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| my first cigaretteOur hamster, Pete, passed away four days ago.
He was the first pet Ross and I bought together, the original Pete, the magical hamster with surprising stamina and unbelievable feats of climbing.
The
night before I found him dead I was lying in bed in my parents' hotel
room, drifting in that limbo between waking and dreaming life, when
thoughts of Pete swam into my mind. I whispered to the darkness "Dear
God, please let Pete be ok."
The next time I saw him, he was lying peacefully dead in his cage. I held back one little tear.
Ross,
Bethany, and Zach helped me bury him. We tried to say nice things
about him and I wanted to sing something. But all I could come up with
was the line from a John Malinen song that was stuck in my head all
day. "You're like my first cigarette, the one I'll never forget." So
that's what I hummed while Zach covered him with dirt.
It's funny, the sad little things that make up life. | | |
| The land of the freeYou should see Lady in the Water, despite what the critics are saying. It's a thoroughly enjoyable movie-going experience.
And, without spelling it out too explicitly, M. Night invites you to think about how humanity might have gotten off-course. And how we can possible get it together again. So I've been thinking about lots of things: globalization and "free" trade. war. and this quote by dwight eisenhower.
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. The world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron."
- Dwight D. Eisenhower, ina speech given on April 16, 1953
essay question: where do you think we got off-track? what do you think we can do to get on-track again?
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| "As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you" - Yahweh, Isaiah 66:13
Thanks to God, for
loving and nurturing us, for giving birth both to us and to this world;
Thanks to the Holy Spirit who continually offers us rebirth,
cleansing us, changing us, recreating the life inside of us;
Thanks to our
mothers, sisters, and friends who live out for us this incredible
metaphor that reflects the image of God. May we learn from their miraculous example.
I had the privilege of experiencing the cycle of pregnancy and birth over the past year with my best friend, Bernadette. It was a difficult process, with a complicated pregnancy and many, many worried prayers. Yet today there is a three month old baby girl nursing in the arms of her beautiful mother. What an incredible miracle that is this cycle of life...
The past two years have taught me in many nuanced, transformative, and sometimes astonishing ways how this process of pregnancy and birth shows us the face of God. I have come to discover how God, our perfect brother and sister, our perfect friend, is not only our father but also our mother.
This may sound strange, and perhaps even heretical, to your ears. I understand this, because it has become for us a foreign concept. Yet it is alive in scripture! I had an incredible experience the past week as my dad put together a sermon that would address these very issues. He and I talked about it a lot, we exchanged information and resources, and came out with an inspired, biblical, and captivating case.
My dad preached this sermon last Sunday. For three services the congregation sat in tears. My mother sat in tears. I believe that for many people, men and women, it was a life-changing spiritual experience.
On mother's day I cannot help but attempt to share this joy.
If you have a second or so, you can follow the link to my parents' church website and read the letter I sent my dad about my mom:
www.rccag.org/home/letter.htm
If you have a few minutes, you can listen to my dad's sermon (which can help to make sense of what I'm talking about in a systematic, detailed manner). I recommend listening to it, having your wives, mothers, and sisters listen to it.
www.rccag.org/media.htm Click on to sermon series "Jesus Decoded", the sermon titled "The Talk".
Please feel free to respond with anything you might think or feel. Although I think it would be better if you listened to the sermon first, because I know that I didn't explain anything directly in this entry.
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| Help Me!!!I just realized that in three weeks and a couple of days I will be graduating from college. Yes, I have known this was coming for a long time, but only now is it really sinking in. My mind is racing with so many questions. Questions about where I will live, where I will work, to get health insurance or not. But the question most pressingly on my mind right now is this: On which library book do I leave my mark?
You see, every graduating senior at Messiah College has the opportunity to have a bookof their choice dedicated to them in the library. This means that there will be a piece of paper mounted on the inside cover of a library book that says "This book is dedicated to [Angela Hennesy] in recognition of her graduation from Messiah College". It also means that this book will be displayed in the library during graduation.
What a cool idea, right? Except that this means I have to actually choose a book! Do I go for my favorite novel? Or do I go for something intellectual? Do I pick my favorite book in the library, even though I'm one of only three people to check it out in the past? Or do I pick something that gets checked out all the time so that lots and lots of people will think of me as they read/research during their own college careers, aware that others have come before them (reading, thinking, researching just as they are now)? I can think of so many books that I have poured over during college, so many books that have shaped my papers, my ideas, my faith and my personhood. But how do I pick the one that will carry my name?
Essay Question: If you could have one book dedicated to you (any book you desired), which would you choose?
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| I awoke this morning to some very wonderful news. The music on the radio was interrupted by NPR news. A man with a British accent was saying: "The other three members of the Christian Peacemaker Team who were captured in Iraq were rescued early this morning..." My heart leapt, this was very good news.
Ever since I heard about their capture, I've thought a lot about what these people chose to do. I've thought about their families and wondered how they dealt with the anger they must have felt. I have wondered whether these families shared - or even understood -the convictions that sent their sons/fathers/husbands/brothers to such a volatile place at such a dangerous time. Then Tom Fox was found dead, and I read the official response of Christian Peacemaker Teams:
"Let us all join our voices on behalf of those who continue to suffer under occupation, whose loved ones have been killed or are missing. In so doing, we may hasten the day when both those who are wrongly detained and those who bear arms will return safely to their homes. In such a peace we will find solace for our grief."
I wept, recognizing that Tom Fox was probably the only martyr whose death I lived through and will remember. Yet I struggled to fully understand why he had gone, and how his death might possibly speak to a world so caught up in violence. Couldn't he have stayed home in America where he would be safe? Did he really need to put himself in harms way? Was his death worth it? And then I found the epilogue to a book entitled "Irresistable Revolution" by a guy named Shane Claiborne who is a friend of many of my friends in Philadelphia. (I recommend it- you should be able to find it in your local Barnes&Nobles). When the war began in Iraq, Shane traveled with members of CPT to Iraq as a witness to peace. These are his words about why he chose to go:
"I am going to Iraq as a missionary. In an age of omnipresent war, it is my hope that Christian Peacemaking becomes the new face of global missions. May we stand by those who face the impending wrath of Empire and whisper: "God loves you, I love you, and if my country bombs your country, I will be right here with you." Otherwise, our gospel has little integrity. As one of the saints said, 'If they come for the innocent and do not pass over our bodies , then cursed be our religion.' May our lives interrupt terrorism and war, in small ways, in large ways, in moments of crisis and in everyday rhythms. These are extreme times. And I go to Iraq as an extremist for Love."
I wonder whether my life can contribute to such an effort. And then I realize that it can only do so if I truly believe in the transformative power of Jesus Christ and what God did for humanity on the cross. If this is my faith, if this is the moment on which I stake my beliefs and my life, then I cannot ignore the pain of a suffering world. And more than that, I cannot contribute to those systems which cause such pain. If I am truly to be a Christian, then I cannot allow myself to be tucked "safely" away in some suburb. I cannot, with my own greedy consumerism, fund dirty sweat shops in Asia or modern day slavery in Immokalee Florida, or some dirty war in Iraq that is paid for with the lives and social programs of the most disenfranchised in America. This is not an easy task, in fact I fail at it daily. Yet I cannot shake the conviction that the question for me is not simply whether or not I am willing to adjust my lifestyle, but rather, whether or not I am willing to become a Christian. I pray that I may have the strength....
Question: When is the last time that you felt inspired to do something great with your life. What inspired you? What did you long to do? | | |
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