Category: Christian

Catholic

Groundhog Day (again)

Groundhog Day (again) audio

Bill Murray in the 1993 film, Groundhog Day.

“In the Lord’s eyes, one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years are as a day.”

2 Peter 3:8

COVID-19 has created a hardscrabble daily life for almost all of us.  And for many, those days have begun to blend together in a kind of monopoly of monotony.  Some have said it’s like having the same day over and over again, as in the movie Groundhog Day starring Bill Murray.  In that story, the main character finds himself in a kind of time warp where he wakes up every morning on February 2 and has to live that day again and again until he gets it right.  In the process, he is changed from an egotistical self-serving boor to a kind and compassionate town hero. That’s not a bad analogy for living the Christian life. Each day is a chance to be transformed to more fully reflect the person of Christ.

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Catholic

Lord, Send Us Out

Words & Music by Tom Kneier; acoustic guitar – Tom Kneier

The laborers are few but the harvest is plenty. We beg the Lord of the harvest to send us out, to send us out.

You send us out as lambs in the midst of wolves, to proclaim the kingdom of God to those who have ears to hear.

We offer You praise O Father, Lord of heaven and earth. For what You’ve hidden from the learned and wise, You’ve revealed to the merest children.

We must be ready, the time is short. Not one of us may stand idle. We must go out for the fields are ripe.

Catholic

Peace Beyond Understanding

Music by Tom Kneier; Arranged by Ray Niccolai; based on the Peace Prayer of St. Francis and Phil. 4:7

Lord make me an instrument of Your peace, peace beyond all understanding.

Where there is hatred let me sow love. And where there’s injury Your pardon Lord. Where there is doubt true faith. Where there’s despair let me bring hope. And where there’s darkness only light, and joy where there is sadness.

O Divine Master grant that I may not seek much to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive. It is in pardoning that we are pardoned. And it is in dying that we are born; born to eternal life.

Catholic

The Emperor Has No Clothes (Again)

The Emperor Has No Clothes (Again) audio
The Emperor’s New Clothes – a tale by Hans Christian Andersen

Have you heard the latest ripple effect of Covid-19?  Cleveland Clinic is reporting a notable increase in cases of broken-heart syndrome – the colloquial name for stress cardiomyopathy.   It’s a dysfunction or failure in the heart muscle attributed to psychological, social, or emotional stress. Dr. Ankur Kalra, the cardiologist who led the study that published these conclusions in the Journal of the American Medical Association told Cleveland.com in a phone interview that “This is going to be the crisis of our lifetime.”  It provides new insight into the impact of the pandemic beyond the illness itself, because none of the patients in the study tested positive for the coronavirus.  It’s as if the social isolation generated by prevention measures has itself become a plague.  

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Christian

Probing the Pig Problem

Probing the Pig Problem audio

Admittedly, when the pandemic afforded me the opportunity to launch this blog, I aspired to lofty themes.  Topics that would stretch the mind and startle the heart with “looking at life and the world through a different lens.”  Now perhaps I’ve fallen victim to the trajectory of Covid-19 and its indifference to society’s outcry.  Maybe I’ve been dizzied by the thin air of the upper atmosphere where lofty thoughts reside.  Or it could just be that you’re about to encounter the bizarre space within my cranium.  Enter at your own risk.

From his Facebook page

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Catholic

No Gift Too Small

Words and Music by Tom Kneier & Ray Niccolai; Arrangement by Ray Niccolai.
Tom Kneier – Vocals; Ray Niccolai – acoustic guitar
Text and Music Copyright 2020 by Tom Kneier & Ray Niccolai

Come from afar to follow a star. Men of great wisdom bearing great gifts. Drawn by a single-hearted purpose, seeking a King to worship.

Led to Bethlehem by the star. Finding the Child they fell to their knees. Laying their gifts before the Babe, they gazed on the King of Kings.

Offer to Jesus all you have. Hold nothing back from your Savior. No gift is too small to give, when it’s given freely from the heart.

What do you have that you did not receive from God’s hand? What can you give that was not given you first? We are but earthen vessels holding the treasures of God.

So offer to Jesus all you have. Hold nothing back from your Savior. No gift is too small to give, when it’s given freely from the heart. When it’s given from your heart.

Catholic

The Gift No One Wants

“Where Is God When It Hurts?”
The Gift No One Wants

One evening several years ago, my wife was having severe abdominal pains.  She wanted to wait and see if it improved overnight.  I insisted on taking her to the emergency room.  She was admitted immediately and subsequently underwent surgery to remove a section of her colon due to advanced diverticulitis.  We were both reminded that night that we ignore pain to our own peril. 

In a recent sermon referring to signs that frequent our summer highways during construction season, our pastor put it this way: “Temporary inconvenience; permanent improvement.”  If we pay attention to the signs of pain when they manifest – physically, emotionally, psychologically, spiritually – we can travel the road to healing and restoration.  Can pain then actually be a gift?

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Catholic

What If?

Social Distancing Gone Too Far
What If – audio version

One of my sons lives in Seattle with his wife and three children.  On a recent phone call with his 9 year old son, Judah, I asked him to tell me about his favorite home school activity during the pandemic.  He introduced me to a You Tube Channel with 3.78 million subscribers called “What If?”.  Each episode highlights a hypothetical question about some aspect of science in our universe to stir the imagination.  His favorite was “What if we dumped our trash into volcanoes?” That drew 13 million other viewers.  Naturally the imagination of his grandfather, whose blog “views life and the world through a different lens,” was stoked by this channel, too.  Not sufficiently, mind you, to watch his 4:26 video.  Though I was able to carve out 6:47 to watch the “What If We Never Aged?” episode.  Go figure.

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Catholic

Are We There Yet?

By Tom Kneier

The International Space Station (I.S.S.)
Are We There Yet?

It was a beautiful letdown when I crashed and burned;

when I found myself alone, unknown, unheard.

It was a beautiful letdown the day I knew

That all the riches this world had to offer me would never do.

In a world full of bitter pain, bitter doubts,

I was trying so hard to fit in, fit in,

Until I found out, that I don’t belong here.

from the song, “The Beautiful letdown”, by switchfoot

Endurance

An American astronaut named Scott Kelly currently holds the record for the longest continuous time in space – 340 days.  From March 28, 2015 to March 1, 2016, Kelly called the International Space Station his home.  In his book, Endurance, Kelly recounts those days in vivid detail. The length of the ship consisted of three American modules and two Russian.  The port and starboard were made up of three Russian modules and one each from Europe, Japan, and the United States.  It was the combined work of fifteen nations over an eighteen month period. 

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