O Emmanuel

O Emmanuel

O Emmanuel: O Emmanuel, God with us, our King and lawgiver, 

the expected of the nations and their Savior; 

come to save us, O Lord our God. 

O Rex Gentium

O Rex Gentium

O King of the Gentiles

O King of the Gentiles and desired One, the cornerstone that makes both one: 

come, and deliver man, whom you formed out of the dust of the earth.

O Oriens

O Oriens

O Rising Dawn

O Oriens, O dawn of the east, brightness of light eternal, and sun of justice; 
come and enlighten those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.

O Clavis David

O Clavis David

O Key of David

“O Key of David, O royal Power of Israel controlling at your will the gate of Heaven: Come, break down the prison walls of death for those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death; and lead your captive people into freedom.”

O Radix Jesse

O Radix Jesse

O Root of Jesse

O Root of Jesse,  you have been raised up as a sign for all peoples; kings stand silent in your presence; the nations bow down in worship before you. Come, let nothing keep you from coming to our aid.

O Adonai

 O Adonai!
O Lord and Ruler!

O Lord and Ruler of the house of Israel, who appeared to  Moses in the flame of the burning bush and gave him the law on Sinai: come, and redeem us with outstretched arms.

O Sapientia

Raphael, "Wisdom"

O Sapientia {O Wisdom}

O WISDOM, who came from the mouth of the Most High, reaching from end to end and ordering all things mightily and sweetly:

COME , and teach us the way of prudence. Amen. 

Pondering the season: Music

I have much pondering in my  heart this season.
But now and again, I hear this song on the radio and it pulls me from the core.
This song is Christmas and Advent for me; especially when it is played on our piano in the living room by my eldest, Chris.

Music is so evocative, especially in this rich season.
This one brings back memories of the Snoopy Christmas Special as a kid {yes, I did just date myself again, and yes we did wait ALL YEAR to see those specials}.
But it also conjures up many memories of my family here in our home over these years.
Now I know what Christmas songs my kids, especially Little Man, like (because he sings it loud and often...and lets just say, I'll let you guess which one is top o' the charts: involving jingles and a fat man smelling).
What Christmas songs are "IT" for you?

Feast of St. Nick.

Yeah, it is: the real one.

Saint Nicholas!

I love learning about him, and thinking about him.  And when my littles ask me, "Mom, do you believe in Santa?" I can say, with truth, "Yes, I do, Saint Nick!"  Now, if you want to get all snippy and say it's misleading, go ahead.  But I'm not gonna listen too closely, because I think it's a fun tradition and teaches our kids to be selfless - at least a tad bit more maybe - and frankly, because Saint Nicholas IS real.  And yes, I do then launch into a conversation, a quick one, about the real St. Nicholas.

There are fun traditions with this feast, most common is leaving a shoe by your bedroom door and filling it with candy.  Not that I've done, ever, that tradition...because I am not organized enough to remember it in time to do it.  But I love the idea of it, and  maybe someday, I might just get it together enough to make it happen.  Hey, it could happen....really!

Collect for the Feast of Saint Nicholas

O God, Who didst adorn blessed Nicholas,

the bishop, with miracles unnumbered,

grant, we beseech Thee, that by his merits

and prayer we may be delivered from the

fire of hell. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Happy Feast of St. Nicholas! 

Have a piece of candy...ok I will on your behalf!

Tis the season....enjoy the beat!

It's the middle of Hanukkah, of course.

And it's a beautiful season in and of itself - the traditional festival of the miracle of candle oil by our big brothers in matters of religion, the Jewish Faith. {By this I mean that of course our Catholic faith is derived out of the Jewish faith, they are truly our big brothers and so many of our rituals and customs have origins in theirs. This is why so many of those traditions call to us, to me, and pull at us deeply.  They call to our selves.}

Anyhow, this is a fun video, you might have seen it already but it's perfect for Hanukkah.  It's about the Maccabee's of course, one of the great stories in the bible and this is a fun reminder of the richness of the season.



Enjoy! Happy Hanukkah!

{h/t to Julie of Happy Catholic!}

Advent: doing and undoing

So, it's Advent.
Lots of folks will say, "It's Christmas time!"  Well, kinda...sorta.  But not really. Not yet.
The newspapers and commercials wanna shout it at ya.  They want you to get all up in a frenzy of "get it, buy it, wrap it, give it."  But first, the most important prep is interior.  Really.
As I try to prepare my home and kids for Christmas, for Christ-Mass, I need to first prepare my hard broken heart.  And if I can walk through this season mindfully, I can have my actions in prepping our home and kids be a real and active prayer.

Of course that means only if I can do it without stepping into that whirling dervish mode of christmas frenzy...complete with glassy stares in stores, aching feet, and griping  mouth.

That is my goal.
I usually fail.
Ok, ok, I have always failed.  Every year.
But, hope is eternal, right? I love that about hope, don't you??

 My sweet Hannah, long ago, but still adorable.  No I'm not at all biased either!

I have everything working against succeeding once again: crazy busy school schedules and activities for three different schools (four if you count the college boys), eight birthdays in this next month (four of them my own children, the other my dad, sis, etc), and oh yeah, the usual everyday crazies of doc appointments and laundry and, oh, cooking dinner and such. 

But even so, I want to slow it down.  Simplify.
I need to prepare myself to really be ready this Christmas. 
I need to prepare my stony selfish heart to be ready to set myself aside and welcome Christ, in the distressing disguise of the littlest among us (even in my children, whoa). 

Little Sarahbird, tiny adorable girl practicing a Christmas pirouette long ago

I need to do this preparation so I will truly be able to rejoice.  No, not to rejoice that the last present is wrapped and the cookies cut out and the sinks of dishes done (well, maybe a little bit)...but instead to rejoice at the Incarnation, the mind blowing condescension of God himself to come to me.   Who'da thunk it?

So, this season is actually something of a penitential season, officially. (Easy jokes there, I know, of course it is: office parties, secret santas, shopping malls....let's talk penitential!).
But it's a season to let go of ourselves {Ok, myself} so we can welcome Himself.

So I have a New Year Resolution, Catholic Version: I will be trying to pray the morning and evening or night prayers, part of the Liturgy of the Hours, daily.  {And yes, I'm putting this up so I'll feel more accountable....I'm lazy like that.}
It helps ground me. It helps me breathe.  Too often I set it aside.  It gets dropped in the ordinary hectic squoosh of a given day, in my tired selfish desire to just drop into bed or surf the net if I find a moment.  So, this will have to be an intentional action.  Better than exercise even! It also connects me to my Chris, who is much better than I am about being regular and steady with this.  One more incentive for me, as if the Incarnation and prepping for it isn't enough.  Gads. 

Anyhow, that's my main Advent effort, or resolution, if you will.  Otherwise I will be calmly (um, yeah, really.....) trying to wrap up a simpler Christmas during this week or so and then being able to be present, really try to be present to the season, the kids, and the anticipation of Christmas.

We will light our Advent Candle/wreath every night for dinner.  I love this too. It's a pause, only a moment, really, but it's a pause, a short held breath at the end of a busy day.  This is a nightly reminder to come together, to slow and be present...to each other but also to the goodness of this season.  To stop and look and see each other, instead of only the whirling tasks and to do's.
We will slowly add a few Christmas items as we get closer and closer to the real Christmas season, December 24th; a nativity set here and there, wreaths, later, a tree.   It will bring that Incarnation closer in to our hearts and home and family as we wait together in Advent.
We will hopefully find those mindful moments together as we step toward Christmas and the evenings lengthen and chill, in the warmth of us around the table and in the flickering light of the candles at dinner.

It's Advent.
It's a time that we are pushed to whirl and twirl and spin ourselves dizzy with anticipation and preparation.
But, it's Advent.
And it's a time to try to still and slow and prepare and savor the quiet quickening of our hearts in anticipation and the most amazing moment, ever, almost upon us.
I love Advent.

Happy New Year! Advent

So, one day late, Happy New Year!!
It's the liturgical new year.
The Church's New Year, yesterday, officially (ok, vespers Saturday night).
We are in the first season of the new year: Advent.
I was going to post this yesterday but it was a busy day.......so much for resolutions, even in the liturgical  year.  Awfully similar to the secular new year resolutions.  But as with those, I can still begin again.

Anyhow...
I love Advent. I really do. It it the time to prepare our hearts and souls and minds for the Incarnation, the coming of Christ to this hard broken beautiful world.  We get these four weeks, punctuated by four Sundays, to prepare in body and  mind and heart - in action and prayer - for our broken beautiful personal world to be ready to welcome Christ, as one of us, come to us, because that is the only way to truly reach us.  The biggest of gifts, come to us.  Even to me.

Another day, another post is for the doing of Advent.  Or the undoing of Advent, perhaps.  More later.  For now, this is best I think:



Advent begins. Not Christmas, not yet.  The preparation of ourselves for Christmas.  The expectation, the anticipation, the quieting of waiting.  I love Advent.

The waiting begins. Advent.

Waiting.
This blog is about nothing if not waiting.
Waiting is one of the very worst skills of mine; by which I mean, I stink at waiting.
I am wretched at waiting because I have no patience.
So, of course I have had to wait many times, and surely will continue to.
And it is surely the reason I have eight children.
I have waited for many things and people over the years.
Sometimes I fall into the huge trap of "wishing away my life" (as they say here in the south) by the way I wait.
It's true.
I have done that far too much, far too often.
I suspect I've lost years.

I have waited impatiently, filled with busyness, to finish college.
To get into grad school and out again.
Waited for Coffeedoc to finish med school. Then internship. Then residency.
Waited to stop being broke.
Waited to get married (seven years dating, so, I'm not kidding).
Waited to get pregnant (but only the third time...and that wait was particularly long and particularly difficult on all levels).
Waited to adopt. To be selected by a birthmom. To hold that baby.
Waited to adopt from Ethiopia. To jump through the paperwork hoops. To be matched with a referral. To pass court. To travel.
Waited for the CDC to clear my daughter to come home. To be allowed to travel.

Heck, I can turn waiting for Coffeedoc to get home for dinner into a sporting event.
So, yeah, I wait...all too often. And I do it all wrong.
Patience is NOT one of my virtues. Thus, I suffer a bit, or a lot, waiting.

The reason to drone on about all this waiting is that today is a special day.
Today is the day to try, once again, to approach waiting in the right spirit.
Today is the day to reframe the waiting into a better approach: preparation.
Today is the day to recognize the beauty of the wait: the anticipation, the slow glow of expectation.
Today is the first Sunday of Advent.

I love Advent.

When done right Advent is a season (four Sundays) of rich tradition, prayerful contemplative expectation, a settling into the deep; it is combined with an overlaid gauze of building excitement.
It is a preparation -not for a Christmas morning frenzy of torn wrapping paper and too many gifts.
But rather, a mindful preparation for the advent, literally the 'coming,' of the most important gift of all.

I almost always fail Advent.
I stay mired in the cycling hubub of my house, the must do's, the should's, the pressures and strains. I get lost in the jumble of calendar commitments and then resent the time they snatch away.
It's the curse of the goal oriented...this sense of 'eye on the prize.' Get to Christmas, make it happen.
But the trap is that then you miss the process, the very beauty of the anticipation.
You miss one of the most beautiful seasons of the year.
I wish away this gorgeous season.

This year, once again, I hope to be more mindful.
To prepare the gifts early enough to stop the last minute frantic fretting and gathering.
To dig in and slow way down.
I hope and pray to see and stop and savor the small moments - the ones I might miss as I move so fast through the days.

This is Advent. It's a beautiful time of preparation, inside and out.
It's almost Christmas! He is coming.
The waiting begins again.

"Know that the Lord is coming and with him all his saints;
that day will dawn with a wonderful light, alleluia."

From the Divine Office: First Sunday of Advent.