Saturday, January 27, 2007
Happy Belated Birthday Kevan!
A little birdie told us that our good friend Kevan W. (also known as jimminy_c) just had a birthday! We hope you had an amazing day and that this year will bring many blessings, fun, friends and other good stuff.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
birthday wishes
hi friends
Today is (mom's) Lisa's birthday ... 38 ...so happy birthday and god bless your day!
-sierra, brett, carlin, darrin
Today is (mom's) Lisa's birthday ... 38 ...so happy birthday and god bless your day!
-sierra, brett, carlin, darrin
Sunday Services
Starting Sunday, February 4 we will be having Communion and Worship services every Sunday at 10:00 a.m. at our usual location - 323 4th St. South, Lethbridge. Prior to this date there are no regularly scheduled services. See you Feb. 4!
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
miners and manners
Amongst the lies we men tell ourselves that are designed to make us a king ...or at least feel like a king, there are sometimes foundational truths that make the lie possible by giving it something firm to sit on. Maybe "lie" is too strong a word to use ... "illusion" might feel a little less severe and allow us to admit we do this. the illusions we hold (or lies we tell ourselves) usually have something to do with our yearning to do something great. think about it for a moment. "I'll be in the NHL one day"... "some day I'll front the biggest rock band ever and change the course of rock and roll"... "I'll go down in history as the greatest PGA golfer"... "I'll save Africa"... "I'm the greatest lover since Casanova"... "I'll be wealthier than ...." "I am a fighter truly unbeatable..." and on and on they go.
Men get along really well with each other when they allow themselves to tell those lies to each other and each guy respects the other guys lies, each guy believes his own, and yet each knows full well that there are many lies alive in the room and everyone is cool with that. More than the cold Coors Light packed perfectly in Povey's homemade wooden first aid box, this sacred ritual keeps me and all the other guys on our Jail hockey team coming out and staying in the dressing room for an hour after every game -it certainly isn't our win-loss record that keeps us coming out!
usually when we as men are busted living smack dab in the middle of our lie (usually by the woman closest to us) we protest and are offended that someone has the audacity to think we would lie or live in an illusion. I think there are two reasons for this objection and protest. One is that many of the illusions and lies are not really as big as the one's I mentioned above and are actually not that far from reach -at least in our own minds. The other reason is that the foundational truth the lie sits on is really true and we can stretch the kernel of truth into nearly anything. As well, there might be a third reason we object to someone bursting our illusion bubble and I wonder if it has to do with the thing I have noticed about the benefit of having those lies around. They always seem to provide the occasion, or project, or activity that allow men to hang around together without having to say to each other that "we want to hang around together". In other words either we are self perceived kings who are better off alone -or just clumsy and don't know how to hang around each other without some goofy project or activity that brings us together without the focus being on something silly like our emotions or feelings. No offence meant here to anyone, but sometimes the women in our lives just don't get this about us. That's because these are man-manners and they are built into the fabric of our creation as men.
o.k, here's one of the foundational truths about myself I'll tell you that I can prove and I'll leave it to you to judge what I build on it. I am a registered Free Miner in the Province of British Columbia! I could pull out my Free Miner's certificate and I can go online to claim territory I've staked out in B.C. that I can purchase as MY claim entitling me to rights to the minerals I find in the ground. Once claimed they are mine and nobody else's. My Dad is also a Free Miner like me, as was his Dad before him (my grandpa) and likely his dad too back in England, and so on, but that's not my 
point. Me and my Dad spend time poking around in the mountains prospecting for gold, hunting for obscure creeks and panning in them when we find them. I got the miner's certificate last year for a trip the two of us made to northern B.C. and the Yukon to prospect. I am renewing the certificate each year and each year we plan trips to various creeks, now mostly in Southern B.C. as 36 hours along the Alaska highway (one way) no longer has the same appeal it had the first time. Cool hobby isn't it.
The thing I tell myself now that my foundational truth (I am a Free Miner) is in place is that one day I'm going to find the mother lode. Me! and my dad tells himself the same thing -I know he does. If he says he doesn't he's lying! He believes it more than anyone could. It's the story and the plan we share together, tell ourselves and each other... that one day, after enough panning and poking around we'll look where no one has and find the gold that the good Lord has placed in the earth and has sat waiting for a gazillion years for us to come and put our name on the claim.
Meanwhile, we pour over maps, we bought a good GPS and computer mapping program, we buy rubber boots, we talk to Uncle Hank about his diamond drill and how we'll need to pull it back into the mountains to a promising site, we design the best ways to load the back of Dad's Rhino so the shovels fit, and we argue over how much extra gas we need to pack in a jerry can for the ATV versus room for the chainsaw. Then Dad does his "witching" thing with a rubber hose and gold nugget wrapped onto it either towards a direction in the mountains or even over a map, 
and we argue over that since I tend to favor praying and asking God where we should look rather than his voodoo shit with a hose and a map. Then, since I've hurt his feelings, he goes and mixes a strong crown royal and disappears for a while. When he comes back (well lit) we pull out the map again and he tells me how proud he is that I "became a minister" and that perhaps I am right that God will lead us to the gold. that's when we go back to packing the rhino and truck and oh yeah, the shotgun since he's terrified of bears and I can't handle him being twitchy all day when we're back in the mountains. when plans are finalized and everything packed we know we are ready to get going 
early the next day. For us this is the ritual before the ritual of actually going into the mountains on any of our trips.
I should tell you it wasn't always this way or this good with my dad. They divorced when I was 10 and we had very little actual contact for the next 25 years except for occasional things like graduations, my wedding, and a little more often when our kids came along. Our Yukon trip broke the ice only last year and.... well.... you know, I guess it's complicated between fathers and sons at the best of times never-mind when you are really only getting aquainted and that as grown men! I've never really felt anger towards him, mostly gratitude when I'd see him followed by some sense of sadness when he left again because I still really didn't know him and whenever he'd leave again, it reminded me of the hole in my soul I still had because of him. But this last year thanks to my miracle working little sister we had
occasion to really have some heart to heart talks where we told him we fully forgive him for being missing all those years and are just happy to be able to hang around so much now and perhaps only now we can understand what was in his mind that caused him to feel the need to run. He cried. I told Lisa I don't have a clue what the hell to do next, and she said relax you're both learning only now how to be around each other.
He lived with us for four months this summer which was awesome, weird, awkward, funny, complicating, and felt for me a lot like a railway accident constantly about to happen, yet you want to keep going because you like the ride and hope you can avoid the wreck. I remember when Carlin was born feeling terrified because I had no certainty on how to be a dad. After 15 years of being a father I don't fear that anymore but for the first time this summer I found myself realizing at 38 that I had no fricking clue about how to be a son. in 16 years of ministry I'd done loads of Bible studies, sermons, summer camp devotionals on the father heart of God and I'd read many books on it.... I could say a lot about God as a Father, but I knew absolutely nothing about the son-ship of men. Nor did I have a clue how minute by minute to be a son
myself. I guess that's why I felt so awkward during those four months, he felt it too I could tell because he kept his bottle of Crown Royal handy so as to turn to it when he needed to take the edge off his own feelings of inadequacy or uncertainty. We found a rhythm after a while, and sure enough less crown royal was needed. Even amidst the awkwardness, it truly was a good summer and in a real sense the gift of God for both of us to get to really know each other (He's almost 60) for the first time ever.
We each kept our Free miners certificates and maps handy however, and would pull them out now and again when we didn't know what else to say so we'd stir up the conversation about where we would next go panning and how to get there. we made plans about buying a good canvas wall tent so we could really work a claim for days on end and drill a few samples with the diamond drill. Our current dilemma is how to get a hold of a small track hoe or tractor with a rear hoe bucket in order to dig down to the important three feet of overlay that sits on top of
bedrock where most placer (pronounced "PLASS-er) gold is found. Since we go back far enough into the mountains by ATV the hoe is too slow because of it's tracks. But, and this is important, if a guy gets a hold of one of those little Kubota diesel tractors with a rear hoe bucket, then one guy can drive the rhino with the little ATV trailer loaded with our prospectors gear, followed by the other guy driving the tractor. We thought we could put a few jerry cans of diesel fuel in the front bucket of the tractor solving the space problem of where to put tractor fuel. That way Dad and I wouldn't need to argue much and swear at each other over the lost packing space taken up by fuel. We agreed it was a brilliant idea and would set us up to do enough digging to get a good idea on how much placer gold was in a claim and indicate if we should pull the diamond drill there on 
the next trip to do some drilling. Dad figured he could do the digging since he does it for a living (oilpatch guy) and he is an expert on reclamation which in B.C. is important as you must leave the ground exactly the way you found it after you dig. The other thing is that he insisted I could then man the shotgun since there would certainly be a grizzly bear hiding only thirty feet away waiting for the time to charge given all the noise we were making with diesel engines, chainsaws, arguing etc! These are important discussions you know.... and worth the occasional argument in pursuit of the dream of the mother-lode.
man-manners have their important God-assigned place in the heirarchy of creation. They are the crucial oil that smoothens the machinery of men interacting together.... it's true with fathers and sons and its true with men in general. Some people might be tempted to call them lies and illusions or show-offy male competitiveness -comparing who is actually the bigger legend in their own minds. But those people forget how much we need those man-manners. Without them I'm not sure we know how to really interact with each other. I'm not saying that we don't tell each other the truth... not at all... especially between good friends and certainly amongst Christian men. But I've noticed that I often find it harder having good friendships of any depth with Christian men because somehow the ridiculous and dishonest church circles we were dragged into taught us that to be godly men we should not engage in exaggeration, or unrealistic dreaming, and instead should only speak biblical truth to each other. I have no issue with talking biblical truth (certainly given my profession), but have you ever noticed that Christian men often don't get the chance to talk about some of the real issues going on in our lives because we feel tied to this forced "niceness" that renders us unable to talk for example about the latest stunt by the notorious workplace idiot who everyone knows was only promoted because of his ass-kissing skills and not because of merit or trust given to him by the other guys? Sometimes I find myself more at ease with the non-churchgoing guys who know this and feel free to say it than the church guys like us who were told never to talk like that and consequently never really bond because the necessary glue of real life issues was never brought up. Man-manners is what we do in light of those problems that we encounter in daily life that help us all to still realize our greatness and the fact that we still need to be kings, if only in the eyes of other men who know this secret and respect it since we allow it for them too. Man-manners is what allows us to be kings around other kings without needing to steal each other's kingdoms and defend our own.
So I am enjoying owning my Free Miners Certificate and that two kings like my Dad and I will spend important time together in search of the mother-lode, and in knowing it is only a matter of time until we find it and become wealthy beyond our wildest dreams, take care of a lot of people, he'll finally find a damsel in distress to rescue (in actuality it will be the reverse) and I'll go on leaping tall cathedrals in a single bound. When he's gone one day I'll be really glad for the time together planning trips, packing atv's, panning creeks, arguing over fuel, and marking up maps because it is the only way a clumsy son knows how to enjoy his clumsy father when both don't know what to do next. The other thing I'll do is carry on what turns out to be a family thing that goes back many generations and is in the blood and connects the line of kings in this family. I see it in Dad's face when he's prospecting -he's honoring grandpa and he feels the connection that began when he was taught how to look for gold as a child. It just seems to be this way with men.... our manners are unique with one another and probably it should be that way since it is unique amongst kings.
Men get along really well with each other when they allow themselves to tell those lies to each other and each guy respects the other guys lies, each guy believes his own, and yet each knows full well that there are many lies alive in the room and everyone is cool with that. More than the cold Coors Light packed perfectly in Povey's homemade wooden first aid box, this sacred ritual keeps me and all the other guys on our Jail hockey team coming out and staying in the dressing room for an hour after every game -it certainly isn't our win-loss record that keeps us coming out!
usually when we as men are busted living smack dab in the middle of our lie (usually by the woman closest to us) we protest and are offended that someone has the audacity to think we would lie or live in an illusion. I think there are two reasons for this objection and protest. One is that many of the illusions and lies are not really as big as the one's I mentioned above and are actually not that far from reach -at least in our own minds. The other reason is that the foundational truth the lie sits on is really true and we can stretch the kernel of truth into nearly anything. As well, there might be a third reason we object to someone bursting our illusion bubble and I wonder if it has to do with the thing I have noticed about the benefit of having those lies around. They always seem to provide the occasion, or project, or activity that allow men to hang around together without having to say to each other that "we want to hang around together". In other words either we are self perceived kings who are better off alone -or just clumsy and don't know how to hang around each other without some goofy project or activity that brings us together without the focus being on something silly like our emotions or feelings. No offence meant here to anyone, but sometimes the women in our lives just don't get this about us. That's because these are man-manners and they are built into the fabric of our creation as men.
o.k, here's one of the foundational truths about myself I'll tell you that I can prove and I'll leave it to you to judge what I build on it. I am a registered Free Miner in the Province of British Columbia! I could pull out my Free Miner's certificate and I can go online to claim territory I've staked out in B.C. that I can purchase as MY claim entitling me to rights to the minerals I find in the ground. Once claimed they are mine and nobody else's. My Dad is also a Free Miner like me, as was his Dad before him (my grandpa) and likely his dad too back in England, and so on, but that's not my 
point. Me and my Dad spend time poking around in the mountains prospecting for gold, hunting for obscure creeks and panning in them when we find them. I got the miner's certificate last year for a trip the two of us made to northern B.C. and the Yukon to prospect. I am renewing the certificate each year and each year we plan trips to various creeks, now mostly in Southern B.C. as 36 hours along the Alaska highway (one way) no longer has the same appeal it had the first time. Cool hobby isn't it.
The thing I tell myself now that my foundational truth (I am a Free Miner) is in place is that one day I'm going to find the mother lode. Me! and my dad tells himself the same thing -I know he does. If he says he doesn't he's lying! He believes it more than anyone could. It's the story and the plan we share together, tell ourselves and each other... that one day, after enough panning and poking around we'll look where no one has and find the gold that the good Lord has placed in the earth and has sat waiting for a gazillion years for us to come and put our name on the claim.
Meanwhile, we pour over maps, we bought a good GPS and computer mapping program, we buy rubber boots, we talk to Uncle Hank about his diamond drill and how we'll need to pull it back into the mountains to a promising site, we design the best ways to load the back of Dad's Rhino so the shovels fit, and we argue over how much extra gas we need to pack in a jerry can for the ATV versus room for the chainsaw. Then Dad does his "witching" thing with a rubber hose and gold nugget wrapped onto it either towards a direction in the mountains or even over a map, 
and we argue over that since I tend to favor praying and asking God where we should look rather than his voodoo shit with a hose and a map. Then, since I've hurt his feelings, he goes and mixes a strong crown royal and disappears for a while. When he comes back (well lit) we pull out the map again and he tells me how proud he is that I "became a minister" and that perhaps I am right that God will lead us to the gold. that's when we go back to packing the rhino and truck and oh yeah, the shotgun since he's terrified of bears and I can't handle him being twitchy all day when we're back in the mountains. when plans are finalized and everything packed we know we are ready to get going 
early the next day. For us this is the ritual before the ritual of actually going into the mountains on any of our trips.I should tell you it wasn't always this way or this good with my dad. They divorced when I was 10 and we had very little actual contact for the next 25 years except for occasional things like graduations, my wedding, and a little more often when our kids came along. Our Yukon trip broke the ice only last year and.... well.... you know, I guess it's complicated between fathers and sons at the best of times never-mind when you are really only getting aquainted and that as grown men! I've never really felt anger towards him, mostly gratitude when I'd see him followed by some sense of sadness when he left again because I still really didn't know him and whenever he'd leave again, it reminded me of the hole in my soul I still had because of him. But this last year thanks to my miracle working little sister we had
occasion to really have some heart to heart talks where we told him we fully forgive him for being missing all those years and are just happy to be able to hang around so much now and perhaps only now we can understand what was in his mind that caused him to feel the need to run. He cried. I told Lisa I don't have a clue what the hell to do next, and she said relax you're both learning only now how to be around each other.He lived with us for four months this summer which was awesome, weird, awkward, funny, complicating, and felt for me a lot like a railway accident constantly about to happen, yet you want to keep going because you like the ride and hope you can avoid the wreck. I remember when Carlin was born feeling terrified because I had no certainty on how to be a dad. After 15 years of being a father I don't fear that anymore but for the first time this summer I found myself realizing at 38 that I had no fricking clue about how to be a son. in 16 years of ministry I'd done loads of Bible studies, sermons, summer camp devotionals on the father heart of God and I'd read many books on it.... I could say a lot about God as a Father, but I knew absolutely nothing about the son-ship of men. Nor did I have a clue how minute by minute to be a son
myself. I guess that's why I felt so awkward during those four months, he felt it too I could tell because he kept his bottle of Crown Royal handy so as to turn to it when he needed to take the edge off his own feelings of inadequacy or uncertainty. We found a rhythm after a while, and sure enough less crown royal was needed. Even amidst the awkwardness, it truly was a good summer and in a real sense the gift of God for both of us to get to really know each other (He's almost 60) for the first time ever.We each kept our Free miners certificates and maps handy however, and would pull them out now and again when we didn't know what else to say so we'd stir up the conversation about where we would next go panning and how to get there. we made plans about buying a good canvas wall tent so we could really work a claim for days on end and drill a few samples with the diamond drill. Our current dilemma is how to get a hold of a small track hoe or tractor with a rear hoe bucket in order to dig down to the important three feet of overlay that sits on top of
bedrock where most placer (pronounced "PLASS-er) gold is found. Since we go back far enough into the mountains by ATV the hoe is too slow because of it's tracks. But, and this is important, if a guy gets a hold of one of those little Kubota diesel tractors with a rear hoe bucket, then one guy can drive the rhino with the little ATV trailer loaded with our prospectors gear, followed by the other guy driving the tractor. We thought we could put a few jerry cans of diesel fuel in the front bucket of the tractor solving the space problem of where to put tractor fuel. That way Dad and I wouldn't need to argue much and swear at each other over the lost packing space taken up by fuel. We agreed it was a brilliant idea and would set us up to do enough digging to get a good idea on how much placer gold was in a claim and indicate if we should pull the diamond drill there on 
the next trip to do some drilling. Dad figured he could do the digging since he does it for a living (oilpatch guy) and he is an expert on reclamation which in B.C. is important as you must leave the ground exactly the way you found it after you dig. The other thing is that he insisted I could then man the shotgun since there would certainly be a grizzly bear hiding only thirty feet away waiting for the time to charge given all the noise we were making with diesel engines, chainsaws, arguing etc! These are important discussions you know.... and worth the occasional argument in pursuit of the dream of the mother-lode.man-manners have their important God-assigned place in the heirarchy of creation. They are the crucial oil that smoothens the machinery of men interacting together.... it's true with fathers and sons and its true with men in general. Some people might be tempted to call them lies and illusions or show-offy male competitiveness -comparing who is actually the bigger legend in their own minds. But those people forget how much we need those man-manners. Without them I'm not sure we know how to really interact with each other. I'm not saying that we don't tell each other the truth... not at all... especially between good friends and certainly amongst Christian men. But I've noticed that I often find it harder having good friendships of any depth with Christian men because somehow the ridiculous and dishonest church circles we were dragged into taught us that to be godly men we should not engage in exaggeration, or unrealistic dreaming, and instead should only speak biblical truth to each other. I have no issue with talking biblical truth (certainly given my profession), but have you ever noticed that Christian men often don't get the chance to talk about some of the real issues going on in our lives because we feel tied to this forced "niceness" that renders us unable to talk for example about the latest stunt by the notorious workplace idiot who everyone knows was only promoted because of his ass-kissing skills and not because of merit or trust given to him by the other guys? Sometimes I find myself more at ease with the non-churchgoing guys who know this and feel free to say it than the church guys like us who were told never to talk like that and consequently never really bond because the necessary glue of real life issues was never brought up. Man-manners is what we do in light of those problems that we encounter in daily life that help us all to still realize our greatness and the fact that we still need to be kings, if only in the eyes of other men who know this secret and respect it since we allow it for them too. Man-manners is what allows us to be kings around other kings without needing to steal each other's kingdoms and defend our own.
So I am enjoying owning my Free Miners Certificate and that two kings like my Dad and I will spend important time together in search of the mother-lode, and in knowing it is only a matter of time until we find it and become wealthy beyond our wildest dreams, take care of a lot of people, he'll finally find a damsel in distress to rescue (in actuality it will be the reverse) and I'll go on leaping tall cathedrals in a single bound. When he's gone one day I'll be really glad for the time together planning trips, packing atv's, panning creeks, arguing over fuel, and marking up maps because it is the only way a clumsy son knows how to enjoy his clumsy father when both don't know what to do next. The other thing I'll do is carry on what turns out to be a family thing that goes back many generations and is in the blood and connects the line of kings in this family. I see it in Dad's face when he's prospecting -he's honoring grandpa and he feels the connection that began when he was taught how to look for gold as a child. It just seems to be this way with men.... our manners are unique with one another and probably it should be that way since it is unique amongst kings.
Daily Readings
We have added a link to the right under "Sacred Heart Connections" for daily scripture readings. If you'd like a quick way to look up the readings that are associated with the liturgical year we follow in our church - just click away!
Another thing - Darrin and I are wondering if we should change the format for this blog so that it is more of a group blog. We could add people as other authors and that way you can post thoughts, updates, topics for discussion, etc. We would love your feedback on that. If you think that is a better format and would like to be one of the authors, just let us know. We just need your email address.
peace of Christ,
Lisa
Another thing - Darrin and I are wondering if we should change the format for this blog so that it is more of a group blog. We could add people as other authors and that way you can post thoughts, updates, topics for discussion, etc. We would love your feedback on that. If you think that is a better format and would like to be one of the authors, just let us know. We just need your email address.
peace of Christ,
Lisa
Saturday, January 13, 2007
Getting Together
For those who are in the area and would like to join us - we are having a Communion Service and potluck lunch at our home tomorrow, Sunday January 14 at 11:00 a.m. We like to have an idea who is coming, so would appreciate a heads up by phone or email. If you don't know how to reach us, post a comment to this entry and it goes directly to our email. You can give us your contact info and we don't have to publish your post. See you soon!
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
sacred heart blog
Hi gang. darrin here.
I thought we should say early on that we want to encourage any of you to go ahead and post on sacred heart's blog. If you do, you'll notice that when you post it will tell you that the blog is moderated.
The reason for this is because we are hoping that the blog will be a forum for sacred hearters to connect with each other, with us, and that as it goes various threads of discussion may kick off.
That being said....unfortunately....the reality today is that any crank can find a church blog and post some of the nastiest comments anonymously as has happened before to other blogs, especially when they are not meant to be personal blogs but sort of church ones.
So..... we will moderate the posts simply to rule out the crazies and to keep it reasonably christian .... yet hopefully still cheeky if cheeky is necessary. Feel free to post any rant or rambling or photographs about your life that may be taken up by someone else for discussion. We will likely post all of it.
pax christi
darrin
I thought we should say early on that we want to encourage any of you to go ahead and post on sacred heart's blog. If you do, you'll notice that when you post it will tell you that the blog is moderated.
The reason for this is because we are hoping that the blog will be a forum for sacred hearters to connect with each other, with us, and that as it goes various threads of discussion may kick off.
That being said....unfortunately....the reality today is that any crank can find a church blog and post some of the nastiest comments anonymously as has happened before to other blogs, especially when they are not meant to be personal blogs but sort of church ones.
So..... we will moderate the posts simply to rule out the crazies and to keep it reasonably christian .... yet hopefully still cheeky if cheeky is necessary. Feel free to post any rant or rambling or photographs about your life that may be taken up by someone else for discussion. We will likely post all of it.
pax christi
darrin
Tuesday, January 9, 2007
Christmas, kids and the animals
There are some benefits in letting people down. Hurting a few feelings too. I know, you're going to say..."does pastor darrin think that?" "He's supposed to make people happy, not disappoint them." Since the ministry is...you know... a feel good happy job to spread happy feelings to people. "He wouldn't do that." You're right... so I'll blame it on Lisa. We mustered up the courage and said to family and friends this year "forget about us coming over on Christmas", "we're spending it alone at home with the kids".
Actually i was as convinced as Lisa on this one. Maybe more. We decided that after 15 years or so of driving to one side of the family on the 24th, rushing back to celebrate a midnight Communion, wrapping gifts till 3:00 a.m. so Santa could leave his offering, followed by driving to the other side of the family on the 25th after getting dragged out of bed by frantic children at 7:00 a.m. to open gifts and sometimes yet another church service..... we would say, in effect, "to you know where with all!"
Actually, we didn't really say that... we're pastors after all. But we thought it. And not to all -just to everyone outside the immediate family. Which brings me to Christmas for kids and animals.
We loaded up the chainsaw and hooked the flat deck trailer to the truck. Threw a bale of straw on the deck to sit on and loaded three kids and three dogs onto the trailer to head across the fields to the river and the trees. For those of you super safety conscious parents our kids are old enough to ride on the trailer, and young enough to have made it dangerous enough to be fun and worry the parents. No kids fell off up front by the hitch or under the side wheels of the trailer. One dog did however! Houston "scrub" our beloved chocolate lab saw three hundred or so Canadian geese take off from the field and since in his little mind he can catch them, fell off the side of the trailer and sure enough just as I looked in the side mirror the trailer wheels (both of them) went right over him. Dumb shit. I pulled over quickly and the big mutt was on his feet and ran over the the straw stack to wonder what injustice had been done to him. We were worried and ran over to him to give him love and he sort of shrunk down like he does when we approach him after he's done something wrong, as he often does. He was fine and we laughed at him for thinking he must be in trouble since the trailer wheels probably did hurt.
Off to the river we went where we cut a bunch of dead-fall for firewood and loaded it onto the trailer. the kids thought it was great, they even did reasonably well when they tried the chainsaw. Again to you safety super-conscious parents just get over it... or your kids never will. Then we discovered a long smooth strip of thick ice at the edge of the Belly river with a convenient two foot hole 30 yards down. So we began sliding rocks to see who could get them into the hole and thus three hours of river curling was born -complete with evolving Parkin rules and unverifiable scores...of course in favor of the man of the house, man of the river, man of the 
trees! In between a few passionate arguments over whose turn it was, did that last shot actually count, hot chocolate cups and who gets which, and yelling at Houston, Murphy and little Chase to get off the thin ice at the middle of the river, we enjoyed the warm air, no actual wind, and the spiritually pregnant Christmas Eve day. Back to the truck and trailer and with windows all the way down we crept back to the yard trying not to loose firewood (or dogs....or kids) on the way.
We stopped to grain the horses, and gave them lots of extra since the kids insisted that Christmas was for them too. Taco and Belle didn't object as they were the object of much attention and much grain.
back home we lit the fireplace, and sat down to an oven ready Christmas dinner complete with
Diana Krall Christmas Songs, wine for all five, and dogs happily laying at the fire. We read the Christmas story from Luke, sat together and watched "It's a wonderful life", opened one stocking stuffer, then made beds on the floor in the living room for three kids, one fire, four dogs, and two cats. We laughed at Scrub for half an hour pulling his ears and stretching his lips and tucking him into Sierra's bed when she got up. It was a lot of fun. In bed by midnight happy, we saw the Eve slip away into a relaxing Christmas day enjoying gifts no better or worse than other years.
It was pretty Norman Rockwell and very unique for a family like ours with the busyness and driving. We loved it. The kids said it was the best Christmas ever. The animals were impressed too, which impressed the kids of course and made for some rare magic that Christmas is supposed to hold were it not for the self-imposed obligation to visit and the silly catholic guilt that makes missing church Christmas Eve, especially for pastors, unthinkable.
Oh well, after a glass of wine and a cigar to cap Christmas Eve we have some really good pictures. And memories that will go with the kids forever too. That itself is worth more than anything else. What we don't have is guilt or regret for the "supposed to do's" at Christmas. The families saw us on the 26th and 27th and that was just fine.
So, cheers to guilt-less Christian living, possibly hurting a few feelings, kids and animals, and Norman Rockwell.
darrin
Monday, January 8, 2007
The Invitation
kay guys - i'm going to be vulnerable and post a poem I wrote in 2002. No one has seen it except Darrin, but here goes:
The Invitation
The trumpet calls,
But do I see?
The hand that holds all
Holds me.
The Holy Warrior,
Ancient One,
Rushing Water,
Shining Sun.
One who sets Himself
Apart from all,
But touches me
As I fall.
"Do not be Afraid"
Death will not be
Life-giving One
Who holds the key
This present death
Will not contain
the First and Last
The One who reigns.
Power and Dominion,
Equaled by none,
Piercing through,
What I have become.
How can I hear,
What I do not see?
How can I know
the Voice calling me?
Lay down my all,
What is real,
To truly touch,
what He will reveal
Truth I have not seen,
But is in wait,
Turn to hear,
As He creates.
Time can never
Take that away.
What is real,
Is here today.
I grasp,
And seeing, fall,
Laying down
My very all.
Seeing through,
and now beyond.
Can it be,
That I belong?
The hand that smotes,
Holds up the air,
And rests on me,
As I linger there.
Knowing now,
and always known,
Hearing first,
What He has shown.
Waking to
the power, real,
Holding fast
the Holy Seal.
(based on Rev. ch. 1)
The Invitation
The trumpet calls,
But do I see?
The hand that holds all
Holds me.
The Holy Warrior,
Ancient One,
Rushing Water,
Shining Sun.
One who sets Himself
Apart from all,
But touches me
As I fall.
"Do not be Afraid"
Death will not be
Life-giving One
Who holds the key
This present death
Will not contain
the First and Last
The One who reigns.
Power and Dominion,
Equaled by none,
Piercing through,
What I have become.
How can I hear,
What I do not see?
How can I know
the Voice calling me?
Lay down my all,
What is real,
To truly touch,
what He will reveal
Truth I have not seen,
But is in wait,
Turn to hear,
As He creates.
Time can never
Take that away.
What is real,
Is here today.
I grasp,
And seeing, fall,
Laying down
My very all.
Seeing through,
and now beyond.
Can it be,
That I belong?
The hand that smotes,
Holds up the air,
And rests on me,
As I linger there.
Knowing now,
and always known,
Hearing first,
What He has shown.
Waking to
the power, real,
Holding fast
the Holy Seal.
(based on Rev. ch. 1)
Sunday, January 7, 2007
Engagement and Wedding News
We have borrowed a link from Kevan's blog to help spread the news of Megan and Aaron's engagement. I think we all knew that was just a matter of time! :-) They are such a great couple and we wish them all of God's blessings for their marriage.
We also want to make sure everyone knows about the wedding of Chad and Sharon which took place on December 30. Darrin had the honour of performing the ceremony and it was such a special event for all of us. Chad and Sharon are very special to our community and they were so full of joy that it was such a blessing to be part of their day. Our children had such a great time at the dance! Tavis did an amazing job as m.c. - especially the game show "The Price is Life"- brilliant! Joanna did an outstanding job in her dual role of "Woman of Honour" and "Barker's Beauty". We look forward to seeing them continue to grow as a couple and see what life brings.
We also want to make sure everyone knows about the wedding of Chad and Sharon which took place on December 30. Darrin had the honour of performing the ceremony and it was such a special event for all of us. Chad and Sharon are very special to our community and they were so full of joy that it was such a blessing to be part of their day. Our children had such a great time at the dance! Tavis did an amazing job as m.c. - especially the game show "The Price is Life"- brilliant! Joanna did an outstanding job in her dual role of "Woman of Honour" and "Barker's Beauty". We look forward to seeing them continue to grow as a couple and see what life brings.
Saturday, January 6, 2007
Sacred Heart new Blog
We have often heard from people who either currently are, or have been connected with Church of the Sacred Heart, have moved away, and would like to stay connected in some way. Even though we are not as technologically savvy as most of you, we are finally embracing this mode of communication! It has come to our attention that many "Sacred Hearters" ( which, from this point on will refer to anyone who is currently or was formerly part of our community and moved away) have blogs and keep in touch through these blogs. We realized this may be one of the best ways we can stay connected and even maintain a certain sense of community with those who no longer live near to our church. This, in itself would be a great topic of discussion: can you have genuine "community" through electronic means - or does it require face to face contact?
Anyway, this is totally new and we have not yet fully thought through the purpose and what it will look like. But, we are open to comments, thoughts, input, etc. What we do know is that we often hear that people found something unique in being part of Sacred Heart and miss it. Maybe this is a way to address some of that. We certainly miss many of the people who have moved on, and would love to keep in touch.
Let's see where this goes....
Peace of Christ to you.
Anyway, this is totally new and we have not yet fully thought through the purpose and what it will look like. But, we are open to comments, thoughts, input, etc. What we do know is that we often hear that people found something unique in being part of Sacred Heart and miss it. Maybe this is a way to address some of that. We certainly miss many of the people who have moved on, and would love to keep in touch.
Let's see where this goes....
Peace of Christ to you.
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