This contemplation was inspired from John 16.

There is, in our time, a fascination with perfection. We long for the problem-less life, the cushy job, the perfect partner. We long for the safe painless world where are children never have to suffer. Even in our spiritual life, we are so easily lured to think that by attaining to our true self we will have no more pain, no weakness. For there is a powerful part in all of us that longs to be the superman, with special powers, with no pain, all our problems transcended, above the muck and mire.

And yet, within each human being, there is something imperfect, unwell, brokenhearted. We know this part of ourselves intimately because of how traumatic life is. And our brokenness is not illusion. The cracks are real. This is so because the cracks are how the light is to shine in…

During The Act of Consecration, smoke rises up from the altar. And even though the smoke begins at the altar, it eventually fills the whole chapel, envelopes our broken-hearts, permeates the cracks with its fragrance…

The secret of Ascension, which we celebrate this week, is that the Christ’s being too rises up, like the smoke at the altar, but He doesn’t abandon us, He fills the whole earth with His being, permeating our imperfect humanity, enveloping our broken world.

Dear friends, Ascension shows us that Christian perfection is not this world’s idea of perfection. Christ did not come to make us into superheros. He came to envelop our cracks, to bear us with our pain.

For Christ’s touch gives us…
the strength to walk with our broken-hearts,
the faith that there is meaning in this imperfect world; the compassion to love what is sick.

May His fragrance fill us!

I adored my first Youth Conference. The effect that it had on the participants was described as a “Golden Bomb” in their year, and after experiencing one, I couldn’t agree more. The memories of that weekend will live with me forever. I still feel the confidence in our group as we sang, care free, parading down the street. I still see the sun and the smiles as we reflected on a labyrinth and conversed under an old oak tree. There was a power in reading I Have a Dream by Martin Luther King as the sun rose in the same spot where he read it. We made true connections with complete strangers during profound conversations with other teenagers. The sheer verve created by the youth conference instilled me with hope.  All these joyous moments helped me grow and heal. Finally, I can testify that these youth conferences  really do create a “Golden Bomb” in one’s year.

Leap, Laugh, Love.

By Rachel Soliday, 17, Wauwatosa, Wisconsin

Video of 2014 DC Youth Conference

To see the stars it needs to be dark. In the long dark winter nights we have many opportunities to lift our gaze and stand in wonder at the abundance of sparkling stars. Fixed stars we call them. They are always there and can be found reliably in that higher order, and they never stop shining. The experience is: stars stand above us. Even if they rise and set, we “look up” to them.

In contrast, the sun always rises up from below. Strong and powerful its rising light lets the stars recede as if they were no longer there. We don’t usually look up to the sun: we look into the world, work in the world, live our destiny in the bright sunlight. Ideals shine above our head like stars. There are moments, when we see them clearly, when they motivate and inspire the course we take in life. Then there can be long periods when we seem to lose sight of them, even doubt they are real. When in the soul, the darkness of confusion, loss of orientation and motivation spreads itself, it requires a decision to turn the inner gaze upward and trust that the star of one’s ideal is still shining. Read more

In the Gospels we have two descriptions of the Mother of God. The feeling-tone of each is different. In Luke, she is the one to whom the angelic messenger announces the coming of God’s son through the inseminating power of the Holy Spirit. She is humble and open, experiencing an other-worldly event.

The Mother in Matthew’s Gospel receives royal gifts. She must flee to Egypt to save her little Son from Herod’s persecution. In John’s Gospel she stands under the cross. Mother’s innocence has become bitter experience, but she also partakes in her Son’s subsequent rise from death.

Read more

Movie review and Anthroposophical commentary by Arthur Hildreth Jr.

The next time you are in front of the mirror take a good hard look and ask yourself, Am I a zombie? In fact, take note of your behavior in the company of others and ask again, Am I a zombie? You might also look around you and take note of anyone else you think might be a zombie. You may be surprised with what you find out about yourself and the people you think you know and those you see at school or work nearly every day. You may even believe the buzz in the media and the subject of some six hundred movies in the last forty years of a coming zombie apocalypse. You might even believe you are living it, or not living!

Until recently, zombie movies have been more a warning of impending doom depicting flesh-eating corpses whose condition spreads to all who are injured, eaten or killed by them. The term Zombie has many meanings in today’s culture from a mixed alcoholic drink to a flesh eating reanimated corpse. Warm Bodies a Zombie movie based on Isaac Marion’s novel and released in February 2013 has an advertising tagline, “He’s still dead but he is getting warmer.” This movie, taking place mostly after the “Zombie Apocalypse”, is a romantic comedy and offers hope rather than doom. Read more