Adventurous Summer Reading

A couple of online friends asked me about my reading of The Shack which I had listed in my sidebar for the last few weeks. I hadn't heard of it until this past spring when Father Acker asked me and his wife about leading a discussion group on the book. So after receiving his e-mail, I put myself on the library waiting list for the book ... several months ago. And in the perfectly horrid timing common to this year, The Shack arrived at the library precisely the same time as my MLA essays did ... which meant that I graded rather than read. And when I gathered my library books and videos to go back on Tuesday, I mistakenly included the long-awaited copy of The Shack that I had planned to read over the weekend, a mistake I did not realize until I returned home after the library closed. Great. So, no, I have not read The Shack yet but hope to when my name pops back up on the library list or when I can borrow a copy from someone. I've heard widely varying opinions on the book and hope to add my own sometime this summer.

So instead, I checked out a book rather far outside my comfort zone: The Host by Stephenie Meyer, the author of the Twilight saga which has become as much an obsession with me as it is for my daughter. Sci fi is so not my genre, but I'm willing to try something new from an author I like. I may put it down in a day or two and return to my British mysteries, but it's worth an attempt. We'll see how it goes....

One of my former students has recommended Gilead by Marilynne Robinson, so I need to add this one to my list. And while the boys romped on the playground at the Wild Animal Park today, we talked books, and Tom recommended some books by Bill Bryson, especially his memoir, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid. I'm going to check out his books as they look really intriguing and fun to boot.

And I definitely want to track down Stephen King's On Writing. I wouldn't really think about taking writing advice from a horror novelist, but one of the few books of his I read long ago was a collection of short stories called Skeleton Key, and I was quite impressed with the quality of his prose. I've read about this book on several writers' blogs, and several writing friends of mine have also highly, highly recommended it. I'm not one who enjoys reading writing "how to" books because I would much rather read excellent writing and learn from the Masters, but I am willing to take my chances on Stephen King.

I have a bunch of really wonderful Christian writings I have been waiting all year to dive into, and although they certainly do not qualify as "light summer reading," I am looking forward to reading them. Most are listed in the sidebar, but Kathleen Norris' Acedia and Me, Brian McLaren's Finding Our Way Again, Thomas a Kempis' Imitation of Christ, Prayer by Richard Foster, The Spirit of the Disciplines by Dallas Willard, The Showings of Julian of Norwich, a rereading of Thomas Howard's Evangelical Is Not Enough, and Introduction to the Devout Life By Saint Francis de Sales are high on the list. And, by golly, I am going to finish the two books that I've been picking at in rare free moments, Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott and The Family Cloister by David Robinson, my dear friend Kitty's cousin. I hope I can get through a few of them this summer, writing in the morning and reading in the afternoons.

And generally catching up on the sleep of which I have been deprived since, um, around mid-August when we started this school year that finished today, Day #180.

Happy Birthday, BCP!

Yes, today (or rather yesterday as I scribble this down after finishing with my Class Day grading well after midnight) is the 460th birthday of the very first Book of Common Prayer in 1549. Commissioned by King Henry VIII and compiled by Thomas Cranmer, the Book of Common Prayer has long been a staple of prayer not only for the 77 milion current members of the Worldwide Anglican Communion but also for the millions of Anglican believers in the nearly 500 years since it was first printed.

I first came across it in the downtown San Diego bookstore I worked. It was a lovely, clothbound volume illustrated with colorful illuminated manuscripts, and I bought it for the artwork rather than the content. For over ten years it sat on the top of my bookshelf with other nicely-bound books for mere decoration until a conversation popped in in my online community at the time about the BCP. Remembering that I owned one somewhere, I searched the house until I located the now-sunfaded cover and, for the first time, opened the book to actually read it. And within minutes, I was hooked.

Somehow the prayers within this book (it was a 1662 English version, complete with prayers for the reigning monarch and Parliament) entranced me. I was taken immediately by the Te Deum Laudamus, a daily prayer of praise, a prayer I still pray nearly every morning even ten years later. It never grows old, even though I have it memorized. Then I found other prayers, some straight Scripture like The Magnificat (Mary's song of praise in Luke), The Venite (verses from Psalm 95 and 96), and The Benedictus (Zechariah's song in Luke 1) and as others ancient prayers of the Church, like the prayer that closes Morning Prayer attributed to Saint John Chrysostom:

Almighty God, who hast given us grace at this time with one accord to make our common supplications unto thee; and dost promise that when two or three are gathered together in thy Name thou wilt grant their requests; Fulfill now, O Lord, the desires and petitions of thy servants, as may be most expedient for them; granting us in this world knowledge of thy truth, and in the world to come life everlasting. Amen.

But the prayer that I kept coming back to again and again besides the Te Deum was the General Confession in the Order for Morning Prayer:

ALMIGHTY and most merciful Father; We have erred, and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep. We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts. We have offended against thy holy laws. We have left undone those things which we ought to have done; And we have done those things which we ought not to have done; And there is no health in us. But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us, miserable offenders. Spare thou them, O God, who confess their faults. Restore thou those who are penitent; According to thy promises declared unto mankind in Christ Jesu our Lord. And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake; That we may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life, To the glory of thy holy Name. Amen.

The majesty of the words, being prayed to the Majestic Lord, just felt so appropriate, so right, to me. I felt, for the first time in over twenty years of being a follower of Christ, that I was truly, truly worshipping Him "in Spirit and in truth." Not that the BCP is the only way to worship God -- but it was the way that felt the most like worship to me. I felt, and still feel, that the Lord deserves beautiful worship, and beautiful music and words are the means by which I can worship my Lord fully, heart, mind, and soul.

At Alpine Anglican Church of the Blessed Trinity, we use the 1928 Book of Common Prayer. A more recent vrsion is available, the 1977 BCP, but the language is much more beautiful in the 1928 and apparently the doctrines remain true as well. The 1928 includes the Psalter (all 150 Psalms, laid out to be read in a month, morning and evening), and the Collects, Epistle, and Gospel readings of Scripture for each Sunday of the Church Year. All of these Scriptures are in the 1540 Great Bible version commissioned by Henry VIII, predating the King James Version (or Authorized Version) of 1611, so the language is even more beautiful than the KJV, at least to me. And I use the Lectionary at the front of the BCP which lays out morning and evening Bible readings (Old Testament, Psalm, Epistle, and Gospel) for each day of the entire Church Year. Very helpful. If you are interested, there's an online version of the 1928 available here: 1928 BCP. Print versions can be found very inexpensively at half.com which is where I got my first 1928.

So I wish the Book of Common Prayer a very Happy 460th Birthday, wishing also that many more Christians would come to enjoy it as I have.

Final Week of Home Schooling ... Until August

Today is our final day of "book work" home schooling for this academic year as we have Class Day tomorrow and a field trip to the Wild Animal Park planned for Friday to celebrate Jonathan's 12th birthday and the last day of school. We will have roughly nine weeks off until we start again in mid-to-late August, early enough to allow us three weeks of Christmas vacation and two weeks at Easter. It's been a good year -- actually, one of our best, even if it has been crazy-busy with tutoring four other students, two Class Day writing courses with a total of 15 students turning in a 3-5 page paper at every class, teaching three courses online at Brave Writer (poetry, grammar, and Shakespeare, plus helping Julie with the junior high language arts subscription, The Boomerang), and doing proofreading for two churches and one missions organization. And all that is besides teaching our four kids who have done quite well this year, especially when one takes into account their standardized test scores.

Benjamin is completing third grade this year. One of my later readers, B has picked up the pace and is reading much closer to grade level. Timothy picked up reading at about the same time in his schooling, and he currently begs me to check out science books from the USD Library. Jonathan was my earliest reader, yet he is picking up books to read for pleasure at the same age as Timothy. It seems that whenever kids learn to read has little bearing on when they start reading for pleasure, at least in the boys of our family; the older two both picked up novels to read for pleasure at about 12 years of age, even though one started reading three years earlier than the other. Anyway, back to Benjamin.... He has done very well in math this year, rarely receiving less than a 96% on his math tests in the ABeka 3 Math book (which is advanced about a year above California math standards), and his penmanship is simply gorgeous: as neat and well-formed as many adults' handwriting. He loves doing handwriting and copywork. Benjamin also did well with grammar (Daily Grams 3), studying the subject for the first time this year, and he definitely enjoyed his Primarily Logic workbook. And he has been just as quick as the older kids in picking up our Greek and Latin root word vocabulary cards that we do as a family. We wrote a few essays this year with him dictating to me while I typed his words, good practice for later writing assignments. Benjamin also enjoyed his Genesis for Kids science book and listening to the older kids' world history and literature. At Class Day (our twice-monthly co-op with Heritage) he took PE, art, and social studies. Overall, he's had a very good year.

According to our PSP (private school program) with Heritage Christian School, Jonathan is graduating from elementary school this year as he finishes sixth grade, although our church added him to the junior high class when he completed fifth grade last year. Jonathan struggled a bit with math this year; the ABeka 6 Math has thrown all three of the older kids for a bit of a loop as it introduces so many new concepts so quickly, but after they complete the ABeka 7 Math, they have it all down and do well. His math scores on the Stanfords this year were very nicely above average despite his low-B grades on tests at home, so we're assuming that he'll pull it together as the other two did once he has Johanna tutoring him next year in math. He and Timothy worked together in several subjects this year: world history, literature (read aloud by me), readers, poetry (Barron's Painless Poetry) and Bible from Sonlight 7; an astronomy unit and most of ABeka's Observing God's World for science; and the Greek/Latin roots that we studied together along with Bible (Sonlight 7 Bible reading schedule, plus Little Book of the Saints and Jason Boyett's Pocket Guide to the Bible which needed a bit of quick editing as I read it aloud when remarks became too, um, adult in nature, plus Bible verse memorization). In Class Day, J took Grossology (a science class dealing with bodily functions and disgusting boy stuff of all kinds), PE, and Cooking. Jonathan also did penmanship (gotta get that boy to slow down and form his cursive more carefully!), Spelling Power, Daily Grams 6, and continued piano with Teri Carpentier-Antti here in Pine Valley as well as guitar with Father Acker's Free Teen Guitar Class in Alpine. Jonathan definitely has a gift for music and is our best all-around student.

Timothy is graduating from eighth grade this year and will be starting high school next fall. (Ack - how did that happen!) He passed me in height over the winter and just this week is officially taller than Keith, too. Timothy and Jonathan studied many of their core subjects together: Bible and Greek/Latin roots, World History Part II (1750 to present), science, poetry, literature (which relates to the same time period as our history studies), readers (also relates to same historical period), etc. Timothy also studies piano with Teri, and he also was tutored in pre-algebra (Saxon Algebra 1/2) with Johanna Vignol, my college friend and home school tutor extraordinaire. He also did Spelling Power (spelling is his one weakness every year on his Stanford tests) and over half of a huge grammar book, Easy Grammar Plus, which he will complete next year. At Class Day, he took two volleyball/basketball classes and a chess class; in fact, he's still undefeated going into the final tournament at Class Day tomorrow. Timothy is always either drawing or tinkering with robots and computer programs; he would like to study engineering or graphics in college, so I will keep those strong areas of his in mind as we plan his high school years. He's just got to decide on a foreign language to study; I doubt he wants to follow in his sister's footsteps and take two years of Latin. In the past we have studied elementary German and Latin, so I hope he will choose one of those as I know them the best, or Spanish of which I still remember a little. He and Jonathan also took my Beginning Writing Class that I have taught in the past at Class Day; Olivia, a neighbor girl J's age, joined us every other Thursday, and they wrote some very creative and interesting essays and also worked on the five-paragraph format. I'm very proud of my little writing class! Timothy wrote a very creative essay a couple of weeks ago, "How Turtles Got Their Shells," based on Kipling's Just So Stories, an idea I stole from a Brave Writer class. Perhaps I'll post it here later on; it was truly wonderful!

Elizabeth completed her junior year of high school and took her SAT test for college entrance this past Saturday. She's had a very busy year with taking my Advanced (Honors) Writing course at Class Day for which she wrote twelve 3-5 page essays and one 7-10 page MLA paper (due tomorrow), and she's done very well. This class is basically a college-level course, and I'm pleased with the quality of her work. She also is taking Cooking as an elective at Class Day. After learning how to make jewelry from her Arizona cousins last summer, Elizabeth has started her own little earring business, and she sells her creations at Class Day during lunch and at small craft fairs in our area. She's had to figure out the cost of beads, the time for labor, the best way to advertise, and must also keep track of profit and inventory; it's been a great practical lesson for her in business/economics. She's finishing Algebra II (Saxon) with Johanna and still has a few labs to do before completing Spectrum Chemistry. Elizabeth has enjoyed ABeka's American History this year; she's taking her final exam today. And she has studied American History from a list Johanna and I made up for her as we didn't care much for the home school curriculum options available; Elizabeth has completed units in the short story and poetry and has read American lit from Ben Franklin to Bless Me, Ultima. Elizabeth has also been involved in our art council's theatre group; last spring she played Lady Olivia in a home school production of Twelfth Night, and she had two parts in the original play A Journey Through Christmas in December. Our theatre group is directed by Dianne Holly who has worked at The Old Globe and has been on staff at SDSU and UCSB; it's delightful to have such a professional living right here in Pine Valley who is willing to work with the community. Elizabeth has been on the front lines of fundraising for the Pine Valley Players, organizing the young people in several events to help provide funds for the PV Players. Next fall she hopes to assist Judith Dupree with Pine Valley's monthly newspaper, The Valley Views as an intern, and she is currently volunteering at the Pine Valley Bible Conference Center once weekly with housekeeping which may become a paid position in a couple of weeks. Elizabeth has narrowed her college search to three universities: Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego (which was helped along when Dean Nelson of the journalism department led a writing workshop in February here in Pine Valley), San Diego Christian College in El Cajon, and The Master's College near Magic Mountain, north of Los Angeles. We'll see where the Lord leads her.

All this is probably too much information, but it's nice to look back through this school year and evaluate what worked well (almost everything) and what didn't (very little, mostly just E's chemistry labs). Grades are due on June 25, but I hope to have them in much sooner so that I can rest and relax this summer and not think much about home schooling until the beginning of August when I need to start ordering curriculum. I'll definitely write about what we choose, too, and that will be another extremely lengthy blog post....

Happy Summer, everyone!

The Joys of Genealogy

I have been interested in genealogical research for the past fifteen years or so, ever since my dad became interested in the subject and wanted me to trace our family line as so many of his family members, including several uncles in their late 80's and early 90's, are still quite sharp and can help us greatly. But the project has been sitting on the proverbial back burner until this past winter.

Our local library advertised a genealogy class in December, and although I had often seen such classes on the large marquee next to New Releases, for some reason I felt the pull more strongly this time and found myself showing up for the Tuesday evening class that met just an hour before our monthly writers' group. Ken, a member of the San Diego Genealogical Society, led a few of us through the basics of researching through Ancestry.com and several other sources. And immediately, I was hooked on genealogy research.

It made sense, really. Research has always been my passion. I love unearthing new material, copying it down, organizing it, and then rewriting it clearly and concisely. I could research forever and never actually settle down to write the main work ... as seen with my theological project on liturgy and the evangelical church which I started nearly five years ago and continue researching. And, obviously despite my complaining, I do love teaching the MLA research method, even if grading the papers takes forever. So genealogical research and I were destined to meet and fall in love.

Ken mentioned his favorite software program, Roots Magic (see illustration above from the Roots Magic site) was coming out with a new fourth version which my parents purchased for me last month. And I have really enjoyed plugging my research into it -- it's all so cool! I've only had access to the software for a month and have been rather overwhelmed with MLA student conferences and now with grading them, so I haven't had as much time to enter information as I would like. That's my plan for the summer ... lots of research, sourcing, and data entry. And from that data I'll be able to trace family trees, lineages, make a separate page for each family member, and even collate all the material into book form. Cool!

Ancestry.com is a great site, but it costs $15 each month to access its wonderful depths. However, the San Diego County Library system provides a free (limited) library version which must be accessed from their own computers; from this source I have gained the vast majority of information on occasional Saturday visits. But I also accessed the LDS genealogy site in the last month from home and was delighted to find a family tree already completed of my father's family which we always assumed was English. I found out, however, that the first Lower (pronounced Lauer), a Michael Lower, came to the colonies before the American Revolution from Germany. He was born in 1732 in Zweibrucken (wish I knew how to make umlauts work!) but married in Pennsylvania in 1750, so he obviously emigrated sometime between those dates. My dad was flabbergasted and amazed.

My parents will be celebrating their 45th anniversary later this month, and we'll have a good number of extended family members joining us for the party. At least one of them is interested in genealogy, so I hope to glean more information as well as share what I've found. And I also want to be able to demonstrate what I have discovered about our family to whomever may be interested. It's just such a great opportunity, but I have so much to pull together before the party on June 27!

I have barely scraped the surface of my genealogical research and of Roots Magic (can't wait to start scanning in photos and really adding in-depth material), but I think I know what I will be doing with a sizable chunk of my summer "free" time.

So tonight it's off to our genealogy class to learn even more about research methods and documentation! Be still, my heart....

Trinity Sunday

The Sunday following Pentecost/Whitsunday is the celebration of the Holy Trinity. Trinity Sunday is a celebration of just one day, and the liturgical color is white, symbolizing the purity and sinlessness of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Now that the Holy Spirit has arrived on the scene to complete the Trinity, Ordinary Time shall begin starting next week, stretching over twenty-some weeks to Advent in late November to early December. Nearly half of the Church Year consists of Ordinary Time for which the liturgical color is green, symbolizing the continual growth of our faith as we follow Christ and endeavor to become more like Jesus. During Ordinary Time, the weeks are counted as being "after Trinity": the First Sunday after Trinity, the fourteenth Sunday after Trinity, etc.

But today we celebrate Trinity Sunday. The website Church Year explains:

Trinity Sunday, officially "The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity," is one of the few feasts of the Christian Year that celebrates a reality and doctrine rather than an event or person. On Trinity Sunday we remember and honor the eternal God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Trinity Sunday is celebrated the Sunday after Pentecost, and lasts only one day, which is symbolic of the unity of the Trinity. The Eastern Churches have no tradition of Trinity Sunday, arguing that they celebrate the Trinity every Sunday. Westerners do as well, although they set aside a special feast day for the purpose.

The Collect from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer:

Almighty and everlasting God, who hast given unto us thy servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity, and in the power of the Divine Majesty to worship the Unity; We beseech thee that thou wouldest keep us stedfast in this faith, and evermore defend us from all adversities, who livest and reignest, one God, world without end. Amen.

For the Epistle today, the 1928 BCP requires the reading of the fourth chapter of Revelation; you may read it here in the English Standard Version: Rev 4 ESV.

The Gospel reading for Trinity Sunday is written in the third chapter of the Gospel according to Saint John, the first verse through the fifteenth. You may read it here, again in the ESV: John 3:1-15.

Today is also the Feast of Title for two churches in the San Diego area, both of which have removed themselves from the liberal San Diego Episcopal Diocese and have put themselves under the authority of Biblical leadership: Holy Trinity in Ocean Beach (part of the city of San Diego) and Alpine Anglican Church of the Blessed Trinity in Alpine, thirty miles east of San Diego. I have been attending weekday healing services led by Father Keith Acker when he was Rector of Christ the King Episcopal Church and also after he and his church left the Diocese and reformed as Alpine Anglican Church of the Blessed Trinity which recently became part of the Reformed Episcopal Church. So blessings to both churches on their Feast of Title!

So today we give special thanks to our Lord who is realized in three distinct persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Although we praise God for the Trinity each and every day of the year, this day we celebrate it more than usual, remembering His gracious goodness, His lovingkindness, and His everfaithful mercy in, as Dr. Stephen Sammons, our pastor at Lake Murray often states, loving us as we are, yet loving us too much to allow us to remain that way. In the words of the Gloria Patri, "Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen."

Growing Pains

(Portrait of our four kids with their four cousins last summer)


As this school year closes, I am so proud of our kids. They have worked so hard this year in their schoolwork and around the house. They are such a huge help in so many ways.

Benjamin is finishing third grade this year, and he's reading far better now than he was at the beginning of the year. He speeds through his math and has the most lovely penmanship. He has been doing a lot more around the house lately: taking out the trash, watering the garden, dusting the living room. He's my "baby" at nine-and-a-half and is growing soooo big. Benjamin makes the funniest and most expressive faces -- he has had the entire family laughing around the kitchen table at dinner many evenings.

According to our home school group, Jonathan "graduates" from elementary school as he leaves sixth grade behind. He's an instigator in our home, always mischievous and enjoying getting under everyone's skin. But he's an amazing help around the house as he cleans all three bathrooms, dusts, waters, and helps wash my car. Math has been his difficult subject as he juggles the concepts of fractions, decimals, proportions, percentages, algebra, and geometry. He'll catch on, but it's not too easy now. Music is Jonathan's gift as he plays both piano (coming up on three years now) and guitar with Father Acker's Free Teen Guitar Class; he's been playing guitar for almost a year now and has a performance in Alpine tomorrow, playing his red-hot electric guitar, a loaner from the guitar ministry. He's a great all-around student, doing well in all subjects.

Timothy is graduating from eighth grade, and next year he will be in high school. (My mind is still reeling at that thought!) He is doing well in school, successfully completing pre-algebra this year. But his passion is art and design, whether that be drawing amazing creatures or designing robotics. His current interest is rocks and minerals, and he has read all the books on the subject in our library and ordered some more titles from the library system today. He also plays piano, and he works very hard around the house and in the yard. Both he and Jonathan do the vast majority of the gardening work around here, J the mowing and T the weed-wacking. Timothy also vacuums the house for me as well as "cobweb patrol" and does any of the heavy work that I need him to do for me. He's a great help, and his love for all of God's creatures is incredible; he is always bringing in critters from outside like frogs, toads, and lizards -- and today he had fun with the four-foot gopher snake we found on our lawn when we got home.

Elizabeth is completing her junior year of high school and will be a senior next year. (NO WAY!) For the last few weeks, she has been working at the nearby Bible Camp on Fridays, vacuuming and cleaning dorm rooms before new groups come in. She's been working mostly as a volunteer for our friend Teri (the boys' piano teacher) and will interview for a "real" job in the next week or so. She also does the dishes every night and keeps the kitchen clean. Elizabeth is so thrilled to be done with science and math for the rest of her high school career, and tomorrow she takes the SAT for college entrance. She loves writing, literature, and history best in school as she considers possible college majors at local Christian liberal arts colleges. I can't believe that this next school year will be the last one with my girl!

Our kids are growing so fast and it's hard as a mother to balance being proud of our maturing kids and being a little sad at watching our babies grow up. I love being with them and I'm so glad that we have had the opportunity to educate them at home so that I hardly miss a minute.

I feel myself becoming nostalgic as our final year of having all four kids at home nears. It's been a great twelve years of homeschooling so far, and if we keep on homeschooling until Benjamin graduates from high school, I'll end up with a total of twenty years of home education. Whew. We'll see if that's what we end up doing; only the Lord truly knows.

Ember Days in the Anglican Church

In the nearly five years that I have attended weekday services at the Anglican Church in Alpine (first at Christ the King and now at Blessed Trinity), I have discovered much to celebrate in the Church Year and in Biblical Saints' Days. But some of the lesser-known Holy Days are still a bit of a mystery to me, and Ember Days fits firmly in that category.

I "Googled" (how did that become a verb?) Ember Days this morning, and I read the Wikipedia and Catholic Encyclopedia explanations with a little puzzlement. I understood what Ember Days were, but their explanations were quite complex, too much so to post here. I finally found a web site that explained Ember Days (and Rogation Days, too, but that's another post), and I copy from it this explanation of Ember Days:

The "Four Times," or Ember Days

The Ember Days are four series of Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays which correspond to the natural seasons of the year. Autumn brings the September, or Michaelmas, Embertide; winter, the Advent Embertide; Spring, the Lenten Embertide; and in summer, the Whit Embertide (named after Whitsunday, the Feast of Pentecost). [Note: this week we observe the Summer Embertide, just after Pentecost.]

The English title for these days, "Ember," is derived from their Latin name: Quatuor Temporum, meaning the "Four Times" or "Four Seasons."

The Embertides are periods of prayer and fasting, with each day having its own special Mass.

The Old Law prescribes a "fast of the fourth month, and a fast of the fifth, and a fast of the seventh, and a fast of tenth" (Zechariah 8:19). There was also a Jewish custom at the time of Jesus to fast every Tuesday and Thursday of the week.

The first Christians amended both of these customs, fasting instead on every Wednesday and Friday: Wednesday because it is the day that Christ was betrayed, and Friday because it is the day that He was slain. (And we now know that this biweekly fast is actually older than some books of the New Testament). Later, Christians from both East and West added their own commemorations of the seasons.

The Ember Days thus perfectly express and reflect the essence of Christianity. Christianity does not abolish the Law but fulfills it (Mt. 5:17) by following the spirit of the Law rather than its letter. Thus, not one iota of the Law is to be neglected (Mt. 5:18), but every part is to be embraced and continued, albeit on a spiritual, or figurative, level. And living in this spirit is nothing less than living out the New Covenant.

Quite often these "Four Times" are set aside for the ordination of clergy, and I recall Father Acker stating that it is a time to fast and pray for our clergy as well. I think that this application of Ember Days to fast and pray for our priests and pastors is of the utmost significance. Yes, the evangelical branch of Christianity has its informal "Pastor Appreciation Month" each October, but it's simply not the same as fasting and praying for our pastors and for future pastors and priests who are called to the vocation.

Physically I cannot fast completely because of my various health issues, but I will do an "oatmeal fast" (eating unsweetened oatmeal only) instead, an idea a former pastor suggested as he also has hypoglycemia. So tomorrow (Friday) and Saturday, I will pray for these pastors for whom I pray on a daily basis:

Father Keith Acker, Rector of Alpine Anglican Church of the Blessed Trinity (Alpine, CA)
Bishop Richard Boyce, Diocese of the West, Reformed Episcopal Church
Dr. Stephen Sammons, Senior Pastor of Lake Murray Community Church (La Mesa, CA)
Nathan Hogan, Associate Pastor of Lake Murray Community Church
Bob Benthin, Pastor to Seniors of Lake Murray Community Church
Seth Clark, Youth and Worship Pastor of Lake Murray Community Church
Kirt Edwards, President of Freedom in Truth Ministries (trips to Turkey and T'stan)and former Pastor at Lake Murray
Chris Rader, Youth Pastor of Journey Community Church and former Associate Pastor at Lake Murray
Rollo Casiple, Senior Pastor of La Vina Community Church (Miami, FL) and former Youth and Worship Pastor at Lake Murray
Joe Murrell, Senior Pastor of Pine Valley Community Church (Pine Valley, CA)

So I encourage you, my dear readers, to use these Four Times, these Ember Days, to pray for the pastors in your life, those who guide your flock now and those who have in the past and continue to minister in other ways currently as well as those who may be called to the pastorate in the future. These church leaders need our prayers on a daily basis (I love that the Book of Common Prayer contains prayers for our pastors and leaders in government in both the Morning and the Evening Prayer Offices) and also a more concentrated time of prayer and fasting four times per year.

Will you join me?

PS: If you have specific pastors for whom you would like our family (and perhaps our readers) to pray for, please list them in the Comments section, and we will pray for them.

Grand Summer Plans

After a long 180 days (36 weeks) of homeschooling our four young persons, I am always itching to have a grand summer. Even if summer is my least favorite season, the free time has its compensations. I have time to write. Read. Garden. Beach days. Time with friends. Special projects.

I always have grand plans, plans I rarely realize. But without grand plans, nothing at all would happen all summer. I list these knowing that finishing them all will never happen. But what's the saying? "Aim at nothing and you'll be sure to hit it." Or something like that. So here are my Summer 2009 Grand Plans:

1. Write up my Intermediate Writing Class in book form, each lecture becoming
its own chapter. Either work with Brave Writer or set up my own site for
marketing.

2. Work on the family genealogy project I've been puttering with since last fall

3. Take the kids to my parents' beach house at the end of July for a week of inexpensive vacation, as well as assorted beach days and fun trips into San Diego

4. Work on gardening, big time.

5. Read at least two books from my "Want to Read" list on the sidebar.

6. Revise some NaPoWriMo poems and compose some new ones

7. Write more of my NaNoWriMo novel -- complete the entire rough draft

8. Clean out closets in my home for a yard sale

9. Organize my books

10. Comparison-shopping grocery list and financial plans

There. That should keep me quite busy this summer. I will be fortunate to complete half of these, but I do hope to make some real progress on each of these projects. The most important ones are the writing book and catching up on my reading. Writing looks like it will be the major focus this summer which suits me just fine -- it's the perfect thing to do on sultry afternoons when the mere idea of physical exertion is ridiculous. So we shall see how this summer progresses, once I finish grading MLA papers and get my own kids' grades submitted to our school. I may not even truly start "summer" until July, and we usually start back up in mid-August, so I really have only six weeks of vacation in which to work on these goals. We shall see....

Countdown to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

It's been a long wait. Too long. Half-Blood Prince was supposed to be in theatres back in November but the execs decided to move it back to July to make room for Twilight and to make the time between HBP and the release of the first half of Deathly Hallows in November 2010 shorter (second half will be released in May of 2011 by last report).

Still, it's been a long wait. Order of the Phoenix was extremely well-done and is my second-favorite of the HP films (Sorceror's Stone will always be my absolute favorite!). David Yates did a wonderful job with OOP, so I'm trusting to continue to do well with HBP and both halves of DH. The decision to make two films of Deathly Hallows was brilliant and really is entirely necessary, given the detailed subject matter and the tying up of all of the loose ends.

But I'm a little wary of Yates' Half-Blood Prince. Apparently the Burrow is going to be attacked, an event that did not happen in HBP at all -- it's apparently a ploy to add more action into this book which is rather quiet in many ways but which ends so spectacularly with the death of one of the major characters. I'll obviously withhold judgment until I see the film in 44 days or so, but I'm wary. Quite wary.

But I am looking forward to the next installment of the Harry Potter films even more than I am waiting for the new Twilight saga film, New Moon, due out in November. I'm just soooooo anticipating that final battle of Hogwarts at the end of the seventh book -- I can't wait to see it realized on film. Sigh. A very long wait we have for that one, too....

So, until July 15th, Potter fans!

Pentecost: The Promised Gift of the Holy Spirit

I've been so busy lately with MLA papers and conferences that my poor blog has been neglected. But today I hope to write at least two posts as several of them are swirling around in my head just now. And the first one I want to blog about (since when did "blog" become a verb?) is Pentecost.

I just do not understand something. Why don't evangelical churches celebrate Pentecost? Scripture tells is that the Gift Jesus promised His disciples has arrived: the Holy Spirit! We read Christ's promise in the 14th chapter of the Gospel According to Saint John, beginning at the 15th verse:

15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.... 26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you....(ESV)"

Then on the Feast of the Pentecost, with Jerusalem filled with Jews from around the known world, Christ fulfilled his promise fifty days after His Resurrection. We read in the second chapter of The Acts of the Apostles:

"2:1 When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested [1] on each one of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. 5 Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. 6 And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one was hearing them speak in his own language. 7 And they were amazed and astonished, saying, 'Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? 9 Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, 11 both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians—we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.' 12 And all were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, 'What does this mean?' 13 But others mocking said, 'They are filled with new wine'” (ESV).

Peter then preaches to the astounded visitors to Jerusalem (also in Act 2), quoting the prophecy of Joel hundreds of years past as well as passages from the Psalms of David while also relating what he and the other disciples witnessed of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection as well as the many sightings of Christ following His resurrection from the dead until His ascension to the right hand of the Living God. Peter concludes:

"32 This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses. 33 Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing" (Acts 2, ESV).

And then we read the response of the crowd listening to Peter:

"37 Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, 'Brothers, what shall we do?' 38 And Peter said to them, 'Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.' 40 And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, 'Save yourselves from this crooked generation.' 41 So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls" (Acts 2, ESV).

The events of this Pentecost were simply incredible, and it is from this amazing Gift of the Comforter, the Counselor, the Holy Spirit of God, that the Gospel of Christ first began to spread and the Church first began to form. Why evangelical churches do not celebrate Pentecost is a mystery to me. It always lands on a Sunday and thus it can be easily celebrated with Scripture readings, with praise songs and hymns about the Holy Spirit, with sermons grounded in the Holy Spirit, and perhaps even with baptisms since approximately 3,000 people were baptized and added to the Church on the first Pentecost after the Resurrection in Acts 2. Pentecost is a Biblical holy day, and we can celebrate it Biblically, too, with "psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with [our] heart[s]" (Ephesians 5:19, ESV).

In the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, one of the Collects (collective or public prayers) for Pentecost reads thus:

"Almighty and most merciful God, grant, we beseech thee, that by the indwelling of thy Holy Spirit, we may be enlightened and strengthened for thy service ; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the same Spirit ever, one God, world without end. Amen."

The Anglican Church has an interesting name for Pentecost: Whitsunday which comes from the white garments worn by those who are baptized this day, just as over 3,000 people were baptized on that first Pentecost in Acts 2. In the above hyperlink to the Catholic Encyclopedia entry of "Whitsunday," an interesting fact is given:

"Whitsunday, as a Christian feast, dates back to the first century, although there is no evidence that it was observed, as there is in the case of Easter; the passage in 1 Corinthians 16:8 probably refers to the Jewish feast. This is not surprising, for the feast, originally of only one day's duration, fell on a Sunday; besides it was so closely bound up with Easter that it appears to be not much more than the termination of Paschal tide [Eastertide]."

So why is this important Biblical Holy Day, celebrated from the very earliest days of the Christian Church, hardly mentioned in evangelical churches, including my own? I don't know. I simply don't get it. But I pray that the evangelical churches will indeed start to celebrate Biblical Holy Days more and more in the future, pulling on the rich, 2,000-year heritage of Pentecost/Whitsunday.