A girl with a thorn in her side

Zoya, 22 | Russian | Lutheran | Would be delighted to talk to you or pray for you

[artthatgivesmefeelings]

Etienne Azambre (French, 1859-1935) Saint Cecilia of Rome, n.d.

[nn-ee-zz]

The first depiction of Mary and Jesus

[nn-ee-zz]

Before thousands of artworks made by hundreds of masters in the span of centuries, it’s clear that the first drawing was made by the hands of a child who just loved his mom

[stcecilia111]

[technofeudalism]

fnb memphis

[theinwardlight]

Jesus is Lord, and everything else is bullshit.

Stanley Hauerwas

[theinwardlight]

The likeness we bear to Jesus is more essential than our notions of him.

Lucretia Mott, 1860

[beguines]

Who among us will celebrate Christmas correctly? Whoever finally lays down all power, all honor, all reputation, all vanity, all arrogance, all individualism beside the manger; whoever remains lowly and lets God alone be high; whoever looks at the child in the manger and sees the glory of God precisely in his lowliness.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas

[hymnsofheresy]

“In my eternity, and in my non-eternity, / and in my annihilation, you were found.”

— Al-Hallaj  (via godinourhands)

[fear-not-beloved]

“What a joyous mystery is your presence within me, in that intimate sanctuary of my soul where I can always find you, even when I do not feel your presence. Of what importance is feeling? Perhaps you are all the closer when I feel you less.”

- St. Elizabeth of the Trinity

[that-catholic-shinobi]

Protestants outnumber Catholics. We can't all be wrong! You'd have to be a retarded faggot to think catholics are Christian.

Might be more of you but we were first.

[ourdaddyofsorrows]

we Protestants can learn a thing or too from our Catholic brothers

[electronicgallery]

The Nativity by Gari Melchers

[ourdaddyofsorrows]

Don’t quite understand how ur like be kind, endlessly kind, but next post is like that doesn’t extend to ppl who love the same sex :/

have a nice day

Don’t confuse love or kindness with tolerance and acceptance of all. I ache for people who have pain in their life, and the LGBT folks definitely are one of these people. They won’t find healing by mans ways, only God knows what’s right for us. It may be hard to accept, but we will be better off in the long run. And I am a living proof of that : I used to be a lesbian but gave up that lifestyle for god. It wasn’t easy, but now I’m happier than ever

[kweza-deactivated20221020]

[beguines]

Kate Cayley, from “Lent”

[thescienceofapologetics]

[nowhere-herenow]

“If my sinfulness appears to me to be in any way smaller or less detestable in comparison with the sins of others, I am still not recognizing my sinfulness at all. … How can I possibly serve another person in unfeigned humility if I seriously regard his sinfulness as worse than my own?”

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

[allieinarden]

The God we come to know in Genesis is a very physical presence. On some level we can’t quite understand, He’s resting from his labor, He’s forming Adam and the beasts from the slime of the earth, breathing the breath of life into Adam. His place in His own creation is palpable–He’s there with them in Eden. After Adam and Eve make their biggest mistake, we have this: “And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.” (Genesis 3:8) It’s evening, and the sun is going down, and they can hear the sound of God walking in His garden, and they’re very afraid. For the first time they’re out of place in this picture. 

Before they leave for their exile, “the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.” (Genesis 3:21) He lets them leave His garden, the place where He and they are close as in no other place, where they’ll have to suffer and toil and bring food from the ground all by themselves. But first he makes them their clothes. 

By the time we meet Cain and Abel, God is still speaking to man. But only speaking. Cain, unlike his parents, isn’t terrified by the thunder of God’s footsteps. There is only a voice: “Then the LORD said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?” (Genesis 4:9) In other words, there is no sign that God is physically with His creations any longer. A voice–no more.

And as the Old Testament continues, the communication between God and man grows gradually more distant as Man continues to distance himself from God. In no time only certain special people, prophets, can hear the voice of God. Finally we have God among us again, in the Ark of the Covenant, the Holy of Holies–but no one can touch it. God is with His people and will never leave them, yet there is a clearly drawn divide between God and Man which cannot be broached.

All right and proper, really. What would you expect? 

But then, then. 

Jesus comes. Appears in the womb of a woman. Is born, held by His mother, lives among His family and His friends. Works in a carpenter’s shop for years. Goes out into the world, walks for miles, feels weariness and hunger and misery and finally death. We kill him. And at that moment, “the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And the earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many. When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, ‘Truly this was the Son of God!’” (Matthew 27:51-4)

We have blown it. God wanted to be with us, God came back to us just as he was in Eden, and we killed him. Surely this would be the final severing? The last possible blasphemy? The thing that makes even God leave us forever?

Right, but isn’t it strange that at this moment of all moments in history, the veil of the temple has been torn from top to bottom? That just when you’d expect the barrier between God and Man to harden and become insurmountable, it has been rendered completely ineffective? What do we make of this?

Never mind that. Three days pass, His tomb is found open and His body gone, His friend Mary Magdalene is very upset:

And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”  (John 20:11-7)

Something is happening. Here is a woman searching for God exactly as desperately as Adam and Eve hid from Him. And He catches up to her. God. The gardener. Walking in His garden. He’s come to find her. 

The very first human being He sees and speaks to, to tell her not to cling to Him because she’s got to go tell the rest of them, all of them, that He’s going to His father and our father, His God and our God, because the barrier between Himself and us has been broken for all eternity and He’s with us now for the remainder of time. 

Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? 

If we can’t find Eden, it’s because we’re in it.