If you are more into listening than reading, Words Twice a Week is available, along with other good stuff, as a podcast from St Paul’s Episcopal Church. Click here.
Backspace to the 13th – we went out to lunch last year to celebrate my birthday and we have not been to a restaurant since, except to pick up take out! So this kind of marks one of the starts of the year of the pandemic for us.
Then this week’s challenge – a poem or a prayer on getting the word from here to there -
To send the word from here to there
We built a stairway on past Mars
And out to Pluto, to the stars
So all could see it everywhere.
To send the word from now to then
We built a railway underground,
We laid a line that carried sound
So all could hear and take it in.
We sent the word in sound and sight
And the word we sent was…….
You could probably do better.
A few days from the church calendar -
March 17 St Patrick Patron saint of Ireland, and Irish people everywhere, and on this day of all of the rest of us as well! Here’s a bit of his story -
According to the Confession of Saint Patrick, at the age of sixteen he was captured by a group of Irish pirates. They took him to Ireland where he was enslaved and held captive for six years. Patrick writes that the time he spent in captivity was critical to his spiritual development. He explains that the Lord had mercy on his youth and ignorance, and afforded him the opportunity to be forgiven his sins and convert to Christianity. While in captivity, he worked as a shepherd and strengthened his relationship with God through prayer, eventually leading him to convert to Christianity.
After six years of captivity he heard a voice telling him that he would soon go home, and then that his ship was ready. Fleeing his master, he traveled to a port, two hundred miles away, where he found a ship and with difficulty persuaded the captain to take him. After three days' sailing, they landed, presumably in Britain, and apparently all left the ship, walking for 28 days in a "wilderness" and becoming faint from hunger. After Patrick prayed for sustenance, they encountered a herd of wild boar; since this was shortly after Patrick had urged them to put their faith in God, his prestige in the group was greatly increased. After various adventures, he returned home to his family, now in his early twenties. After returning home to Britain, Patrick continued to study Christianity. And later, as a result of a vision, returned to Ireland.
So – a good morning to start with some form of the lorca of St Patrick – here’s shorter version: (The Rune of St Patrick)
At Tara today in this fateful hour
I place all Heaven with its power,
And the sun with its brightness,
And the snow with its whiteness,
And fire with all the strength it hath,
And lightning with its rapid wrath,
And the winds with their swiftness along their path,
And the sea with its deepness,
And the rocks with their steepness,
And the earth with its starkness
All these I place,
By God's almighty help and grace,
Between myself and the powers of darkness. (Always reminds me of Gandalf and the balrog – “You shall not pass”!)
There’s also a hymn by C.F. Alexander – I Bind Unto Myself Today which is in the 1982 Hymnal (Episcopal Church)
March 18 Not really a day of the church calendar, (Well, it is, it’s the feast of Cyril of Jerusalem) but what I was noting, for those of you who were along for the ride, is that this is the day last year that we started the “An email a day” series. The first couple were kind of lame, but as the days went on they got more fun, and interesting, at least in my humble opinion!
March 19 Saint Joseph Husband of Mary, legal father of Jesus. We identify him as a carpenter, but the word could mean a person who works with wood, metal, stone – kind of a craftsman. There’s not really much about him in the New Testament. His visions/dreams about marrying Mary, his care for her and Jesus at his birth, his link to the family of David. “Upon a typical Saint Joseph's Day altar, people place flowers, limes, candles, wine, fava beans, specially prepared cakes, breads, cookies, other meatless dishes, and zeppole. Foods are traditionally served containing bread crumbs to represent sawdust since Joseph was a carpenter. Because the feast occurs during Lent, traditionally no meat was allowed on the celebration table. The altar usually has three tiers, to represent the Trinity.” (Wikipedia) Hey check out that “zeppole” – I’m ready for that. Looks way better than the pazckis to me!
March 20 Thomas Ken He was born in 1637. His stepsister married Izaac Walton, (who I never knew really much about except that he “had a league”! He’s got kind of an interesting story – 10 minute read or so.) He (Thomas Ken) wrote hymns, in particular a morning hymn and an evening hymn which both ended with a stanza “Praise God from whom all blessings flow…” which we commonly sing as The Doxology today.
March 21 Thomas Cranmer Born in 1849, he was a leader in the English Reformation Archbishop of Canterbury. He helped build the case for the annulment of Henry's marriage to Catherine of Aragon, which was one of the causes of the separation of the English Church from union with the Holy See. Along with Thomas Cromwell, he supported the principle of royal supremacy, in which the king was considered sovereign over the Church within his realm. He wrote and compiled the first two editions of The Book of Common Prayer, from which this evening prayer is taken -
O Lord, support us all day long, until the shadows lengthen, and the evening comes, and
the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then in thy
mercy, grant us a safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at the last.
And some days from the world/earth calendar
March 15
+ The Ides of March – Beware!
+ the Lakeview gusher – the largest accidental oil spill in history. It happened in Kern County, CA, in 1910. It lasted 18 months and released 9 million barrels of oil. (Deepwater Horizon estimated at 4.9 million barrels.) Anybody remember the John Wayne movie Hellfighters based on the story of Red Adair?
+ the first internet domain name was registered in 1985. It was registered to the Symbolics Computer Corp of Massachusetts, which has since gone out of business.
+ The Godfather opened in 1972.
March 16
+ St Urho’s Day And yes, there is an Ode to St Urho. Try reading it here. And a bit more about the origin of St Urho here and here, including the fact that while the legend originally credited Urho with chasing the frogs out of Finland, later it shifted to the grasshoppers who were attacking the grape vines. Maybe that’s where the purple color comes into the observance. And yes, there is a St Urho’ wife, Sinikka.
+ Psycho premiered in 1960. Ok – no shower tonight!
+ Arthur Godfrey died in 1983. Remember him? “Serutan spelled backwards is Natures” or was it the other way around – “Natures spelled backwards is Serutan”?
+ + + + Now, take a deep breath – this next item is pretty sobering + + + +
+ In 1968 US Army troops killed between 347 and 504 unarmed Vietnamese citizens at My Lai. When charged, platoon leader William Calley claimed to be “following orders”. He was sentenced, but paroled after three years. Hugh Thompson, a helicopter pilot, landed between the troops and the villagers and ordered his crew to shoot at the soldiers unless they stopped shooting the civilians.
March 17
+ St Patrick’s Day – I know we looked at it above, but it’s as cultural day as well as a church feast day. Green beer? Green hair? Green shirt? Green eggs and SPAM? And the legend that Patrick drove the snakes from Ireland? Turns out all evidence suggests that post-glacial Ireland never had snakes. "At no time has there ever been any suggestion of snakes in Ireland", says naturalist Nigel Monaghan, keeper of natural history at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin, who has searched extensively through Irish fossil collections and records. And I love it, if you go down to the bottom of the St Patrick page (above), there is a link for St Urho!
+ Apartheid ended in South Africa in 1992 when 68.7% of the white citizens voted to abolish it.
March 18
+ Johnny Appleseed died on this day in 1845. He was a Swedenborgian missionary. (What the heck is that, you ask? As I did. Well it’s an actual church that flows from the work of Emanuel Swedenborg. Helen Keller, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Andrew Carnegie, and William Blake were Swedenborgians. There’s a church in Royal Oak and a camp by Lapeer. I never knew...and we lived near Lapeer for 5 years.) The popular image is of Johnny Appleseed spreading apple seeds randomly everywhere he went. In fact, he planted nurseries rather than orchards, built fences around them to protect them from livestock, left the nurseries in the care of a neighbor who sold trees on shares, and returned every year or two to tend the nursery. If you didn’t have apple pie last Sunday, maybe today?
+ In 1892, Lord Stanley of Preston offered to provide a challenge cup for the best ice hockey team in Canada.
March 19
+ first International Women’s Day in 1911.
+ Daylight Savings time authorized by congress in 1918.
+ Bob Dylan’s first album Bob Dylan released. Who would have guessed what was to follow?
+ Willie Mosconi ran 526 consecutive pool balls – a world record. (since surpassed, but not in actual competition, and the video has never been released!) He consulted and had a cameo in the movie The Hustler.
March 20
+ Spring equinox
+ Harriet Beecher Stowe published Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1852.
+ John Lennon and Yoko Ono got married in 1969.
+ Albert Einstein presented his general theory of relativity in 1916. It’s about gravity. Ok – I checked, I don’t understand it.
+ and speaking of gravity, Isaac Newton died on this day in 1726.
+ the US invaded Iraq in 2003. When will they ever learn, when will they ever learn?
March 21
+ 3,2,1 (3/21) We have a pan cookie that I bought a day or two after New Year’s that had a little “3,2,1” plastic sign stuck in it. So we’ll get it out for today. I guess it would be a good day to get started on something – what?
+ 2006 – the first tweet on Twitter. Again, who would have guessed what was to follow?
+ Earth Day celebrated for the first time in 1970. Now we celebrate it on April 22.
That’s what I got for now…
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