Look well to the growing edge! All around us worlds are dying and new worlds are being born; All around us life is dying and life is being born. The fruit ripens on the tree; the roots are silently at work in the darkness of the earth against a time when there shall be new leaves, fresh blossoms, green fruit. Such is the growing edge! It is the extra breath from the exhausted lung, the one more thing to try when all else has failed, the upward reach of life when weariness closes in upon all endeavor. This is the basis of hope in moments of despair, the incentive to carry on when times are out of joint and [people] have lost their reason, the source of confidence when worlds crash and dreams whiten into ash. The birth of the child—life’s most dramatic answer to death—this is the growing edge incarnate. Look well to the growing edge! —Howard Thurman (The Mood of Christmas & Other Celebrations, p. 23)
On his birthday, I wanted to both honour J.R.R. Tolkien and offer up some of the wisdom that can be found in his writings. Tolkien’s books, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy reflected Tolkien’s own experience in WW1 and as he watched WW2 unfold with all of its horror and bloodshed.
In Chapter 18, Thorin Oakenshield, the King under the Mountain was dying and he shared the following words with Bilbo Baggins.
If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world. — J.R.R. Tolkien (The Hobbit)
Perhaps we can learn a lesson on living together from both the humble Hobbit and the humbled Dwarf King.
“We have all had winter seasons in our lives when what was familiar is stripped away and we have to hold grief and open ourselves to the grace of being rather than doing.”
— Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, The Online Self-Study Retreat ~ A Midwinter God: Making a Conscious Underworld Journey
When have you experienced winter in your life? Were you able to surrender to “the grace of being rather than doing”?
Verse of the day
Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.
– Isaiah 60:1
Voice of the day
Arise, your light is come! / Fling wide the prison door; / proclaim the captive’s liberty, / good tidings to the poor.
– Ruth Duck, “Arise, Your Light Is Come”
Prayer of the day
May we feel your light upon us. Help us as we fling wide the prison doors and set each other free.
The true meaning of Christmas is expressed in the sharing of one’s graces in a world in which it is so easy to become callous, insensitive, and hard. Once this spirit becomes part of a [person]’s life, every day is Christmas and every night is freighted with the dawning of fresh, and perhaps holy, adventure. —Howard Thurman (The Mood of Christmas & Other Celebrations, p. 19 as found in The Work of Christmas: The Twelve Days of Christmas with Howard Thurman, p. 62)
“The future will be different only if we make the present different.”—Peter Maurin, cofounder of the Catholic Worker Movement
“There is always light. If only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it.”—Amanda Gorman
Verse of the day
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
– Hebrews 11:1
Voice of the day
We live in hope — that life will get better, and more importantly that it will go on, that love will survive even though we will not.
– John Green, “The Anthropocene Reviewed” (2021)
Prayer of the day
Thank you for the promise that love will go on, even when we leave this earth.
Verse of the day
But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for see, I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”
– Luke 2:10-11
Voice of the day
When the song of the angels is stilled, / when the star in the sky is gone, / when the kings and princes are home, / when the shepherds are back with their flocks, / the work of Christmas begins: / to find the lost, / to heal the broken, / to feed the hungry, / to release the prisoner, / to rebuild the nations, / to bring peace among the people, / to make music in the heart.
– Howard Thurman
Prayer of the day
As we begin the work of Christmas, may we not be afraid, for you, Emmanuel, are with us.
As I opened the news this morning my heart sank as I saw the news from Bethlehem… the attacks on October 7th by Hamas were absolutely horrific… yet so too is the response by the Netanyahu government and the IDF. The following quotes from Pope Francis and Thomas Merton speak to the anguish that I feel as we remember the birth of the Prince of Peace.
Tonight, our hearts are in Bethlehem, where the Prince of Peace is once more rejected by the futile logic of war, by the clash of arms that even today prevents him from finding room in the world. — Pope Francis
Into this world, this demented inn, in which there is absolutely no room for him at all, Christ comes uninvited. But because he cannot be at home in it, because he is out of place in it, and yet he must be in it, his place is with those others for whom there is no room. His place is with those who do not belong, who are rejected by power because they are regarded as weak, those who are discredited, who are denied the status of persons, tortured, exterminated. With those for whom there is no room, Christ is present in this world. He is mysteriously present in those for whom there seems to be nothing but the world at its worst. — Thomas Merton, “The Time of the End Is the Time of No Room” in Raids on the Unspeakable, pages 51-52
This verse from the Creation story in Genesis 1 came to my heart as I reflected on these quotes: So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. (Genesis 1:27)
Even though this world doesn’t seem to want to make room for God’s Peace / Shalom / Salam, may it still break into the world… I have to believe that there is always hope.
