Author Archives: remcmahan

Advent 2024:  Passion and Dream

Advent Day Twenty, December 20, 2024 “The Christmas stories are not about a spectacular series of miraculous events that happened in the past that we are to believe in for the sake of going to heaven. Rather, they are about God’s passion, God’s dream, for a transformed earth.”  Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan, TheContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024:  Passion and Dream”

Advent 2024: See

Advent Day 19, December 19, 2024 As the days of Advent-waiting move us ever closer to the Light, I reflect on how we can continue to be Advent People who carry the light together, especially after the tree is taken down and the ornaments placed in their dusty boxes and the calendar flipped to 2025.ContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024: See”

Advent 2024: Fog

Advent Day 18, December 18, 2024 The above photo shows the view from my kitchen window yesterday morning. At this time of year, with the leaves gone, I can usually see the traffic below on one of the busiest roads into the city, but not yesterday. Fog snaked low across the valley before descending over the roadContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024: Fog”

Advent 2024: Caesar or Christ?

Advent Day 17, December 17, 2024 This Advent series began as an invitation to unity in a world that is fractured by war, political division, insatiable greed, power-seeking, and biases of every sort, from skin color to sexual orientation. It is, in fact, a world very like the one that the Light/Love/Christ entered some two-thousandContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024: Caesar or Christ?”

Advent 2024:  Candlelight

Advent Day 16, December 16, 2024 “Light your candles quietly, such candles as you possess, wherever you are.”  Father Alfred Delp If you’ve followed my blog at all these past few years, you can’t miss the fact that I love candlelight. In fact, I deLIGHT in the light, especially in these dark winter months. This morningContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024:  Candlelight”

Advent 2024: Gaudete Sunday

Advent Day 15, December 15, 2024 For those who incorporate an Advent wreath into their Advent traditions, today is the day to light the pink candle, the Joy Candle. Known by its Latin term, Gaudete Sunday, this third Joyful Sunday in Advent reminds us that we are almost “there,” that the waiting for the Christ-LightContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024: Gaudete Sunday”

Advent 2024: JOY

Advent Day 13, December 13, 2024 “We need a little Christmas now.”  Songwriter Jerry Herman If you’re looking for a prayer app, let me suggest Lectio365, a 10 minute devotional resource composed by leaders of Prayer 24/7, an international Christian movement focusing on prayer, mission, and justice. My reflection this morning is motivated by yesterday’sContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024: JOY”

Advent 2024: The Long Goodbye

Advent Day 12, December 12, 2024 Today marks the 10th anniversary of my mother’s death. She died at 94 after a long decline caused by dementia and Parkinson’s disease which left her a “two-assist,” an impersonal term meaning that it required two people to move her from her bed anywhere else, even though she only weighedContinueContinue reading “Advent 2024: The Long Goodbye”