on the Pilgrimage

  The Message of the Flame   … by the alter, in the darkness stands the tree                    sparkling with silver                    glistening, glittering                    twinkling like a star, pointing skyward                    without a word, whispering a message                    of peace and hope and love Silent Night, Holy Night a hush blankets the room –           a single candle stands alone           a sin...

Fourth Sunday in Advent - Love. I think after this last week, the most I can actually say is that there are four Sundays in Advent, and it seems that there are so many versions of what each candle means that who knows what the actual particular is!  This has been a crazy week for me ... and one in that I feel like I have actually accomplished nothing. So, here I sit, Sunday afternoon, realizing that IF I accept the challenge, I have more things to accomplish than I probably have time for. Maybe these few minutes will be good for me? I can relax, re-focus and decide what to do and what to let go.  Advent is supposed to be about preparation, but I don't think that frenzied preparation is what is meant. We have turned this time of year into a cash grab, an insane dash to the finish line. And what are the results?  This past week I saw a meme in some Facebook group. It was definitely interesting - a shopfront window, somewhere in an Asian country (Japan?). And, the disp...

Rejoice! Again, I say rejoice!  Ha! how difficult that is in our world today! What do we rejoice over? in what do we find joy? I think that there are very few people I know that actually know what that feels like ...  feels  like in their soul. And yet, that is what this day is about.  What was it like in that time? I don't think things were much better than they are now. In fact, have they ever been 'good'? The truth? I think it is what we make of it. And, I think that the world will always be in a state of chaos. The earth will always be in flux, there will always be earthquakes and tornados and floods. (To note - at this time, there is massive flooding in western and eastern Canada, and in Spain; this last weekend saw a horrifically destructive tornado slice through five states, with at least 80 people dead.) But, at the time of Christ's birth, the world was in the middle of Roman occupation throughout the 'known' world, and those weren't fun times, e...

It's that time of the year again - the last brilliant rays to the sunset of another year. And with that comes this last beautiful celebration. Possibly my favourite of them all. And I'm not sure why. I certainly don't have a plethora of fantastic family memories from this time; I have often spent this time alone. But still, there is a quiet beauty and reverence ... and, dare I say it? a kind of holiness captured in the season.  I want to write for each Sunday and on each special day for the last month of 2021. I want to mark my thoughts and observations and feelings this year. It has been a year full of struggle and frustration and learning. I am grateful to end the year employed, which is not how I started it. I set my Word for the Year as "Threshold" which became most appropriate. This was a year of great change for me. So, there is something wonderful to be reminded of Hope today - that there are still wonderful things to come, even in the midst of our burden...