Advent Traditions

[honorentheos]

Hi Jersey Girl,

You may find this old thread interesting.

viewtopic.php?p=2156626#p2156626

[msnobody]

Our church and past church always has suggested Advent resources for the family, but I can’t say we’ve ever done it in our family.

Do you have any idea why in church sometimes the Advent candles are purple, pink, and white(If I recall correctly)? This year at church, ours are oil filled clear candles.

[Jersey Girl]

I shall return! Life started getting a little life-y!

[Jersey Girl]

Yes I do know what the candle colors mean.

Cliff hanger!

[msnobody]

Yes I do know what the candle colors mean.

Cliff hanger!

You’re leaving me with a lot of cliff hangers lately.
Don’t make me Google it.

As an aside, I attended a Maundy Thursday service at a UMC church. I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned this before. When it came to the stripping of the sanctuary part at the end, I was left absolutely intrigued by the silence inside as contrasted by the noise of the world outside. My thoughts went to thoughts of Revelation 20, and maybe verse 7 in particular, and the parallel of Revelation finally, and swiftly set into motion, no going back. He’s coming back, Jersey, he’s coming back! \o/ \o/ \o/

I think we keep our minds stuck in time and space, and don’t often enough consider eternity. I suppose it is understandable though, as we are here in time and space for the time being.

[Jersey Girl]

Is there a special meaning in "Evensong"? And Chap are you familiar with the Prayer of Examen?

"Evensong" is the common name for the Anglican service formally called 'Evening Prayer'. Despite the suggestion that there must be some singing (and there usually is) the service is perfectly properly conducted if it is simply said. It is a pretty old name, since (I quote from memory) there is a verse in Chaucer including the words "If Morwesong [=Morningsong] and Evensong accord" i.e. if what one says remains the same as time passes.

Oh Chaucer. Olde English poet. I don't know much about him but I like knowing what the words mean. Thanks for that information.

On the prayer you cite, which is I think part of Jesuit spirituality,

Yes it is. I did a not-so-deep-dive on the order and they have a long history of inflicting slavery on folks to (according to them) was so they could literally have a captive audience to evangelize. In more contemporary times it seems they've made contributions to science, I think tech was mentioned, and charity. Not sure what to think about that. I know that all denominations develop as long as they exist and humans are running them! Still using the prayer as a construct to review my day though.

these things are nowadays of purely academic interest to me because I no longer thing that there is any non-human personal being out there to whom prayers can be addressed. Still, that does not mean I have forgotten the cultural and aesthetic significance of what I did as a believer. After all, I am still a human being, and for me religion is nowadays just some things that some human beings choose to do.

I know, Chap. You have a wealth of information to share and I appreciate it. I think that the cultural and aesthetic significance (as you refer to it) can be transformative believer or not. We're not obligated to declare a faith when moved by a transformative poem, book, or film. In much the same way I think anyone can experience transformative "genre" or even trancendence with or without God belief as the lens we with which we view the world. I don't think we're meant to put ourselves into a box. The boxes change over time because we humans change over time.

[Jersey Girl]

Thanks, Whiskey! I think it's been of benefit to me so far. I've been doing daily Bible studies from this ministry for possibly 4-5 years now. Just finished up Ecclesiastes which was more relevant than I anticipated. This is the first and only year I've ever seen them offer a Christmas related study in December. Don't know why they didn't do it before now. It's a free app you can put on your phone or do it on the website. You don't need to purchase the study guide. I think I've gotten 3 study guides including this one.

I knew I wanted to kickstart my Bible study space so it all came together. This study is also to help us keep our mind on the birth of Christ instead of all the "things" we tend to do this time of year.

I'm aiming for Passover and Hanukkah next year. If I can't eat the food involved I'll just improvise.

I passed a Bible Study sign recently. It was on a property that had Lamas in the front yard. Part of me thought that no matter the topic, these people would be interesting to spend an evening with. I hope you are doing with this with some fun and funny folks.

Maybe those are granola boho type Bible students! I'd have to go see what the Llamas are about. We had Alpacas right down the street (dirt road) here. Lots of Alpacas, Llamas, Ostriches,and various cattle around here. The owners put those hanging IKEA chairs in their trees and would sit out there while the Alapacas roamed around. So peaceful. Oh and I have to tell this. One of the goat farmers in our area hires out his goats as a mowing service. It's true!

Whiskey I'm doing my study time alone. I couldn't do a group study if I wanted to. I'm extremely introverted. Listening to everyone talking would derail my train of thought. I'm better at one:one interaction so I can go deep with folks or in this case, to go deep and reflect on what I'm learning about. Idle chit chat drives me up the wall. Never liked group study in school either. I'd always end up leading the group because other students wouldn't step up and then I'd end up having to accept a lesser grade when others didn't follow through on their group assignment. All that to say, I prefer to work alone.

Learning a lot from this Advent study so far. The comparisons of Old Testament and New Testament scriptures are fascinating to me.

[Jersey Girl]

I grew up LDS, and celebrating Advent is not part of the LDS tradition. I game with some folks in Germany and hasn’t realized the significance of the season. One of them explained the significance, although he is not a believer. It was a good reminder that how I experience the world is not representative of anyone else’s experience.

I see a lot of that type of what...lack of awareness going on today, actually. I had no real idea what Advent was about until I opted in to this study which is why I'm doing it. It gives me a chance to learn something new and fresh. Until this study I thought Advent was a series of count down to Christmas calendars for children where you open a door and maybe get a piece of candy. Now they've even got high end cosmetic and perfume ones. The prices are outrageous! For the love of money...too much of that going around today, too.

Thanks for reminding me of that hymn, Chap. It is beautiful.

In my growing up church and even in school at the time I learned to sing some carols/hymns in Latin. Any time I hear Oh Come All Ye Faithful I automatically hear it in Latin. Did you have that in your early experiences, too?

When I was a child I taught myself to sing Silent Night in German...a nod to my German roots, and I hear that in German today still.

If I get to go to candle light services on Christmas Eve I love it if I get a chance to sing it in those languages without looking at the screen just like I can with the rest of the hymns.

[Jersey Girl]

I grew up LDS, and celebrating Advent is not part of the LDS tradition. I game with some folks in Germany and hasn’t realized the significance of the season. One of them explained the significance, although he is not a believer. It was a good reminder that how I experience the world is not representative of anyone else’s experience.

The most valuable thing about this thread for me is finding out that Advent is a wider tradition and not just a series of gimmicky (albeit fun) calendars.

I was just mentioning those calendars in another reply! That's all I thought Advent was about. Opening little doors on a count down calendar and get a piece of candy. And...as I was also mentioning there are some high end pretty pricey Advent calendars going around today. I bet you could even get a Advent with the Kardashian calendar that costs about a bazillion bucks.

Afterthought: Jersey Girl often self-deprecates her knowledge of things, but I can't count the number of times I've learned basic stuff from her. We all have our areas of experience and knowledge, which excludes all other areas. Opportunity cost, and all that.

I know some things...but isn't sharing knowlege, experience, and view points the actual point of interacting with each other in society and in this online community? That's how I see it anyway.

Makes me wonder what the right balance of feeling good about what know with understanding the breadth of your own ignorance really is. I guess you can spend a good number of cycles contemplating both.

If you ask me, there's not enough time in a whole lifetime to learn what we would like to. I can think of so many topics I want to know more about and art classes I would like to take*. I like being able to pick up information here on the board but so...in terms of Bible study, I'd really like to study Judaism and would prefer it to be from Messianic Jews but that's not a requirement. Some things I learned about the development of Judaism (independent study...searching around everywhere) is that some sects of Judiasm were forbidden to read the Prophets so they wouldn't be able to fathom Jesus as the Messiah as he is presented in the New Testament since their missing gaps of information where other sects DO have the Prophets so...I'm guessing that those who are familiar with the Prophets might be folks who develop into Messianic Judaism. There's SO much more to it than just that though.

I didn't understand until I started watching The Chosen that the Sanhedrin was a group with political clout. How would I know that if it weren't ever taught in church? Either it wasn't taught in church or I was too busy passing notes to my friends.

Yes so pick an area of study and you'd have to devote your literal whole life to get close to knowing it all about anything and considering that new information emerges and then you have to figure out how that fits your previously held notions and...we can only do what we can do with the time we have.

*This is a little off the wall but in the art association I'm a member of one of the artisans offered to teach me stained glass only he's an elderly man (PhD in Ornithology!) and is losing his ability to use his hands so that's not going to happen. Meanwhile in the same organization I've now got a connection to someone who teaches actual pottery classes. Both art forms have been on my "list" of things to learn for decades.

Way to post off topic on your own thread, Jersey Girl.

[Jersey Girl]

The most valuable thing about this thread for me is finding out that Advent is a wider tradition and not just a series of gimmicky (albeit fun) calendars.

Afterthought: Jersey Girl often self-deprecates her knowledge of things, but I can't count the number of times I've learned basic stuff from her. We all have our areas of experience and knowledge, which excludes all other areas. Opportunity cost, and all that.

Makes me wonder what the right balance of feeling good about what know with understanding the breadth of your own ignorance really is. I guess you can spend a good number of cycles contemplating both.

Same. I have often benefited from Jersey Girl’s knowledge and experience. I think that learning how much I don’t know is invigorating — there’s always something new to dive into.

I don't even know what knowledge or experience I could possibly have to benefit anyone. I mean that. You looked at your credentials lately?

That last is exactly where I'm coming from. Diving in. Learning about something new and fresh. What are we here for if not to grow? So in this case it's the pursuit of a new topic of Bible study. New!

To boldly go where no Jersey Girl has ever gone before.