Ash Wednesday is upon us.
Remember the childhood saying: "Ring around the roses, Pocket full of posies, Ashes, Ashes, All fall down"?
We are dust and ashes and we will return there.
Not a hopeful day, except for Jesus' promise in Luke that if we 'do good' in secret, God will reward us.
We shall know when we know.
...is the last Sunday before Ash Wednesday.
My sermon is called "In the Presence of God".
All the readings and the collect refer, in one way or another, to being in the presence of God.
I want the Parishioners and me to long for the presence of God.
I tell a them about my last conversation with my father--who had been senile for 3 years. He was in the hospital and we had the best conversation we'd had in all those years. It was as if we were in the presence of God and God gave me my father back for 45 minutes.
By the time I got home, the hospital called and he had died.
I went back to sit with his body. A Catholic priest came by to ask if I wanted him to give Dad 'last rites'.
My father was a Baptist and then a Methodist, but my experience of that last conversation let me be open to anything.
So, he had Catholic 'last rites'!
I'll tell people tomorrow that we are 'in the presence of God' when the bread and wine are blessed and become the Body and Blood of Christ.
I pray they'll believe me, because I believe it so profoundly.
The way our President treated the President of Ukrain today was deplorable. Zelenskyy is an ally, not the enemy.
Russia is the enemy of both countries.
Has he lost his mind?
Been to the grocery store lately?
He was going to bring down food costs, but they have gone up.
And firing the U.S.'s workforce--what evil can that do?
Even MAGA folks are turning on him and Republicans in the Congress,
About time, I would say, but it's too late for that....
God help us.
Across the street--on the north side of Cornwall Avenue--all the snow has melted in the front yards.
On our side--the south side--front yards are still covered by snow.
I've never figured out why that is--but it always is.
Living on the cold side of the street means it's difficult to put out the trash and recycle bins.
Tuesday I was having trouble getting the recycling up on 5 inches or more of snow. A guy walking down the street came over. He pulled and I pushed and we did it.
What a nice guy. He was walking on the warm side--the only side that has a sidewalk.
I should have given him a hug--cold as my hug might be.
I went to a new dentist yesterday.
My dentist for years retired about a year ago. So I needed a new one.'
The woman who cleaned my teeth was wonderful and funny.
But the dentist wanted me to have a 'deep cleaning'. That would require two visits and being numbed each time.
I turned it down.
I'm 77--how many decades do I have left.
My teeth will be fine until I'm not....
Alas....
Someone who reads this blog sent a letter to Bern with a copy of my Valentine's Day post.
She hadn't read it on-line and was very pleased to read it.
Whoever did that, if you will, send me an email at Padrejgb@aol.com to let me know.
I'd like to thank you personally.
It was a kind and loving thing to do.
People like whoever did that make the world more gracious and loving.
Thank you again.
I went to see my Orthopedic doctor today.
I fell down several months ago and broke my shoulder bone and my thumb.
The thumb is perfectly healed--that I'm typing with all ten fingers shows that.
My shoulder is almost healed. I don't need pain meds in the day and don't wear an Icy-Hot patch any more. I do take 2 pain pills at night.
It sometimes hurts--but not nearly as much as it did before.
He didn't give me another appointment, so he thinks I'll be fine.
He told me that his 4 year old daughter is already reading!
She'll be bored in Kindergarten and First Grade....
