We may not paint you as our souls see you, you first light that birthed the miracles of dawn. We fetch instead from the old color pots the same brushstrokes and the same golden rays with which the blessed saints concealed you.

The point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer. ~Rainer Maria Rilke, d. 29 December 1926

Merry Christmas! “What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it” (John 1:3-5) Image: Georges de la Tour, The New-Born, c. 1645.

(In my sleep I dreamed this poem) Someone I loved once gave me a box of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift. ~Mary Oliver (1935-2019), “The Uses of Sorrow”

If we do not transform our pain, we will most assuredly transmit it—usually to those closest to us: our family, our neighbors, our co-workers, and, invariably, the most vulnerable, our children. ~Richard Rohr

Faith does not need to push the river because faith is able to trust that there is a river. The river is flowing. We are in it. ~Richard Rohr

The White House claims the vote to rename the Kennedy Center was “unanimous.” That is false. I was muted on the call and denied the opportunity to speak or register my opposition. That is not consensus. That is censorship.

Not repentance, metanoia. An Advent reflection on Matthew 3:1-12.

Remembering Karl Barth, who died Dec 10, 1968: "As ministers we ought to speak of God. We are human, however, and so cannot speak of God. We ought therefore to recognize both our obligation and our inability and by that very recognition give glory to God." ~The Word of God and the Word of Man (1928)

Paul is the patron-saint of thought in Christianity. And all those who think to serve the faith in Jesus by destroying freedom of thought would do well to keep out of the way. ~Albert Schweitzer, The Mysticism of Paul the Apostle (1931)

i’m just only a Baptist preacher somebody bigger than me coming in blackness like a star ~Lucille Clifton (1936-2010), “john” catonsvillepres.org/sermons/prep...

“From The Depths,” William Balfour Ker

Metanoiete (μετανοεῖτε).

The Philemon Foundation is dedicated to publishing previously unpublished works by C. G. Jung. I have been a supporter of the Philemon’s mission for many years and am happy to share that I have just joined its board of directors. Have a look: philemonfoundation.org.

"Once metaphysical ideas have lost their capacity to recall and evoke the original experience they have not only become useless but prove to be actual impediments on the road to wider development."~CG Jung, Aion

Bonhoeffer is a wise guide through Advent.

Happy Feast Day of St. Andrew (30 November)! Image: Museum of the University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews, Scotland, @musa_standrews. #standrewsday

The power of King Jesus is intrinsically revolutionary and subversive against every repressive regime. ~Walter Brueggemann

Pope Leo and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew signed a joint declaration in Istanbul today, renewing their commitment to theological dialogue and “full communion” between the Catholic and Orthodox churches. religionnews.com/2025/11/29/p...

Reading this weekend: Fateful Hours: The Collapse of the Weimar Republic by Volker Ullrich. The opening sentence: “Democracies are fragile. They can flip into dictatorships. Liberties that seemed won for all times can be squandered.”

Reading this weekend: Fateful Hours: The Collapse of the Weimar Republic by Volker Ullrich. The opening sentence: “Democracies are fragile. They can flip into dictatorships. Liberties that seemed won for all times can be squandered.”

The only reason to have the military in D.C. is to increase tensions and antagonize people to the point they over-react, creating "justification" for increasing crackdowns on innocent people. It's all a con.

“Most days we remain unaware that we receive much more than we give, and that it is only through gratitude that life becomes open and free.” ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer, 1943 Happy Thanksgiving, y’all!

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From Sunday's sermon, Astounded and Amazed: “It is not the task of Christianity to provide easy answers to every question, but to make us progressively aware of a mystery. God is not so much the object of our knowledge as the cause of our wonder.” ~Kallistos Ware catonsvillepres.org/sermons/asto...

“It is not the task of Christianity to provide easy answers to every question, but to make us progressively aware of a mystery. God is not so much the object of our knowledge as the cause of our wonder.” ~Kallistos Ware

We may not see you as our souls see you,... ... We build up pictures before you like walls - by now a thousand such walls surround you. For each time our open hearts behold you, our pious hands cloak you in disguise. ~Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926), The Book of Hours

It’s official! I just filed to run for the US Senate. It’s time to take power back for working people.

Yep that's how it happened

Khanna: "There should be no buildings named after people in this Epstein class. There should be no scholarships named after them. They shouldn't be enjoying perks of being affiliated w/ corporations or universities. Many of the survivors will tell you some of these people still are celebrated"

A webinar on the latest volume published by the Philemon Foundation: ON DREAMS AND THE EAST Jung’s landmark seminar on the symbolism of yoga and its applications to dream analysis ~ A Presentation by Giovanni Sorge 7 December 2025 | 7 pm GMT ( 2 pm EST | 11 am PST ) Approx: 1hr 30

“My sister is not a political tool for you to use. These survivors are not political tools for you to use. These are real stories, real trauma. And it's time for you to stop just talking about it and act. Vote yes.”

The longer I behold your face, O Lord, my God, the more keenly you seem to fix your glance on me. ~Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464), De visione Dei (On the Vision of God), 1453

They think we’re all so stupid

This picture says everything about the state of our nation right now, peaceful clergy being arrested and forced face-down on the pavement.

“The only punishment capable of punishing Hitler, and deterring little boys thirsting for greatness in coming centuries from following his example is such a total transformation of the meaning attached to greatness that he should thereby be excluded from it.” -Simone Weil, The Need for Roots (1943)

The human heart is so delicate and sensitive that it always needs some tangible encouragement to prevent it from faltering in its labor. The human heart is so robust, so tough, that once encouraged it beats its rhythm with a loud unswerving insistency. ~Maya Angelou

Nearly two dozen arrested as faith leaders protest outside Chicago-area ICE facility reuters.com/legal/governme… Meet the Rev. Dr. Michael Woolf, an American Baptist minister and theology professor. Lord have mercy. Grateful for friends and colleagues who were at Broadview today.

Oh wow @reuters.com got the photo here:

Unreal things have a reality of their own...You have to assent to the invisible if you are ever to see it. ~Christian Wiman, 'Zero at the Bone: Fifty Entries Against Despair' (2023)

“Jesus was a revolutionary, who did not become an extremist, since he did not offer an ideology, but himself.” ~Henri Nouwen

Our supremest need is real faith in the omnipotence of Love. Thousands talk of God Almighty, and have no faith in Love at all; to them the real powers are force, wealth, competition, and self-interest. These are the powers that sway the world. ~G. A. Studdert-Kennedy, Food for the Fed Up (1921)

Amazement.

“A Christianity without empathy is nothing but an empty religion. The heart of the gospel is to love your neighbor as yourself, to rejoice with those who rejoice, and to weep with those who weep.” ~Henri Nouwen, “The Return of the Prodigal Son”

For the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. ~Audre Lorde

"We would rather be ruined than changed; We would rather die in our dread Than climb the cross of the moment And let our illusions die." —W. H. Auden, The Age of Anxiety