two cups of tea

I have read so many fantastic books 2008, old and new. Here are a few that are outstanding:

Fiction:

Midnights Children by Salman Rushdie

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostevsky

Nonfiction:

Let your life speak by Parker J. Palmer

The bookseller of Kabul by Åsne Seierstad

Biography:

a billion lives by Jan Egeland

Theology:

The CS lewis book on the bible by Schriftman,

Christian thought revisited by Gonzalez

Doxology by Geoffrey Wainwright

The new Christians by Tony Jones

The fingerprints of God by Robert Farrar Capon

What are your top books this year?

the history of “Jul”

The celebration of God becoming human is celebrated in what the English world calls Christmas. Here in Scandinavia we don’t call it Christmas, we call it “Jul”. Jul has originally nothing to do with Christ.

Yule or Yule-tide is a winter festival that was initially celebrated by the historical Germanic peoples as a pagan religious festival, though it was later absorbed into, and equated with, the Christian festival of Christmas.

Christianity transformed and put new meaning into old religion all over the known world. Examples of this is how the church did this is how the word advent is turned into a christian holiday. Augustus introduced the advent of Augustus to celebrate the fact that he was the son of God 17 years before the birth of Jesus. (Read more about it here)

Christianity had a hard time

Here in Scandinavia the church never were able to remove the word Yule or Jul as we say today from what we called the birth of Jesus. Originally it has nothing to do with Christianity.

The festival was originally celebrated from late December to early January on a date determined by the lunar Germanic calendar. The festival was placed on December 25 when the Christian (Julian) calendar was adopted.

Some historians claim that the celebration is connected to the Wild Hunt or was influenced by Saturnalia, the Roman winter festival. The term “Yule” is still used in the Nordic Countries and to a lesser extent in English speaking countries to refer to Christmas. Customs such as the Yule log, Yule goat, Yule boar, Yule singing, and others stem from Yule. In modern times, Yule is observed as a cultural festival and also with religious rites by some Christians and by some Neopagans.

Merry Christ mass

Have a good mass, a mass where Christ is celebrated. Where the fact that God became man is a story we now all can be a part of. Have a blessed Christ mass or a “god Jul” as we say here in Scandinavia.

I have been reading and following the Catholic priest; George V. Coyne lately. His thoughts and ideas on God are very similar to those of Irenaeus. I propose in another blog post, that this is a Christianity which was lost to the dominant type A and B theologies. Read more about this here.

Coyne says the following:

“Religious believers must move away from the notion of a dictator God, a Newtonian God who made the universe as a watch that ticks along regularly.”

He proposes to describe God’s relationship with the universe as that of a parent with a child, with God nurturing, preserving and enriching its individual character. “God should be seen more as a parent or as one who speaks encouraging and sustaining words.”

He stresses that the theory of Intelligent Design diminishes God into “an engineer who designs systems rather than a lover.”

“God in his infinite freedom continuously creates a world which reflects that freedom at all levels of the evolutionary process to greater and greater complexity,” he said. “God lets the world be what it will be in its continuous evolution. He does not intervene, but rather allows, participates, loves.”

Richard Dawkins has a great talk with coyne which is posted on youtube. I recommend watching seven parts of this youtube series.

The wonderful Martti Ahtisaari received the Nobel peace price today.

I want to pull out a few things from the speech he gave in Oslo today.

Religion and war

For many people, tensions between religions have provided an easy explanation for the intractability of the Middle East crisis. I cannot accept this view. During my career I have seen many crises in which religion has been used as a weapon or as an instrument for prolonging the conflict. Religions themselves are, however, peace-loving. They can also be a constructive force in peace-building, and this also applies to the Middle East.

A question of will

“Peace is a question of will. All conflicts can be settled, and there are no excuses for allowing them to become eternal.”

Peace must involve everybody

“In a conflict, one party can always claim victory, but building peace must involve everybody: the weak and the powerful, the victors and the vanquished, men and women, young and old.”

Fight against poverty

“I call on all governments to remain committed to their stated goals of eradicating poverty. … If nothing is done, we will be creating an effective breeding ground for crime, instability and war as young people lose all hope. I believe that the fight against poverty is also the most effective measure of countering terrorism in the long term.”

Middle East

“Many have come to believe that the Middle East knot can never be untied. I do not share this belief. All crises, including the one in the Middle East, can be resolved. The solution would require a contribution from all the parties involved as well as the international community as a whole.”

Congratulations

Congratulations and thankyou for the great inspiration and leadership you have shown us. May we follow in your footsteps.

Read the full speech below:

Continue reading Martti Ahtisaari and religion

The book of Job is the oldest book of Scripture and it asks one of the oldest questions, ‘Is there hope?’ ‘Is there hope for a tree cut down? …Yes. At the mere scent of water it will bud and grow green shoots.’

From the album : hope for a tree cut down.

Beautiful, free and recommended as this years christmas music!

Check out the website here

Download it for free here

If you are familiar with the Emerging Church crowd, this is a must see.

Watch this and be inspired!

Watch and you will see there is hope for the world. Beautiful!

Check out the choirs website here.

I saw a documentary about Amos Oz tonight. You can watch it here.

He says the following towards the end of the movie;

“we live now in a world where people work harder than they should be working in order to make more money than they really need, in order to buy things they don’t really want in order to impress people they don’t really like. this will lead to a certain reaction, and this reaction will brings back some kind of voluntary collectivist spirit.”

Amos Oz

Read more about this remarkable writer here, and read an interview with newsweek here.

My friend “Brown”(also known as Ryan Dalton) in Cape Town, invited me to be a part of his 365 days of activism blog/project.

Head over here to check it out.

Listen to him here.

and watch Ryan talk about it here: