Quote of the day:
“I'm as pure as the driven slush.”
--Tallulah Bankhead
Today is Ash Wednesday on the Christian calendar. It’s the day we’re explicitly reminded that we’re human and that our lives will end one day.
As a minister, I would usually stress that today is the beginning of Lent. I did that because the whole thing about mortality can be quite upsetting for people. And there’s really no need to deliberately upset anyone. It serves no purpose.
Nonetheless, today is about our mortality. And Lent is about our lives. What we are doing with them, and what we want to be doing with them.
Lent is the season for some deliberate thought and reflection about who we are, and whether that matches up with who we want to be. More specifically, Lent gives time to examine our priorities--honestly, even ruthlessly.
The questions are: What are the priorities of my life? Are they what they should be? If they are, am I living them or just saying them?
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Ash Wednesday
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4 comments:
Sometimes I wonder where you get your "quotes of the day," especially the more inane, ridiculous and just plain nonsensical ones. Do you have some big book of quotes that you pick from at randon?
Lynda, It must be random – but the quotes seem to orthogonally track the photo content consistently, thick with a pastoral relevancy that sticks to your ribs and has nothing to do with what's on the table (in the daily sightings); it's like the chef felt he needed a side dish to fill out the menu.
Well, well, well. The quotes come from all kinds of places--magazines, newspapers, comments on other blogs, movies, TV news, TV shows, friends, miscellaneous internet sources, letters to editors and books. I seem to accumulate small piles of quotes in different places at home, and sometimes on my iPhone.
For a while I tried to be thematic with the quotes and the photos, but that wound up more predictable and ordinary than I like.
Now there are often unusual connections among quotes, photos and entries--daily and on adjoining days. Those connections are forged by a force other than me.
Here are a couple of my favorite quotes for your little piles you might find some future use for:
"When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes."--Erasmus
"Just the knowledge that a good book is awaiting me at the end of a long day makes that day happier."--Kathleen Norris
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