Yes, it's a bumper sticker and car magnet all rolled up into one. BLESSINGS ALL.
Tuesday, December 25, 2018
Friday, December 21, 2018
Merry Christmas 2018
Merry Christmas
December 25, 2018
Pam and I wish all of you a Joyous Christmas and Blessed New Year.
At right is the cover of the Christmas cards we bought this year. It was drawn by a nun at the Mississippi Abbey, in Dubuque, Iowa where the sisters make scrumptious candy year round. One of their candy pages is here: Monastery Candy. They a great variety of gift candy including baskets. Under their "Religious Goods" category they have one product: the card at right.
I'm at an age where eating candy, especially, chocolate meltaways, mints, fruitcake, truffles and "fudgy chocolate sauce" forces me into the confessional. These sisters must have a full time priest and several confession booths on the premises.
On the back of the card is this verse:
My mother, my daughter, life-giving Eve,Do not be ashamed, do not grieve.The former things have passed away,Our God has brought us to a New Day.See, I am with Child.Through whom al will be reconciled.O Eve! My sister, my friend.We will rejoice togetherForeverLife without end.
The scene is what theologians call the Proto-Evangelium (the link is to a brief Wikipedia article). But if you're into Hebrew, here's a deep dive page that explains much more.
Also suggested by the image is what the Early Church Fathers (e.g. Justin Martyr and Irenaeus) called Mary—the New Eve. For it was through Eve's disobedience that sin and death entered the world, but it is through Mary's obedience (her fiat—"Let it be done unto me.") that salvation ad eternal life entered the world through her son, Jesus Christ. More Here.
One of the more important Masses held each year in Catholic Churches is the Christ Mass, celebrated on Christmas Eve. It celebrates Mary's obedience and Christ's birth. It occurred to me some years back that this celebration is proBably where the phrase "Merry Christmas" originated. Except it was spelled different. So, I made a bumper sticker:
Stan Williams
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