"That Life was the Light of Men"--John 1:4

Before anyone ever talked about Seasonal Affective Disorder, I found myself growing depressed as summer ended, the cool fall arrived, and the winter plunged us into darkness.  I hated winter.  The Winter Solstice was my hope: from the day forward, I reasoned, we would gain more light.  Through many years of personal darkness, I looked to this day for relief. 

When I lived in northern France, I remember hearing the news in December: "16 hours of daylight this month!"  "How will it be possible to live here?!" I wondered.  

But in January, the tilt of the planet meant northern France gobbled up darkness much more quickly than at Georgia's latitude.  By the end of January, we had already gained two hours, and by the Summer Solstice, I could sit outside in the light until 11.  It took me exactly one year to love that! 

 

Well, I grew up a lot in France, and have since found firmer footing, a firmer foundation, and my Hope goes a lot deeper than a calendar event! 

In a word, JESUS!!!  Whose “life was the light of men.”

Thank God not only for the light of the sun, for the Light of the World.  

 Ring the bells that still can ring.
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything.
That's how the light gets in.

Leonard Cohen

Gaudete Sunday

Gaudete--the Latin word for Rejoice!  And our theme for Week 3 is Joy. 

What is joy? 

It is a bird that we all want to catch.

It is the same bird that we all love to see flying.

—Sri Chimnoy

Where do you find joy?  What are you celebrating this Advent?

Although I am not a fan of this poet, his poem captures the lovely, elusive, wild nature of joy--hard to tame, nor do we want to.  We just want to catch it now and then, don't we?

Wild shore birds feature in my Advent book, and these words will soon find their way into the book as well.  (And some day I'll master posting photos on this blog so you can see it!)

How are you doing on your book?  What is the Lord teaching you?  I've loved seeing some of the work, and hearing some of the stories.

And we now have visitors to the blog from Russia, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, France, Ireland and Bolivia, as well as the US and UK!  Over 500 hits...Advent is a 'hit' this year!   

Week 3 Meditations, Creative Process and Materials are posted.

Have a joyful week creating! 

Hope: Living in the Now and the Not Yet

Well, we are definitely living in the "now" and the "not yet" with this blog!

For some reason, even though there are 11 of us registered as members, no members are showing on some of your screens, including mine.  Sometimes it's there, sometimes it's not.  Silvi and I are still trying to sort out the glitches, so we can streamline this, but time is elusive and jet lag abounds...but we have hope!

18 people are now involved in the Creative Advent journey, from Brazil to Bulgaria!  We'd love to hear from ALL of you, and if you send us photos of your work, we'll post in the "Gallery" (to the left).  Let's see what you're working on!   

Seven of us met last Monday in Tyrone, GA, to begin our adventure together.  It was a sweet and powerful time.  We took communion together, prayed, and then set to with a vengeance!  Images were flying in all directions, out of magazines and into piles.  The goal was to get some direction for the first theme--Preparation--make the accordion book and cover its outside with paint or image or word, and begin to assemble images for the first page layout on the inside.  We'll finalize this coming Monday, and begin on our second theme, Hope.

Week 2 Meditation, Materials & Creative Process are posted on the left sidebars.  If you have any questions, you can put them in the comments below and we'll try to help. 

Enjoy your week!

Birthing the Holy

Welcome to those of you who are joining us! We have 5 nations represented in our little group of eight—England, Scotland, Spain, the Netherlands and America!

Christine Valters Paintner (http://www.abbeyofthearts.com/) calls her online Advent retreat “Birthing the Holy”—what a great phrase. That is in fact what we hope to do, right?! And what better way than through the creative process?

Birthing is not a pretty, easy, comfortable process. Nor is the creative process, nor is the spiritual process of making room for God. But as surely as we build nurseries for the arrival of our children, we need to create room for our Lord to come to us.

Let’s examine our hearts in preparation for the coming of our Lord Jesus once again into our innermost beings.

If you look at the sidebars to the left, you will find a Meditation, a Materials List, and the Creative Process for each week. Begin by reading the meditation, gathering your materials, and then entering the Creative Process.

We’ll keep the blog going randomly with food for thought, feedback, poems, prayers, and creative ideas; please feel free to contribute!

And for starters, here is a poem that Paintner posted:

If You Want

If you want,

the Virgin will come walking down the road

pregnant with the holy,

and say…

“I need shelter for the night, please take me inside your heart,

My time is so close.”

Then, under the roof of your soul, you will witness the sublime

intimacy, the divine, the Christ

taking birth

forever,

as she grasps your hand for help, for each of us

is the midwife of God, each of us.

Yes, there, under the dome of your being does Creation

come into existence eternally, through your woman, dear pilgrim –

the sacred womb of your soul,

As God grasps our arm for help’ for each of us is

His beloved servant

never far.

If you want, the Virgin will come walking

Down the street pregnant

With light and

…sing.

-St. John of the Cross from Love Poems to God translated by Daniel Ladinsky

Advent is a journey

Advent is a journey...or used to be, right?! A time to prepare spiritually for the celebration of Christmas, traditionally with some soul-searching, repentance, and even fasting.

Nowadays we're usually journeying to keep our wits about us in the crush of commercialism and Christmas parties, and I've been thinking about how to creatively journey through the season, and spoken with some of you about this.

Would you be interested in meeting for the four weeks of Advent, and doing a creative exercise together for an hour or two? I've had this on my heart for a little while, and I think it's something I need to do in community, so checking with the sisterhood :)

I'm going to propose the following, and inviting a couple of you who I haven't spoken with yet, cuz I think you will like the idea, which is.....We meet once a week for each of the four weeks of Advent, beginning the week of Nov. 27, for only an hour or two. I would give you some kind of creative exercise to do, and some food for thought to get you launched.

I like the idea of taking the four weeks to do one thing, so it has time to develop and 'birth'-just like the season.

More to come...

Pat

By the way, welcome our English sisters that will join us on this journey. Looking forward to sharing these 4 weeks with you. How exciting!
Silvi

Stay tune! More information coming soon...