More Advent Calendars ... !

I posted several online Advent calendars in the entry Advent Steps Forward on 11/30. Since then, I've found more online Advent calendars!

Here's one for cat lovers -- in your choice of 5 languages even!:

http://www.catwholaughed.com/2009/index.html

...one from the Woodlands Junior School for Girls in Kent, UK:

http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/Xmas/calendar

..one from St. Margaret Mary Parish is located in Naperville, IL:

http://www.smmp.com/Advent/Advent.php

... video calendar from Holidays.net:

http://www.holidays.net/adventcalendar

Advent Reflections - Visual Meditations

Geranium Farmer Harry Taplin of Chelmsford, MA is a gifted photographer who has, in previous years, shared his images with us here at MOLC.

Here is the note that came recently with two wonderful photo meditations:

"It's time for another round of advent photos. Here's my brief explanation of why I began this tradition, now in its fourth year.

For many years I gave Advent Calendars to my immediate family. Around 2006 - or maybe
it was 2005 - I couldn't find any calendars that I liked, so I decided to replace printed/
published calendars with a few photos that I would send during the season. Ultimately, I extended the season through January 6 - known also as Twelfth Night, Little Christmas, Epiphany - and I expanded the list of those to whom I would send photos."

Thank you, Harry, for sharing your talent and art with us!

Meditating on time. Sculpture, Jardin de Reuilly, Paris, November 03, 2009

The flow of time. River Seine, Paris. October 24, 2009

Advent Reflection

"The house lights go off and the footlights come on. Even the chattiest stop chattering as they wait in darkness for the curtain to rise. In the orchestra pit, the violin bows are poised. The conductor has raised the baton. In the silence of a midwinter dusk there is far off in the deeps of it somewhere a sound so faint that for all you can tell it may be only the sound of the silence itself. You hold your breath to listen. You walk up the steps to the front door. The empty windows at either side of it tell you nothing, or almost nothing. For a second you catch a whiff in the air of some fragrance that reminds you of a place you've never been and a time you have no words for. You are aware of the beating of your heart. The extraordinary thing that is about to happen is matched only by the extraordinary moment just before it happens. Advent is the name of that moment."

- Frederick Buechner, from Whistling in the Dark

Advent Steps Forward

Want some great resources for the Advent season (including many on-line Advent Calendars)?

Click on the links to find what lies therein -- and may your holy Advent be taken one day at a time. The first link is from the Diocese of Bethlehem, PA:

http://www.diobeth.org/Ministries/Christian%20Formation/Advent.html

the next is from The Episcopal Church and the Visual Arts. Click their link to view their Advent Exhibition "Full of Grace":

http://ecva.org/exhibition/FullOfGrace2009/FullOfGraceMain.htm

here's an Anglican Advent Calendar with a message from Archbishop Desmond Tutu:

http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81808_117403_ENG_HTM.htm

for a 'daily video meditation' from the president and dean of EpiscopalDivinity School, the Very Rev. Dr. KatherineHancock Ragsdale, go to http://www.eds.edu then choose Advent Resources and Events.

If you have Advent resources to share with Geranium Farmers everywhere, send them on to me at: molc@geraniumfarm.org.