Redemption
Dec 27th, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

Boxing Day, that’s the day after Christmas, was very quiet for us. We sat around. I emptied out my sewing area and set up my new sewing table. Whoo hoo. I’ve never had a “for real” sewing table. You know, the kind that’s made to fit an actual sewing machine. I’ve been sewing since I was 8 years old and I’ve always had a sewing machine on a regular table. So now I feel as if I’ve “arrived.” Now I’m for real myself. I’ve been sewing for 33 years and quilting for 9 and now I’m real. Hmmm …

In the evening we discovered that Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was on Pay Per View. Since the LightHusband had not seen it with us in the theatre, we decided to “rent” it and watch it together as a family. So we did. We ate popcorn for dinner. And juice (to make it healthy). I ate some of the chocolate that was in my stocking from Christmas morning. It’s hard to watch this movie and not lust after chocolate.

I realized some things that I hadn’t particularly noticed the first time around. First, it seems to be trendy to slap moviegoers upside the head with psychodrama these days. This was the case with Narnia, and I noticed it here too. In Narnia we were given all sorts of psychological reasons why Edmund was angry, resentful and bitter and thus betrayed his siblings. In, Charlie, we’re given all sorts of psychological reasons why Willy Wonka is a disturbed chocolatier. Roald Dahl never wrote those into the story. C.S. Lewis never wrote any reasons into his story. Both preferred to let the reader use their imaginations to come to their own conclusions. However, moviemakers do not. They obligingly fill in ALL the blanks for us. I find this trend disturbing. I do not want all the blanks filled in for me. I like to be able to think, to imagine, to be encouraged to use my brain. I recognize that this movie is primarily aimed at children, but I want my children to be encouraged to think, to imagine and to use their brains as well. I do not want all of their blanks filled in either. I want them to struggle with the story a little bit, to have some questions unanswered that they must think about and wonder about. It’s what helps them to grow.

The second thing I noticed about the movie was how redemptive the storyline is. And it started me thinking about stories in general. All of the really great stories are about redemption on some level. About taking evil and making something good out of it. Or about good defeating evil. We always want the white hats to win. So the classics, the stories that have stood the test of time, have something of redemption in them (I think). I think it has to do with that bit by Blaise Pascal about the God-shaped hole in us. Or maybe it’s just the part of us that longs for our Creator whether or not we know Him or Her. I’m not sure what exactly it is, but I think it’s that piece of the author or the artist that is calling out to the song of creation, that song we no longer hear, but can only imagine.

Dear Dad
Dec 23rd, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

Happy Birthday!

Today, 74 years ago in a house on Althea Street, West Springfield, Massachusetts, you made your entrance into the world. You were born into a family of older half-siblings, little space, big heart, courage, intelligence and grace.


When I was young, I thought for sure you should remember the Depression. Now I realize how silly that is. You probably remember WWII, but the Depression is no more real to you than the 60’s are to me.

You were about to turn 30 when I was born, about to graduate from college, about to begin your life. Except you had also already lived a good life too. Served in the USAF in Alaska, been a carpenter, gone to Community College, terrorized your mother, bedeviled your sister, read to your blind grandmother, and occasionally, begrudgingly obeyed your father.


You are neither part of the so-called Greatest Generation nor the Boomer Generation and I am glad, for you are unique. You have taught me to think for myself, stand against the tide, and speak truth into a whirlwind. As I grow older and learn to find my voice, I am discovering in it echos of yours and I am proud to claim it.


One of your grandchildren recently declared, “Grampy … he thinks, that what he does.” So, Dad, have a Happy Birthday. I hope you get to think!!


Love, your favorite daughter 😉

Poetry Thursday – Angelou
Dec 22nd, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

Amazing Peace (A Christmas Poem)
by Maya Angelou

Thunder rumbles in the mountain passes
And lightning rattles the eaves of our houses.
Floodwaters await in our avenues.

Snow falls upon snow, falls upon snow to avalanche
Over unprotected villages.
The sky slips low and gray and threatening.

We question ourselves. What have we done to
so affront nature?
We interrogate and worry God.
Are you there? Are you there, really?
Does the covenant you made with us still hold?

Into this climate of fear and apprehension,
Christmas enters,
Streaming lights of joy, ringing bells of hope
And singing carols of forgiveness high up in the
bright air.
The world is encouraged to come away from
rancor,
Come the way of friendship.

It is the Glad Season.
Thunder ebbs to silence and lightening sleeps
quietly in the corner.
Floodwaters recede into memory.
Snow becomes a yielding cushion to aid us
As we make our way to higher ground.

Hope is born again in the faces of children.
It rides on the shoulders of our aged as they
walk into their sunsets.
Hope spreads around the earth, brightening all things,
Even hate, which crouches breeding in
dark corridors.

In our joy, we think we hear a whisper.
At first it is too soft. Then only half heard.
We listen carefully as it gathers strength.
We hear a sweetness.
The word is Peace.
It is loud now.
Louder than the explosion of bombs.

We tremble at the sound. We are thrilled by
its presence.
It is what we have hungered for.
Not just the absence of war. But true Peace.
A harmony of spirit, a comfort of courtesies.
Security for our beloveds and their beloveds.

We clap hands and welcome the Peace of Christmas.
We beckon this good season to wait awhile with us.
We, Baptist and Buddhist, Methodist and Muslim, say come.
Peace.
Come and fill us and our world with your majesty.
We, the Jew and Jainist, the Catholic and the Confucian,
Implore you to stay awhile with us
So we may learn by your shimmering light
How to look beyond complexion and see community.

It is Christmas time, a halting of hate time.

On this platform of peace, we can create a language
To translate ourselves to ourselves and to
each other.

At this Holy Instant, we celebrate the Birth of Jesus Christ
Into the great religions of the world.
We jubilate the precious advent of trust.
We shout with glorious tongues the coming of hope.
All the earth’s tribes loosen their voices
To celebrate the promise of Peace.

We, Angels and Mortals, Believers and Nonbelievers,
Look heavenward and speak the word aloud.
Peace. We look at our world and speak word aloud.
Peace. We look at each other, then into ourselves,
And we say without shyness or apology or hesitation:

Peace, My Brother.
Peace, My Sister.
Peace, My Soul

Narnia
Dec 21st, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

Spoiler Alert – I’m going to complain!

Update – Here is a review at Amy Loves Books that says it even better!

Okay … I’m probably the only “Christian” in the land who is complaining about the latest, greatest thing since Jesus. But yes, I’m going to. This movie is a Disney travesty of the book. I say this as an aficianado of the “real” Narnia. I say this as someone who gaped with anticipation at the trailers a year ago. I say this as someone who was breathless for three years running each December when a new Lord of the Rings movie came out. But this movie was a dud.

It began in the beginning. I don’t need to be hit over the head with foreshadowing of why Edmund is angry, impulsive and “sinful.” Clive handled him more delicately and one would think that using the medium of the big screen the writers for Walt could have too.

Beware Narnia lovers everywhere, when you attend this movie the credits roll “Based upon the book by C.S. Lewis,” and should have read “Loosely based…” The screenwriters took great liberties with the book and did nothing to enhance it.

Other complaints have to do with techniques used to film Aslan’s resurrection from the dead. I’m sorry, Lewis didn’t have Thomas Kinkade in mind when he wrote that scene … mostly because Kinkade had yet to be born. In fact, there were several scenes in the movie that Kinkade seemed to have painted and that made me want to (well, I’ll stop there in the interests of decency).

The Stone Table was not based upon Stonehenge … no how … no way. That does not make any sense. UPDATE: I forgot … This was a huge oversight on the part of the screenwriters. They are not mythologists, that is clear. It bugged me to no end. You DON’T ride Unicorns!! Ever. No one ever rides unicorns. It’s … like … a rule and it cannot be broken.

And here’s my final critique. However, I must also critique the book here, because this was faithful to the book. It was the scene where Aslan presents himself to be sacrificed. In the movie and (to a lesser extent) in the book, all the forces of evil come out to celebrate and participate in the killing. But here Lewis (in the book) gets himself mixed up. Because if Aslan is the Christ-figure, Lewis knew as well as I know that evil didn’t kill Christ. What killed Christ was, as Edmund Burke said, good men doing nothing. Evil men did not come out and party at the cross. Good men and women did. Men and women like you and me. The people who cheered and jeered Jesus on the via Dela Rosa and at Calvary were not twisted evil figures, they looked just like me … and you.

A Cat Far From Home
Dec 19th, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

Yesterday we splurged, the LightFamily and I. We went to a local tree lot and found us a tree. We got a Christmas tree. Yes we did.

This morning we tidied the livingroom and cleared out a corner and put up the tree and let the branches fall out as the tree warmed up.

This evening we giggled and danced and hung the ornaments. We tripped over boxes. We drank hot chocolate and ate horrible oversweet store-bought Christmas cookies and listened to Christmas music. Then a song came on via iTunes and said I to the LightHusband, “This is really good, but I wonder if the Stray Cats ever did a Christmas song?” He said, “I don’t know.”

So I grabbed the laptop to investigate the iTunes music store and discovered that the very song that was playing was Nutcracker Suite …

… by Brian Setzer!

HAH … can I pick em? or what!!

Sharon’s Christmas Prayer
Dec 18th, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

this is an audio post - click to play

This poem came from a blog I’ve been following for a bit now.

I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For
Dec 15th, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

No, I’m not (for once) talking about U2. At least not overtly. LightHusband and I were talking again. Yep, it does happen. But we were talking about that certain something, that je ne sais pas, that sets the emerging cohort apart from the rest of the institutional church. We were trying to get our arms around it. This discussion stemmed from a number of things. Not the least of which was a discussion on an e-mail loop we belong to where there’s been an ongoing discussion of the existence of absolute truth (whether or not it exists). We’ve also been doing some reading in the blog-o-sphere and found a rather wide range of opinions out there about literally everything under the sun!! If you can think of it, someone has blogged on it. I can almost guarantee it.

In any case, one of the things we finally were able to put our fingers on was this. Well, I feel I have to back up here, and give a few definitions first. I want to define at least one term. That term has to do with generations. For the most part I’m going to speak in generalizations. I hate to do that; generalizing paints in such broad brushes that it leaves no details and wipes all the beauty and grainlines that are necessary for good dialog. It packages people into boxes and puts labels on them. I don’t like to do that, because I really believe that for the most part, most of us are a messy mix of a lot of different things and when you put a label on a person you create a wall that prevents communication. But, with all of that said, I’m still (here) going to use some labels for some people groups because it’s going to make the telling of this a whole lot easier. And when all is said and done, it’s all about me ;-), ain’t it!

So, one of the terms I want to use has to do with moderns and post-moderns. Or I might use baby-boomers and gen x. I’m not sure what to use here because sometimes I empathize with one group and sometimes with the other. Altho on the whole, I have to say I’m more often post-modern, but I really don’t know what that is. All I know is that most often it’s spoken of pejoratively. Or as if those who are post-modern might believe in the boogey man. But I’m neither of those things. So, I’m going to stumble through this as best I can with some very limited terminology. Hopefully, you’ll stumble through it with me.

I’m part of a cohort group which is finding out that for some things there are no answers yet. That science, technology and logic and reason can only take us so far. That when we get to the edge of that knowledge we come to a cliff and beyond the edge of that cliff there’s a vast realm of mystery. Do we know how vast the realm of mystery is? No. Do we care? Some do. Some are just fascinated by the mystery itself. Some are just sitting on the edge of the cliff kicking their feet on the rocks. Some are standing on the edge of the cliff, hollering into it and hearing their voice echo back. Some are watching the clouds go by. Some are casting about to find a path down into the canyon. There are many different ways of approaching this cliff at the edge of our knowledge, but we’re all embracing the mystery for what it is. This doesn’t mean we eschew the knowledge (truth?) that we already have. It does mean we’re exploring that knowledge in light of the mystery.

The cohort group (moderns, baby boomers, whatever-you-want-to-call-them) who go before mine, get to that cliff at the edge of knowledge and are convinced that the wonders of science, technology, logic and reason can build a bridge across it. Can conquer it and tame it and make it useful for humankind. No matter that the process might forever change and ruin the canyon, destroy the mystery. It must be brought under the thrall of humans for our use/abuse. They are threatened, for some reason, by those who just want to embrace the mystery. They must attempt to conquer the mystery or ignore it, but embracing it and exploring it does not seem to be an option they wish to acknowledge.

I’m not certain that either way is the “right” way. I just know which one is working for me. And I know that I’d like the chance to explore without being called names. I know that I’m an adult and I’d like to be trusted as one. Most of all, as a Christian, I extend grace and mercy to my brothers and sisters in the faith and I’d like to have a little come back this way. I think that’s an important part of being the Body to one another.

So while I still haven’t found what I’m looking for, I’m enjoying the journey. It’s all part of embracing the mystery. I’m hollering into the canyon and listening for the echo …

Quakerging
Dec 14th, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

Back when I was sick last month (as you may recall) I spent a lot of time in my chair, and on my laptop prowling the internet. I won’t tell you that it was all fun and games, but I found some new acquaintances that I’m getting to know in the blog-o-sphere. I’m really enjoying this experience. I set out to find some women who had some similar faith paths as mine. It turned out to be not so easy for a time. But then I found this young woman, who practices the Quaker faith. I have long been drawn to the Quaker expression of faith, so I really enjoy reading her blog. Her most recent post is very interesting. I think you would all enjoy it here. She is looking for people’s posts about the Emerging church/conversation and the Quaker church (but not necessarily both together, if I understand her correctly), and if/how the emerging conversation fits within other denominations. So read her yourself, she is engaging and delightful.

Yep … I’m Procrastinating
Dec 14th, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

The Cure Shares Your Taste in Music


See their whole playlist here (iTunes required)
Kids Say the Darndest Things
Dec 13th, 2005 by aBhantiarna Solas

The City Girl recounted how her daughter attempted to raise some Christmas shopping money and it had me in stitches. I remember LightGirl doing much the same thing one year. But it also made me think of this.

It’s right up there with the popcorn stand that LightBoy is going to set up on the sidewalk outside our house. He’s going to hire his friends that live down the street to work at it. He’s told me he needs me to purchase some lunch bags to sell the popcorn in. Then he also needs a barcode scanner so he can scan the prices. That’s what he told me. He’s just dying to get a barcode scanner. Today he’s decided to sell his Bionicle creations on Lego.com so he can get a bar code scanner. He got mad at me that I posted the photograph of his Bionicles on my blog. Really … he very nearly burst into tears when I showed him the post. Which surprised me. I thought he’d be happy that I was showing off his creations. Then he critiqued my blog because I didn’t tell enough about each creation.

But what he really, really wants in life right now is a barcode scanner and to develop a business plan. I’m not kidding.

Kids … oy.

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