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This thing has feathers. (pinned post)
Tags: UncategorizedYeah, yeah, I misquoted Dickinson. (She wrote, “Hope is the thing with feathers,” not “Hope’s the thing…” But this is a meme I made a while back that isn’t really a meme because it’s not meming, but it does seem, unfortunately, to be evergreen: Feel free to use it if you like, though.
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40
Welcome to the new iteration of my blog! I’ve decided the next few posts will be poems of mine that have been published in some form elsewhere (with links, where possible, to the elsewhere) along with a little discussion about the poem. Today’s poem is “40.” It’s “published” as a song, actually, by Optimist Park
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Full Circle
Today is the second and last time this century that Good Friday and the Feast of the Annunciation fall on the same day. Historically, though, they’re linked. In the earliest centuries of the Church, the death and resurrection of Christ were observed, but Christ’s birth was not. However, the symbolic value of placing Christ’s conception
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Merry Christmas! God is with us!
Gaudete! Christus natus est! Alleluia! Tonight God’s purpose in creation is fulfilled. I love this gaudily-colored painting from the reredos of one of the side-chapels in my church. Christ is born, and everybody, human and otherwise, has shown up to celebrate! I’m reminded of a phrase from the requiem Mass (quoting from the Psalms): Ad te
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Ruinenlust—Taking pleasure in ruins
Tags: UncategorizedThis post is adapted from one of my comprehensive exams in my doctoral program. What does it mean to take pleasure in ruins? There’s a German name for it: ruinenlust. It turns out this is pretty much a European (and European-American) phenomenon, born out of a Romantic sensibility—that is to say, it’s relatively recent. Taking
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Lift Every Voice for Charleston
Tags: Theological reflectionI have a friend who believes the correct response to whatever befalls a community of faith is: “What, then, shall we sing?” This morning in church, many of us throughout the United States joined in solidarity with the congregation at Mother Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, SC by singing the great hymn, “Lift
The Sound 