After MP this morning one of the guys that had noisily walked in during prayer came up to me while I was changing the Psalms on the hymnboard. I was rather defensive expecting to be panhandled for something or another. After I worked my way through my unjustified judgmental-ness I was humiliated to realize that G was in fact telling me that he didn't know how to cross himself properly during the prayers and that he wanted some instruction. After a few minutes he looked alike a pro. "You'll have to give me a quiz later," he said.
Breakfast was well attended - about eight of us, Gail working on the stove. I was especially happy to see one of our regulars who had a court date yesterday. He had told me that he might be in jail today, so his presence meant that all had gone well as expected. E told stories about his time in Europe learning to "winter camp" from the snowboarding students who wandered across Switzerland, a skill he then transferred to winter survival in Boston. T, a young woman who's been with us for some time, joined the conversation and, after some twists and turns, we realized that we both grew up in Minneapolis about 20 miles apart, and that she used to go "Fergus Falls Days" in my wife's hometown. One newcomer, B, was in town to work at the State Fair before going back to Greensboro. "But I know all these guys out here for a while."
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Breakfast 10.6.10
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
"...as the incense..."
Yesterday on the Feast of St Francis of Assisi we sang a Solemn Evensong at my instigation since, other than simply being the greatest and most beloved Saint of the church after Our Lady, he also has the unenviable honor of praying for me as I contemplate entering his Third Order.
Before the service I told our old and much-written-of friend C that that I needed to go into the church and start the incense for the service. Curious, and known to be incense-loving, he asked, and I showed him the big bag of spiced incense that we use and the coal he instantly recognized as identical to those used to smoke hookah. So I ended up giving him a few coals and a little bag of sweet smelling crystals. Having thought nothing of it at the time, and today having completely forgotten about it, I walked into the hospitality house this afternoon only to find that it now smelled just like the church.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
St. Augustine Against Idolatry
ὁ ἀναγινώσκων νοείτω.
"Foolish people think their gifts are given by the demons they worship; indeed they sometimes say to themselves, 'God is necessary for eternal life, for spiritual life, but we need to worship those other powers to make sure of temporal things.' Oh, the empty-headedness of the human race! You set greater store by those advantages for the sake of which you want to worship demons; in fact you think it more important to pay cult to them - well, perhaps I should not say more important, but at any rate equally important. But God does not want to be worshiped along with them, not even if he gets much more worship and they much less. 'What,' you will say, 'aren't those gods necessary too, if we are to secure everyday things?' Absolutely not. 'But we should still be afraid that they may do us harm if they are angered.' They will do no harm unless God allows it. They will always have the will to do harm; they never stop wanting to, even if they are appeased or appealed to, for this is characteristic of their ill-will. What will you achieve, then, by worshiping them, except to displease God? And if he is offended you will be handed over into their power, with the result that those who could do nothing to you when God was well disposed will be able to do whatever they like once he is angry. If any one of you thinks that this sort of worship is necessary to secure temporal well-being, the following example will help you to see the futility of it. Take all those who worship Neptune: are they immune to shipwreck? What about all those who scoff at Neptune: does that mean they never reach harbor? And all those women who worship Juno: do they all give birth successfully? Or do all those who scoff at Juno miscarry? You must understand, beloved, that the men and women bent on worshiping these gods are empty-headed, for if it were necessary to pay cult to them for earthly things, only people who worship them would have these earthly things in plentiful supply. Even if that were the case, we should nonetheless shun such gifts and seek from God only the one thing [namely, to contemplate the Lord's delight], and all the more so because the God who is slighted when such gods are worshiped gives us earthly things too. So let our [former] father leave us, and our [former] mother too; [that is,] let the devil leave us and the city of Babylon leave us. And let the Lord take us into his arms to console us with temporal things, and bless us with the gifts of eternity. [So the Psalmist says,] 'My father and mother have abandoned me; but the Lord has taken me up.'"
Augustine of Hippo. "Exposition 2 of Psalm 26." In Exposition of the Psalms 1-32 (III/15), ed. John E. Rotelle, 15, 274-290. (Hyde Park: New City Press, 2000), 286-287.
