putting food on the table” has become more figurative than literal. Praying before a meal no longer carries the weight it once did.
A gratitude economy involves, I think, a more spiritually conscious consumerism. It is no better to wallow in guilt about our need to buy things than to flaunt our ability to buy while considering ourselves specially blessed. It will not advance global justice to focus simply on what not to buy; rather we also have the responsibility to buy the right things – for ourselves and for our brothers and sisters worldwide.
As we go about our shopping or no-shopping in the next days, why not say a prayer dedicating the buying and giving and receiving and yes – our stuff - to God.
May the food we eat, feed those who farmed it. May the things we buy, support those who fashioned and shipped and sold them. For everything we enjoy from your good earth, God, thank you.
And if the purchase doesn’t sit right with the prayer – well, maybe that’s a sign to put it back on the shelf.
Bill Moyers’ Commencement Speech at SMU
June 07th, 2007 | Category: news, Inspirations
Below is the last portion of Moyers’ poignant speech at Southern Methodist University in Dallas on May 19. It speaks to the overall mission and need for the Boston Faith & Justice Network.
My young friends, you are not leaving here in ordinary times. The ancient Greeks had a word for a moment like this. They called it “kairos.” Euripedes describes kairos as the moment when “the one who seizes the helm of fate, forces fortune.” As I was coming here to Dallas today to ask what you are going to do to make the most of your life, I thought: Please God, let me be looking in the face of some young man or woman who is going to transcend the normal arc of life, who is going one day to break through, inspire us, challenge us, and call forth from us the greatness of spirit that in our best moments have fired the world’s imagination. You know the spirit of which I speak. Memorable ideas sprang from it: “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”…“created equal”… “Government of, by, and for the people”…“the only thing we have to fear is fear itself”…“I have a dream.” Those were transformational epochs in American politics, brought forth by the founding patriots who won our independence, by Lincoln and his Lieutenants who saved the Union, by Franklin Roosevelt who saved capitalism and democracy, and by Martin Luther King, martyred in the struggle for equal rights. These moments would have been lost if left to transactional politics – the traditional politics of “You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.” But moral leadership transcended the realities at hand and changed the course of our history.
Never have we been more in need of transformational leadership.
America’s a great promise but it’s a broken promise.
It’s not right that we are entering the fifth year of a war started on a suspicion. Whatever your party or politics, my young friends, America can’t sustain a war begun under false pretenses because it is simply immoral to ask people to go on dying for the wrong reasons. We cannot win a war when our leaders don’t have the will or courage to ask everyone to sacrifice, and place the burden on a few hundred thousand Americans from the working class led by a relative handful of professional officers. As is often said – America’s not fighting the war; the American military is fighting the war, everyone else is at the mall. Our leaders are not even asking us to pay for it. They’re borrowing the money and passing the IOU’s to you and your kids.
America needs fixing. Our system of government is badly broken.
You are leaving here as our basic constitutional principles are under assault – the rule of law, an independent press, independent courts, the separation of church and state, and the social contract itself. I am sure you learned about the social contract here at SMU. It’s right there in the Constitution – in the Preamble: “We, the People” – that radical, magnificent, democratic, inspired and exhilarating idea that we are in this together, one for all and all for one.
I believe this to be the heart of democracy. I know it to be a profoundly religious truth. Over in East Texas where I grew up, my father’s greatest honor, as he saw it, was to serve as a deacon in the Central Baptist Church. In those days we Baptists were, in matters of faith, sovereign individualists: the priesthood of the believer, soul freedom, “Just you and me, Lord.” But time and again, as my dad prayed the Lord’s Prayer, I realized that it was never in the first person singular. It was always: “Give us this day our daily bread.” We’re all in this together; one person’s hunger is another’s duty.
Let me see if I can say it a different way. A moment ago, when the reunion class of l957 stood up to be recognized, I was taken back half a century to my first year at the University of Texas. In my mind’s eye I saw Gilbert McAlister – “Dr. Mac” – pacing back and forth in his introductory class to anthropology. He had spent his years as a graduate student among the Apache Indians on the plains of Texas. He said he learned from them the meaning of reciprocity. In the Apache tongue, he told us, the word for grandfather was the same as the word for grandson. Generations were linked together by mutual obligation. Through the years, he went on; we human beings have advanced more from collaboration than competition. For all the chest-thumping about rugged individuals and self-made men, it was the imperative and ethic of cooperation that forged America. Laissez faire – “Leave me alone” – didn’t work. We had to move from the philosophy of “Live and let live” to “Live and help live.” You see, civilization is not a natural act. Civilization is a veneer of civility stretched across primal human appetites. Like democracy, civilization has to be willed, practiced, and constantly repaired, or society becomes a war of all against all.
Think it over: On one side of this city of Dallas people pay $69 for a margarita and on the other side of town the homeless scrounge for scraps in garbage cans. What would be the civilized response to such a disparity?
Think it over: In l960 the gap in wealth between the top 20% of our country and the bottom 20% was thirty fold. Now it is 75 fold. Stock prices and productivity are up, and CEO salaries are soaring, but ordinary workers aren’t sharing in the profits they helped generate. Their incomes aren’t keeping up with costs. More Americans live in poverty – 37 million, including l2 million children. Twelve million children! Despite extraordinary wealth at the top, America’s last among the highly developed countries in each of seven measures of inequality. Our GDP outperforms every country in the world except Luxembourg. But among industrialized nations we are at the bottom in functional literacy and dead last in combating poverty. Meanwhile, regular Americans are working longer and harder than workers in any other industrial nation, but it’s harder and harder for them to figure out how to make ends meet…how to send the kids to college…and how to hold on securely in their old age. If we’re all in this together, what’s a civilized response to these disparities?
America’s a broken promise. America needs fixing.
So I look out on your graduating class and pray some one or more of you will take it on. I know something about the DNA in this institution – the history that created this unique university. Although most of you are not Methodists, you can be proud of the Methodist in SMU. At the time of the American Revolution only a few hundred people identified with Methodism. By the Civil War it was the largest church in the country with one in three church members calling Methodism their faith community. No institution has done more to shape America’s moral imagination. If America is going to be fixed, I believe someone with this DNA will be needed to do it. It’s possible. So as you leave today, take with you Rilke’s counsel “to assume our existence as broadly as we can, in any way we can. Everything, even the unheard of, must be possible in this life. The only courage demanded of us is courage for the most singular and the most inexplicable that we may encounter.”
Some of the elders among you will remember that Martin Luther King made a powerful speech here at SMU in l966. It’s been said – this part of the story may be apocryphal – that when he was asked why he chose SMU instead of one of the all-black colleges, Dr. King replied: “Because if John Wesley were around he’d be standing right here with me.” Martin Luther King said at SMU: “…The challenge in the days ahead is to work passionately and unrelentingly…to make justice a reality for all people.” One of your own graduates – the Reverend Michael Waters – got it right a few years ago when he was a student here: “Martin Luther King became the symbol not only of the civil rights movement but of America itself: A symbol of a land of freedom where people of all races, creeds, and nationalities could live together as a Beloved Community.”
Not as an empire. Or a superpower. Not a place where the strong take what they can and the weak what they must. But a Beloved Community. It’s the core of civilization, the crux of democracy, and a profound religious truth.
But don’t go searching for the Beloved Community on a map. It’s not a place. It exists in the hearts and minds – our hearts and minds – or not at all.
I pray I am looking into the face of someone who will lead us toward it.
Good luck to each and every one of you.
Gratitude & Creation with Shane Claiborne - Saturday, Feb 21
Category: news, Events, Fair Trade, Creation
Climate change. Toxic trash. The earth’s budget overstretched. What would our relationship to the environment look like if rooted in gratitude to God?
On the eve of Lent, learn about and undertake a creation commitment together with Christians from all traditions at Gratitude & Creation on Saturday, February 21, 4:30-9:00pm at Park Street Church, Boston.
4:30-6:00
Prayer with Shane Claiborne, Jubilee Sessions sharing practical ways to respect God’s creation.
* Feast without Injustice: fill a Fair Trade cupboard
* Water without Waste: resisting commercialization of water resources
* Beauty without Contamination: clearing out toxics from your household
* Energy without excess: reducing your carbon footprint beyond the light bulb
6:00-7:00
Community Dinner
7:00-9:00
Worship and Message with Shane Claiborne. Music led by bluegrass band featuring local musicians.
Shane Claiborne is the author of the Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical and founding partner in the neo-monastic community, the Simple Way.
A $10 donation to defray costs is suggested but not required. All are welcome to attend.
Sponsors include the Massachusetts Council of Churches, the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, Massachusetts Interfaith Power & Light.
This event was pretty intriguing and inspiring. I missed the seminars due to arriving late with friends, but still enjoyed the night immensely.The author & speaker Shane Claiborne was down to earth, real, pssionate, and captivatingly humorous as he delivered his message to us. I love and live to be inspired to live for Christ and that is exaclty what Shane's message did for all that attended.
They asked us to commit to giving something up for lent in a way that would help our environment such as stop using a clothes dryer, or stop purchasing bottled water, and or remove toxic household cleaning and beauty products from your home.
It made us think of making wise decisions on what we buy and to the extent of the purpose behind our purchase. Do we need it, is it good for our envirnment, ect..
This was an event that was quite different from the normal church event I am used to but was refreshing that now is the time for the church to make a stand on our social resposibility to care for God's creation.
We are the generation that must be the change!
Excerpts from The www.bosonfaithjustice.org website for more check out their website!
A Pre-Consumption Prayer
November 29th, 2008 | Category: Fair Trade, Consumption
Posted on God’s Politics
“Consumption” isn’t a bad word. Even as we watch the excesses of the consumer economy crumble and collapse around us, we should remember that the word “consume” also means “to eat.”
This season, many of us consume to excess as eaters; on “Black Friday,” many also consume to excess as shoppers. But as pastor Eugene Cho has pointed out, buying stuff at low prices isn’t by itself a mark of shame or weakness. It is, in our post-agrarian, post-industrial society, a necessity. The issue isn’t whether we buy or not buy things. It is whether we do so with appreciation for all of God’s creation.
Before we eat, we say a prayer to acknowledge our gratitude for God’s bounty. Through prayer, we express both humility and appreciation. If we pray mindfully (rather than out of rote habit), we simultaneously acknowledge our joy at what we have while also feeling compassion for those who have not.
What if we said a prayer each time we bought something – each time we “consumed”?
For most of our history, getting enough to eat has been our primary preoccupation. Praying before we ate ensured a direct connection between our livelihoods and God. But for those of us lucky enough to live in a modern, developed nation, the idea of “putting food on the table” has become more figurative than literal. Praying before a meal no longer carries the weight it once did.
A gratitude economy involves, I think, a more spiritually conscious consumerism. It is no better to wallow in guilt about our need to buy things than to flaunt our ability to buy while considering ourselves specially blessed. It will not advance global justice to focus simply on what not to buy; rather we also have the responsibility to buy the right things – for ourselves and for our brothers and sisters worldwide.
As we go about our shopping or no-shopping in the next days, why not say a prayer dedicating the buying and giving and receiving and yes – our stuff - to God.
May the food we eat, feed those who farmed it. May the things we buy, support those who fashioned and shipped and sold them. For everything we enjoy from your good earth, God, thank you.
And if the purchase doesn’t sit right with the prayer – well, maybe that’s a sign to put it back on the shelf.
Bill Moyers’ Commencement Speech at SMU
June 07th, 2007 | Category: news, Inspirations
Below is the last portion of Moyers’ poignant speech at Southern Methodist University in Dallas on May 19. It speaks to the overall mission and need for the Boston Faith & Justice Network.
My young friends, you are not leaving here in ordinary times. The ancient Greeks had a word for a moment like this. They called it “kairos.” Euripedes describes kairos as the moment when “the one who seizes the helm of fate, forces fortune.” As I was coming here to Dallas today to ask what you are going to do to make the most of your life, I thought: Please God, let me be looking in the face of some young man or woman who is going to transcend the normal arc of life, who is going one day to break through, inspire us, challenge us, and call forth from us the greatness of spirit that in our best moments have fired the world’s imagination. You know the spirit of which I speak. Memorable ideas sprang from it: “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”…“created equal”… “Government of, by, and for the people”…“the only thing we have to fear is fear itself”…“I have a dream.” Those were transformational epochs in American politics, brought forth by the founding patriots who won our independence, by Lincoln and his Lieutenants who saved the Union, by Franklin Roosevelt who saved capitalism and democracy, and by Martin Luther King, martyred in the struggle for equal rights. These moments would have been lost if left to transactional politics – the traditional politics of “You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.” But moral leadership transcended the realities at hand and changed the course of our history.
Never have we been more in need of transformational leadership.
America’s a great promise but it’s a broken promise.
It’s not right that we are entering the fifth year of a war started on a suspicion. Whatever your party or politics, my young friends, America can’t sustain a war begun under false pretenses because it is simply immoral to ask people to go on dying for the wrong reasons. We cannot win a war when our leaders don’t have the will or courage to ask everyone to sacrifice, and place the burden on a few hundred thousand Americans from the working class led by a relative handful of professional officers. As is often said – America’s not fighting the war; the American military is fighting the war, everyone else is at the mall. Our leaders are not even asking us to pay for it. They’re borrowing the money and passing the IOU’s to you and your kids.
America needs fixing. Our system of government is badly broken.
You are leaving here as our basic constitutional principles are under assault – the rule of law, an independent press, independent courts, the separation of church and state, and the social contract itself. I am sure you learned about the social contract here at SMU. It’s right there in the Constitution – in the Preamble: “We, the People” – that radical, magnificent, democratic, inspired and exhilarating idea that we are in this together, one for all and all for one.
I believe this to be the heart of democracy. I know it to be a profoundly religious truth. Over in East Texas where I grew up, my father’s greatest honor, as he saw it, was to serve as a deacon in the Central Baptist Church. In those days we Baptists were, in matters of faith, sovereign individualists: the priesthood of the believer, soul freedom, “Just you and me, Lord.” But time and again, as my dad prayed the Lord’s Prayer, I realized that it was never in the first person singular. It was always: “Give us this day our daily bread.” We’re all in this together; one person’s hunger is another’s duty.
Let me see if I can say it a different way. A moment ago, when the reunion class of l957 stood up to be recognized, I was taken back half a century to my first year at the University of Texas. In my mind’s eye I saw Gilbert McAlister – “Dr. Mac” – pacing back and forth in his introductory class to anthropology. He had spent his years as a graduate student among the Apache Indians on the plains of Texas. He said he learned from them the meaning of reciprocity. In the Apache tongue, he told us, the word for grandfather was the same as the word for grandson. Generations were linked together by mutual obligation. Through the years, he went on; we human beings have advanced more from collaboration than competition. For all the chest-thumping about rugged individuals and self-made men, it was the imperative and ethic of cooperation that forged America. Laissez faire – “Leave me alone” – didn’t work. We had to move from the philosophy of “Live and let live” to “Live and help live.” You see, civilization is not a natural act. Civilization is a veneer of civility stretched across primal human appetites. Like democracy, civilization has to be willed, practiced, and constantly repaired, or society becomes a war of all against all.
Think it over: On one side of this city of Dallas people pay $69 for a margarita and on the other side of town the homeless scrounge for scraps in garbage cans. What would be the civilized response to such a disparity?
Think it over: In l960 the gap in wealth between the top 20% of our country and the bottom 20% was thirty fold. Now it is 75 fold. Stock prices and productivity are up, and CEO salaries are soaring, but ordinary workers aren’t sharing in the profits they helped generate. Their incomes aren’t keeping up with costs. More Americans live in poverty – 37 million, including l2 million children. Twelve million children! Despite extraordinary wealth at the top, America’s last among the highly developed countries in each of seven measures of inequality. Our GDP outperforms every country in the world except Luxembourg. But among industrialized nations we are at the bottom in functional literacy and dead last in combating poverty. Meanwhile, regular Americans are working longer and harder than workers in any other industrial nation, but it’s harder and harder for them to figure out how to make ends meet…how to send the kids to college…and how to hold on securely in their old age. If we’re all in this together, what’s a civilized response to these disparities?
America’s a broken promise. America needs fixing.
So I look out on your graduating class and pray some one or more of you will take it on. I know something about the DNA in this institution – the history that created this unique university. Although most of you are not Methodists, you can be proud of the Methodist in SMU. At the time of the American Revolution only a few hundred people identified with Methodism. By the Civil War it was the largest church in the country with one in three church members calling Methodism their faith community. No institution has done more to shape America’s moral imagination. If America is going to be fixed, I believe someone with this DNA will be needed to do it. It’s possible. So as you leave today, take with you Rilke’s counsel “to assume our existence as broadly as we can, in any way we can. Everything, even the unheard of, must be possible in this life. The only courage demanded of us is courage for the most singular and the most inexplicable that we may encounter.”
Some of the elders among you will remember that Martin Luther King made a powerful speech here at SMU in l966. It’s been said – this part of the story may be apocryphal – that when he was asked why he chose SMU instead of one of the all-black colleges, Dr. King replied: “Because if John Wesley were around he’d be standing right here with me.” Martin Luther King said at SMU: “…The challenge in the days ahead is to work passionately and unrelentingly…to make justice a reality for all people.” One of your own graduates – the Reverend Michael Waters – got it right a few years ago when he was a student here: “Martin Luther King became the symbol not only of the civil rights movement but of America itself: A symbol of a land of freedom where people of all races, creeds, and nationalities could live together as a Beloved Community.”
Not as an empire. Or a superpower. Not a place where the strong take what they can and the weak what they must. But a Beloved Community. It’s the core of civilization, the crux of democracy, and a profound religious truth.
But don’t go searching for the Beloved Community on a map. It’s not a place. It exists in the hearts and minds – our hearts and minds – or not at all.
I pray I am looking into the face of someone who will lead us toward it.
Good luck to each and every one of you.
Monday, February 23, 2009
The Boston Faith & Justice Network...www.bostonfaithjustice.org
Christians seeking social justice as an expression of our faith...
Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow.-Isaiah 1:17
www.bostonfaithjustice.org
Our Story: In the winter of 2005,a small group of Christians in Greater Boston began to meet to share the connection of faith and justice in our lives.
Looking at the Boston community, we saw churches with rich and varied gifts-some with a strong emphasis on social engagement on behalf of the poor and others with a focus on individual disciplship. We felt that the power to live out God's mission in the world must come from bringing these gifts together: Christians embraceing social engagment and personal discipleship as part of the same calling.
About Us:
The Boston Faith & Justice Network is a community of Christians committed to alleviating poverty and promoting just stewardship.
We believe that over-consumption and unjust consumption may just be emptying our bank accounts, exhausting the world’s dearest resources, and fueling the exploitation of the most vulnerable. Something must change inside our souls and in our communities to set things right. So, together,we are taking these steps.
1. Live Gratefully. Many of us have lost track of how much is actually enough. We make promises to buy less, but these promises are hard to keep. The BFJN organizes small groups that support each other in spending less, buying justly, and giving collectively. It all begins with giving thanks.
2. Change our Community. All around us, advertising urges “buy more!” What if our community reflected a different set of values: respect and dignity for people and creation. The BFJN is seeking to make ours a more just community, starting by increasing Fair Trade in neighborhoods throughout Boston and beyond.
3. Advocate. Good policies enable people to steward and enjoy God’s blessings together. Good policies include the interests of those who are the poor at the highest levels of decision-making - not just those who are rich and powerful. The BFJN partners with organizations like the Micah Challenge to advocate for policies we believe will make a difference in the lives of those who are poor.
In the summer of 2006, we launched the Boston Faith & Justice Network with a worship event at Tremont Temple. We are now a community of evangelical, mainline and Penecostal Chrisitans with the goal of inspiring, uniting, and mobilizing Christians to alleviate poverty and promote social justice.
What We Do:
We work to see Boston embody God's Shalom-the peace that comes from right relationships between one another an between us and God.
Our programs change,community change and advocacy for social change.
Personal Change-Community Change-Advocacy
Iniatives:
Lifestlye Discipleship
When half of the world's people live on less than $2 a day, what is a just Christian lifestlye? Lazarus at the Gate, is a Scripture based discipleship group fostering simple living, just consumerism, and collecting giving in response to global poverty.
Fair Trade
The Fair Trade Iniative connects global responsibility with local action. We seek to transform Greater Boston into a fair trade community- a place where more of what we buy supports poor producers and growers.
Advocay
The Boston Faith & Justice Network advocates on policies related to global poverty including HIV/AIDS prevention and care, hunger, an enironmental sustainability. By partnering with the Micah Challenge, we join our voices with Christians around the world.
Getting Involved:
Connect-
We meet as a community every other month and quarterly for worship. Come get inspired and get involved.
Contact: rachel@bostonfaithjusice.org
Join Lazarus at the Gate-
Respond to global poverty by changing your life. Join or host a Lazarus at the Gate discipleship group.
Contact: discipleship@bostonfaithjustice.org
Become a Member-
The Boston Faith & Justice Network relies on members for financial and volunteer support. If you share our passion for living justly, community change, and advocacy, become a member!
Contact:members@bostonfaithjustice.org
Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke?
-Isaiah 58:6
Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow.-Isaiah 1:17
www.bostonfaithjustice.org
Our Story: In the winter of 2005,a small group of Christians in Greater Boston began to meet to share the connection of faith and justice in our lives.
Looking at the Boston community, we saw churches with rich and varied gifts-some with a strong emphasis on social engagement on behalf of the poor and others with a focus on individual disciplship. We felt that the power to live out God's mission in the world must come from bringing these gifts together: Christians embraceing social engagment and personal discipleship as part of the same calling.
About Us:
The Boston Faith & Justice Network is a community of Christians committed to alleviating poverty and promoting just stewardship.
We believe that over-consumption and unjust consumption may just be emptying our bank accounts, exhausting the world’s dearest resources, and fueling the exploitation of the most vulnerable. Something must change inside our souls and in our communities to set things right. So, together,we are taking these steps.
1. Live Gratefully. Many of us have lost track of how much is actually enough. We make promises to buy less, but these promises are hard to keep. The BFJN organizes small groups that support each other in spending less, buying justly, and giving collectively. It all begins with giving thanks.
2. Change our Community. All around us, advertising urges “buy more!” What if our community reflected a different set of values: respect and dignity for people and creation. The BFJN is seeking to make ours a more just community, starting by increasing Fair Trade in neighborhoods throughout Boston and beyond.
3. Advocate. Good policies enable people to steward and enjoy God’s blessings together. Good policies include the interests of those who are the poor at the highest levels of decision-making - not just those who are rich and powerful. The BFJN partners with organizations like the Micah Challenge to advocate for policies we believe will make a difference in the lives of those who are poor.
In the summer of 2006, we launched the Boston Faith & Justice Network with a worship event at Tremont Temple. We are now a community of evangelical, mainline and Penecostal Chrisitans with the goal of inspiring, uniting, and mobilizing Christians to alleviate poverty and promote social justice.
What We Do:
We work to see Boston embody God's Shalom-the peace that comes from right relationships between one another an between us and God.
Our programs change,community change and advocacy for social change.
Personal Change-Community Change-Advocacy
Iniatives:
Lifestlye Discipleship
When half of the world's people live on less than $2 a day, what is a just Christian lifestlye? Lazarus at the Gate, is a Scripture based discipleship group fostering simple living, just consumerism, and collecting giving in response to global poverty.
Fair Trade
The Fair Trade Iniative connects global responsibility with local action. We seek to transform Greater Boston into a fair trade community- a place where more of what we buy supports poor producers and growers.
Advocay
The Boston Faith & Justice Network advocates on policies related to global poverty including HIV/AIDS prevention and care, hunger, an enironmental sustainability. By partnering with the Micah Challenge, we join our voices with Christians around the world.
Getting Involved:
Connect-
We meet as a community every other month and quarterly for worship. Come get inspired and get involved.
Contact: rachel@bostonfaithjusice.org
Join Lazarus at the Gate-
Respond to global poverty by changing your life. Join or host a Lazarus at the Gate discipleship group.
Contact: discipleship@bostonfaithjustice.org
Become a Member-
The Boston Faith & Justice Network relies on members for financial and volunteer support. If you share our passion for living justly, community change, and advocacy, become a member!
Contact:members@bostonfaithjustice.org
Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke?
-Isaiah 58:6
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