First Frost

Shadowfeet

I stumbled on this song today after a friend posted another song by Brooke Fraser on my Facebook wall. "Shadowfeet" is an incredible song, and a powerful myriad of faces appears in this video to help in the singing! Ah humanity, all of us so different, and all of us so alike in our yearning for the Infinite One Who alone can satisfy!

"Shadowfeet"

Walking,stumbling on these shadowfeet
toward home,a land that i've never seen
I am changing: less and less asleep
made of different stuff than when i began
and i have sensed it all along
fast approaching is the day

When the world has fallen out from under me
I'll be found in you, still standing
when the sky rolls up and mountains fall on their knees
when time and space are through
I'll be found in you

Theres distraction buzzing in my head
saying in the shadows it's easier to stay
but I've heard rumours of true reality
whispers of a well-lit way

You make all things new

When the world has fallen out from under me
I'll be found in you, still standing
Every fear and accusation under my feet
when time and space are through
I'll be found in you

Breathing Gold

These fall days are ridiculously busy with family life, teaching, prepping, grading, planning, but just 5 minutes under golden trees like this is like time spent in Lothlorien, where time ceases to move at its normal tick. What is it about beauty and things natural that stops the infernal tick of time, or at least seriously delays it for awhile? Don't miss this holy season! Get out there under some trees for a spell! And let them cast their spell over you!

I first heard Eva Cassidy's angelic voice in 1996, the year she died. At the age of 33, cancer took her away. Her voice was little known outside of the DC area, where she sang in jazz and blues clubs. But now her gifts are reaching the world. I don't know how old she is in this heart-breaking rendition of Somewhere Over the Rainbow, but by her look, it appears she already has the cancer.

This song takes on a whole new weight of sorrow, fragile beauty, and glory should that be the case. I hope you are ready for this! And for a search for more of Eva's music! She is a gift, and her voice still echoes in the world!

Leather Goods and Phenomenology

Rebecca and I were watching a show on hulu.com last night, squeezed in between Clare's brief nap and before the Boy's first waking of the night, when this Louis Vuitton commercial came on. It was captivating, and I immediately thought of Pope John Paul II. It was not because he wore leather goods.

This short clip is a perfect illustration of a philosophy that formed John Paul's thought; phenomenological personalism. Wazzat?

Phenomenology is the study of what things, people, experiences do to us. How they impress themselves upon our hearts as realities in themselves. This is a receptive way of living and growing, as opposed to a grasping, ladder-climbing, crush all enemies approach. We knock and seek and look, and behold the Door is opened unto us. We receive, we don't demand. We say "may it be done unto us according to His Word," according to Life's unfolding myriad of graces, the dark as well as the light, and see how all can lead to wholeness, to His Face.

I could watch this video all day. It's beautifully rendered, intimate and soaked with a reverent beauty, a holy longing, and shows us our hearts on a Road seeking shelter. May we all find it, the Way, the Truth, and the Life that we are destined for!

Resurrection Day

From the tomb of the earth life has emerged! And the world weeps and watches. From the womb of the earth, men are born again, made new, promises made, and loved ones embraced as if for the first time.

One miner said, "There were not 33 men down there. There were 33 men and God."

As the world watched the events in Chile, did we see the sacramental connections? Did we feel the Hand seeking us out in our dark tombs of cold rock and emptiness? Did we recall that God has been there, done that? That He entered that cavernous place and in his own burial in the womb of the world, He filled it with grace? And rose again! There is a dank, barren place that our radical individualism has placed us in, and it doesn't keep the heart warm, doesn't fill us.

We're made for the arms of others, for the embrace that melts the cold, for the light of human eyes that shatters the shadows of solitude, and fear, and isolation. Viva Chile! for your determination and passion for the lives of these men, showing us through this tragedy that life counts, every life. For teaching us to hope beyond hope. For reminding us of the truth that alone can satisfy: that we are made for each other, that the hollow places of the human heart, like the mines, should be filled with love, of God and neighbor. Love fills the void in every human heart, love fills the mines that greed burrows through, love brings to light all that is buried in darkness. Love conquers all!

Is There Really Right and Wrong? A Vintage Video Lecture by Dr. Peter Kreeft

One Plus One is One

The same Love, the one Love

that filled the heart of Francis, with joy

that guided the eyes of Teresa, to the poor

that fed the mind of Thomas, with wisdom

that gave Philip his laughter, for sorrow is a passing cloud

and Edith her conviction

and Maximilian his courage

and Therese her smile

is the one Love, the same Love

that looks at you and I

and knocks soft upon our hearts

and seeks and hopes to find

the one thing, the same thing

of us as of them:

an open door

to enter as a Guest

and let fall from arms immeasurable

gifts innumerable.

Little Flowers

Today is a great feast; it's the Feast of Littleness. The Feast of the Ordinary and the Celebration of the Common. This is the feast celebrating a little French girl, Thérèse, who was little known in her day, did not travel too much, performed no miracles, made no marvelous journeys to faraway missions, and from roughly her 15th to her 24th year, was "hidden" in a cloister from the eyes of the world. She died in just as much obscurity from tuberculosis before her 25th birthday. Little though she was, however, she possessed a heart that was aflame with love. In fact, she herself once wrote that love was to be her very life, her vocation!

Small though it seemed in her time and place, we know this fire had a way of being seen and felt. Darkness cannot overcome it. The smallest spark can still be seen in the deepest darkness. Today, I wonder if a Catholic church exists that does not have an image, icon, pamphlet, or prayer of St. Therese in it. That's the paradox of humility; that she who humbled herself would be so exalted. God makes big with our little. And all that is needed to become a great saint, as Therese was found of saying, is not much time, but much love.