I have been a baaaad, blogger. I’m sorry. There’s just been so much going on, I haven’t had much time to write. We had our “Rite of Acceptance” at the Church on the 14th, which went great! And I’ve been hosting Advent Dinners for family and friends on Sunday evenings. It’s been great fun doing the Advent Wreath again, and very rewarding preparing for Christmas in a sacred way.

One thing I have been trying to do is keep up with the daily readings of the Church. Today’s struck me particularly to my heart.

First Reading: Isaiah 7:10-14

Again the LORD spoke to Ahaz, “Ask a sign of the LORD your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.” But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, and I will not put the LORD to the test.” And he said, “Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel. With bow and arrows men will come there, for all the land will be briers and thorns; and as for all the hills which used to be hoed with a hoe, you will not come there for fear of briers and thorns; but they will become a place where cattle are let loose and where sheep tread.

Gospel Reading, Luke 1:26-38:

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary.

And he came to her and said, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be.

And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there will be no end.”

And Mary said to the angel, “How shall this be, since I have no husband?”

And the angel said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God. And behold, your kinswoman Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. For with God nothing will be impossible.”

And Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.

….and with that, dear brothers and sisters, with Mary’s magnificat, her YES! - is the very beginning of Christianity.
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I can’t believe it’s been over a month since I updated this thing. I suppose it’s a good thing - I’ve been busy enough and happy enough not to have the time.

EWTN was really getting on my nerves before the election; to the point where I was about ready to stop watching it. I heard things like “You can’t be Catholic and vote for a pro-abortion candidate” - which irritated me to no end. That, and the non-ending rantings of some Bishops on the topic of witholding the Eucharist for pro-choice Catholic politicians, was enough to give one a headache.

Fortunately, the teachings I was receiving from the good people at the Church I attend, was far more logical, reasonable, and less fanatical. “There are LOTS of right-to-life issues, there are LOTS of reasons to vote for a candidate, as long as you’re not voting for a candidate SOLELY because he is pro-choice, you’re fine.” Please note the difference in terminology: “pro-abortion” vs. “pro-choice.”

Now I *get* the Church’s stance against abortion, and for the most part I agree with it. But I’m also a very practical person, and I have extensive experience working with women who are pregnant and in crisis; I worked as a social worker for three years with women who were at risk for delivering premature babies. And if there’s one thing I know, it’s that NO one is “Pro-abortion.” Women have abortions when they feel they have no other choice, when they feel the situation is hopeless, when they feel they won’t be able to support a child they bear.
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It’s not Lust, it’s…… sacred sexuality using tantra.

It’s not Gluttony, it’s….just my natural Earth Mother Goddess body.

It’s not Greed, it’s… my Goddess given right to do money spells.

It’s not Sloth, it’s….being too busy finding enlightenment online, to do the dishes and feed the kids.

It’s not Wrath, it’s…just Dark God/dess energy.

It’s not Envy, it’s…”The Secret” to Success.

It’s not Pride, it’s… “Being a Celt” (or Norse, or High Priestess, or…)

Yup; Seven Deadly Sins. And in case you might think I’m only picking on pagans here, I’m not. It was, after all, Christians who defined them. Actually, we’ve gotten really good at sinning; we just don’t use our religion as an excuse for sinning. All too often it seems pagans, do.

But ya know, when you’re surrounded by people all doing the same thing, you don’t really see it. After awhile it becomes the norm. When everyone around you eats too much, it’s easy for you to eat too much. When everyone you know is sleeping with everyone else, it’s easy to believe that’s a good and normal thing to do.

The problem arises when you start having to pay the price.

Forget the word “Sin” for a minute. Think about what is HEALTHY. What you KNOW is good and healthy for your body, for your mind, for your soul. Takes you right back to those ol’ Puritanical values, doesn’t it?

Let’s take lust for example.
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Pagans like to keep watch on the planet Mercury.

Every time that wee little planet appears to be moving away from us, it’s called a “retrograde,” and all sorts of things seem to happen. Since it’s the planet of “Communication” (think of Mercury, the messenger god)  - communications seem to go haywire. People misunderstand each other. Computers fry. You hit “reply to ALL” instead of “reply TO” and just basically, the cosmic doo-doo hits the fan.

When one turns away from the pagan path, and turns back home towards Christianity, one would kinda expect that the affects of Mercury would no longer apply.

But ya know what? It kinda sorta DOES. Or at least it seems that way.
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Well, not really. Been doing pretty good, actually.

Whilst others are beating their chests, wailing on CNN, or blogging about the collapse of our economy/society/political system, I’ve just been bee-bopping along here. No worries.

It’s not that I’m not aware of what’s going on, or that I’m not concerned. I am; I just know that whatever happens, I’ll be ok. Chaos whirls around me, but my center is stable and I am at peace.

There’s a phrase our deacon has said a couple of times in RCIA class that I’ve found extremely reasurring. He’s said “Catholics are FOR this world, we aren’t OF this world.” It all seems to tie into the view of personhood; yes, our personhood does include our bodies, but it also includes our spiritual selves. They’re united. Since we aren’t OF this world, we’re pretty much immune from what goes on within it.

I really wasn’t that way when I was pagan. Read more…

Current Mood: Sad

well the crying’s over, and I’ve been spending a lot of time hugging on Rufus. He doesn’t mind, he’s an affection whore anyway. I swear I’ve never had a dog who was ALWAYS in such a good mood.

I loved Jenz, everyone who met Jenz loved Jenz. She had such a goofy sense of humor it was hard not to. We met many years ago in the “Ask a Witch” room on AOL and fell into friendship. Of course she did with most she met!

I knew her for probably 10 years online before I even met her. But you know, it didn’t really matter; a friend is a friend, online or in real life. I remember after my divorce, when things got really dark for me, Jenzi sensed that things were really really wrong and set up a three way call with me and another friend, and really just cheered me up. Took about an hour and a half, but it did.

The only time our friendship was ever really threatened was over stupid forum crap, when she was letting herself get swayed by some negative people, well, one in particular. I had made a comment that sometimes the greatest life lessons, come from being ill. She thought that was the most stupidest thing she’d ever heard, and really attacked me for it. You know while we were going through that, I kept thinking to myself - God, I hope she never has to find this lesson out, personally. Cuz you know the Universe works that way sometimes.

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Current Mood: Playful

Story in USA today:

Touched by an angel? Most say they’ve been protected

“A new survey of the USA’s religious beliefs and practices finds 55% of all adults — including one in five of those who say they have no religion — believe they have been protected from harm by a guardian angel.”

What I found particularly interesting was this little tidbit right here:
“Members of almost every major religious group sensed angels running heavenly interference: evangelical Protestant, 66%; black Protestant, 81%; mainline Protestant, 55%; Catholic, 57%; Jewish, 10%; other religions, 49%; no religion, 20%.”

I think we must be running our Guardian Angels ragged these days

RCIA class went great tonight! It was on creation and original sin. Learned two important lessons: 1)It wasn’t Eve’s fault it was ALL ADAM’S FAULT for letting the serpent in to begin with and 2)Eve was intimidated into eating the fruit by a great big ol mean 7 headed dragon type critter, not some talking serpent from Dr. Doolittle. That always bugged me.

Current Mood: Sickly

You know, women who get all into this “menstration as female empowerment” crap, scare me.

I can’t say that I’ve ever felt “more mystical” “more powerful” more “anything” other than “more cranky,” in the 35 years that I’ve had a period, period. It’s a period dammit, a sign that most of the time means you’re not pregnant, and no longer need all this fertile bedding stuff anymore. It’s not empowerment, it’s em-bed-iment, a perfect time to sit in bed and do nothing other than eat chocolate, watch George Clooney movies and give yourself pedicures.

It’s my down time, dagnabit, I get precious little of that as it is, why any woman would want to do anything else besides collapse and assume a fetal position, is beyond me.

My anamcara, who is blood-brother Lakota, told me once that in the Lakota tradition, the women have their own special “Moon Lodge” where the women who are on the rag go and do nothing. It’s a very special place of ritual, where they bleed in reparations for the sins of their husbands and brothers and warrior men from the previous month. Apparently, there’s lots of sinning to be had in warrior Lakota men.

And here’s what I have to say about that:
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So the class tonight was on the holy trinity. The buzzwords for the day were “It’s a mystery” which kept reminding me of the movie “Shakespear in Love.”

“It’ll all work out.”

“How do you KNOW??”

“I DON’T know. It’s a mystery!”

…but, I figured it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to bring up a movie about a Catholic man having an adulterous affair, in my RCIA class, so I shut mah mouth.

I kept my mouth shut about a lot of things, actually. Like how some theologians (including Pope John Paul I) envision the third person of the trinity as feminine, but fortunately I didn’t have to say anything - he brought it up. He also admitted to having issues with that theory, which it is helpfull to know what one’s teacher’s issues, are. I suspect discussion of the Divine Feminine will be kept to a minimum in this class.

I really don’t have much difficulty with the concept of the trinity; I never did stop dealing with a triune god figure, even in paganism - after all. And even though it’s been proven that the whole shamrock-as-a-symbol-of-the-trinity thing can NOT be attributed to St. Patrick (the story is only traceable back 100 years or so; St. Patrick lived around 500 A.D.) - it’s still a good representation, I think.

A few more people showed up tonight, all with that wild-eyed deer-caught-in-the-car-headlights look. Catholics should take a cue from the Methodists and FEED new people.

It’s harder to bolt out the door when you’re busy digesting.

Yesterday, as I was getting ready to go to my very first RCIA class, I was nervous as all get-out. Not so much in what I was doing, but in the fact that it’s a new place, with people I’ve never met before, etc etc. The fact that I couldn’t get the church’s webpage to load filled me with a kind of superstitious dread - “maybe it’s a BAD OMEN that I’m not supposed to go.”

So I said a quick prayer. Not so much demanding that I BE GIVEN A SIGN, as much as a “Hey God, can you kinda let me know that I’m doing the right thing??” - kinda thing.

None was forthcoming. But I got in the car to go, anyway.

Guess what was on the car radio. Go on, guess!
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