Random Bullets of Aliveness

  • Yes, I’m still alive. Barely. But I’m buried under a mound of crap.
  • I did finally send off one thing that should have been done a month ago. It’s a project M and I are doing together. More on that one later, perhaps.
  • I have 217 feeds waiting for me in Bloglines. That means y’all are still alive and writing. Good news, but I fear they’ll continue to pile up for a while. I may be mostly away until the end of Lent or so.
  • I do have something in the works for the Cafe so I’ll still be marginally about.
  • Thomas, I fear I don’t have any other good recommendations on Anglican lectionaries. There are a few historical works out there on the BCP but they seem few and far between. The only two things in my library that are even close to the topic are Marion Hatchett’s Commentary on the Prayerbook and Martin Dudley’s The Collect in Anglican Liturgy: Texts and Sources 1549-1989. Christopher, M, or others may be able to point you to some other, better stuff. The single most instructive thing I’ve found to do is to peruse Chad Wohler’s amazing BCP site and to print out various liturgies/tables/etc. and to study them in parallel.
  • Lil’ H is no longer wandering the halls at night and—for the moment at least—has stopped stripping off her diaper at night. Instead, she and Lil’ G are bunking down together—at Lil’ G’s insistence. As the big sister, G sleeps on the outside so H can’t roll out…
  • Enough procrastinating–back to work. Y’all take care of the Anglican Communion while I’m away, ya hear?

Big Bed Update

I’m typing away in here, the Muse is going and suddenly I hear a loud thump from the next room, a moment of silence, then wailing… Lil’ H had indeed fallen out of bed.

Actually, the transition’s been going well. No more nocturnal wanderings. *fingers crossed* The major problem we’re having now with her has no relation to the crib/bed change. It’s that whenever we put her in pj’s with pants, whenever she feels wet she’ll strip off her pants and the wet diaper—which, as nature continues its course through the night and calls again, leads to 2 AM wailing and a lot of sheets and mattress pads that need washing…

New Stuff at the OJN Liturgy Page

I have been alerted through a broken link notice (thanks, bls!) that there is new material that the Order of Julian of Norwich’s Liturgical Publications page. There are three new items: a new set of collects, a 2008 kalendar, and—perhaps most exciting—the order’s hymnal from Advent through Lent. I’d posted Advent bits but did not have the time to get to the rest. Thankfully, they have…

Patristic Bits

The sum of all we have said since we began to speak of things thus comes to this: it is to be understood that the plenitude and the end of the Law and of all the sacred Scriptures is the love of a Being which is to be enjoyed and of a being that can share that enjoyment with us, since there is no need for a precept that anyone should love himself. That we might know this and have the means to implement it, the whole temporal dispensation was made by divine Providence for our salvation. We should use it, not with an abiding but with a transitory love and delight like that in a road or in vehicles or in other instruments, or, if it may be expressed more accurately, so that we love those things by which we are carried along for the sake of that toward which we are carried.

Whoever, therefore, thinks that he understands the divine Scriptures or any part of them so that it does not build the double love of God and of our neighbor does not understand it at all…  (Augustine, On Christian Teaching, 1.35.39-36.40)

Since God accepts repentance after sin, if each one knew at what time he would depart from this world, he would be able to select a time for pleasure and another time for repentance. But the one who promised pardon to a person who repents did not promise us a tomorrow… (Gregory the Great, Hom. 10)

Random Stuff

  • I’m really slammed with stuff right now—I’ll not be posting or commenting much for a bit.  I’ll be back before too long, though.
  • I saw the moving from a crib to a big bed that Marshall+ posted in the comments below. I’m not convinced and I’ll tell you why… As far as I’m concerned, a “wrote-down prayer” (as we call ’em down here) ought to be what I’m thinking and feeling, but just more eloquent and with more depth. My crib to big bed transition prayer at 2 in the morning was, “Father in Heaven, please make this darn baby sleep instead of playing, giggling, or roaming around the upstairs. Amen.” And to my eyes, certain elements of that were, well, missing from the suggested prayer below.
  • I was struck the other evening that Ps 59 would make an awesome voice-over at the start of a vampire-slaying movie. I blame it on verse 2…

News from the Smaller Set

  • I walked down stairs to find M dredging chicken bits for some fried chicken with “help” from Lil’ G (the 4.5 yr old).
    • M: Okay G, It’s your turn—you can do these next two pieces.
    • G: [Looking out over the counter] Welcome back—I’m Rachel Ray. First we’ll take the chicken, then we’ll put it in the egg like this…
  • Last week, Lil’ G informed us that Doodoo’s mother had passed away and that she’d be coming to live with us. (In actuality, Doodoo’s been living with us since we were in PA—she’s one of G’s imaginary friends…)
  • Though her second birthday is still over a month away the signs are clear: Lil’ H needs to move to a toddler bed. We’ll be commissioning Fr. John Julian to write the requisite “life-transition” prayers… :-D