Christmas Links

Advent
"The Light Began to Come Back to My Heart"
Christmastime: When Our Souls Can Sing
Joy in Times of Lament
Open This Gift and Try Not to Cry
He Did It

Christmas Links

I'm changing things up a tiny bit this year and including a couple videos directly in the post instead of just linking to them.

The Time My Family Celebrated "Un-Christmas"

He Is the Brightest Light

How December 25 Became Christmas

'Tis Better to Give

Notable Lyrics: A set of lyrics quizzes in which getting a word in one verse gives you the words for the given note(s) in all verses. About half are Christmas songs.

Memories of Christmas Past

The Christmas Story Told in Quilts

Do You Look Like Christ?

Christmas Links

Wise Men Are Seeking
Feed My Lambs
Knowest Thou the Condescension of God?
Why Do We Celebrate the Pagan-Influenced Christmas and Easter?
Is Christmas or Easter More Important?
Messiah Clicky-oke: Sing (and click) along with Handel's most famous piece of music

Christmas Links

'Twas the Day Before Christmas
Stream Christmas music by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir
History of Handel and his Messiah
Come Let Us Adore Him
The Living Christ: The Testimony of the Apostles
The Condescension of Jesus Christ
Reflections of Christ Art Gallery
Free Music Downloads (Christmas songs are the first three links at the far right)

Christmas Links

Grace and Christ's enabling and strengthening power
3 Christmas hymn origin stories, lyrics, and performance videos
When Bishop Monson saved Christmas
12 Christmas songs arranged by Mack Wilberg, performed by MoTab
Christmas Is About a Baby
Festival of the Nativity

Easter Movies and Music

A while back I read an article about keeping the focus of your Easter celebrations on Jesus Christ. Most of the suggestions related to making a bigger deal out of Easter, sort of like how we make a huge month-long production out of Christmas. The decoration aspect I'd already thought about and have some ideas for, but after reading the article I started thinking seriously about music.

I have some music that is appropriate for Easter but not a huge variety. Christmas music starts playing on the radio the day after Halloween. We don't really play it at home until after Thanksgiving, at least. But even that would be a long time to make due with just 27 songs, which is what I have for Easter. And my Christmas music also has the benefit of a wide variety of genres. I've got stuff with a pop influence, stuff that's countryish, stuff that's jazzy... but I can count my popular music influenced Easter songs on one hand.

Movies are also a big part of Christmas traditions. People make long lists of must-see Christmas films, and I have a few. Now, if I'm going to increase the significance of Easter in my and my family's lives, I should probably also get a collection of Easter movies for us to watch in the weeks leading up to the holiday. And I do have a couple I think work for the purpose: Easter Dream and The Testaments. But I'm not sure what else to add. I know there are movies about Christ's ministry and the events of the Holy Week in Israel, and I'll probably get one of those, but watching several versions of the same story in a month or so might not go over well. I guess The Robe or Ben Hur could work as something different, but are there any good just plain cute or fun shows set around Easter? I've heard of an old show called Easter Parade but what I've been able to find out about it doesn't sell it as an Easter story. Have any of you seen it? Does it work as an Easter movie?

And do you have any other specific recommendations for Easter music or movies I can add to my list of things to slowly accumulate when I can? Or maybe picture books. It wouldn't hurt to have a few Easter picture books as well.

Christmas Links

A couple years ago I decided to make a tradition of posting links to Christmassy things I've found around the internet over the year. I actually haven't noticed many this year, and haven't had much free time to seek them out, so this year's list is pretty short.

Longfellow's Christmas video
Christmas Devotional
Gospel Topic Page

Christmas Links

Last year, I thought it would be nice to have a special Christmassy post up on Christmas day so anybody who found themselves online would have something fitting to read. But I didn't really have a lot of time to plan it out so I just posted links to previous entries on here that seemed to fit the meaning of the holiday. I took it down the next day because it seemed a bit silly to leave a post of links to my other posts laying around.

Then I decided to make a Christmas Link post an annual tradition. But from now on, I will be collecting links to other sites throughout the year and schedule the post to go up early Christmas morning.

Here are this year's offerings. Enjoy.

Stormy
A Gift to the World
10 Free Christmas Songs by MoTab
Rejoice and Be Merry: Nativity Play Music Video
Being a More Christian Christian
1 Free Christmas Song (O Holy Night) by Eclipse
Pay What You Want Christmas Album by Various Artists
First Presidency Devotional Archives

The Anthem

Whenever I think about it, I am a bit disappointed in the way we usually sing the national anthem. I don't mean the style (although I think it's pretty disrespectful when the performer seems more interested in showing off their talent than in honoring their country). I mean the fact that, except in church and maybe an occasional full choir performance, we only ever sing the first verse.

And the first verse is about a flag. Sure, the symbol of the country, but not the country itself. Just a piece of fabric. It isn't until the next couple of verses that Key starts to bring in the actual significance of that flag.

My personal favorite verse is the last one, which speaks mainly of our country's ideals, then makes a clear link with the banner we are singing of: 

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand

Between their loved home and the war's desolation!!

Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land

Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,

And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Deck the Walls

Over the years I have thought a lot about home decorating. Not so much coordinating the rugs to the drapes to the throw pillows, but holiday decorations.

Well, I was recently thinking about an Easter wreath I saw featuring bunnies (it was cuter than it sounds) when I realized that there really aren't many religiously-themed Easter decorations. Which actually makes sense. You can have a lot of nativity scenes around at Christmastime and everything's great - they are generally cute or beautiful. But to have tons of images or figures of Christ hanging on the cross or sweating blood in Gethsemane would be a bit morbid. And if you tried to make it cute, it would be even more disturbing. And sacrilegious. And to fill your house with empty tombs would be a bit weird. Like displaying random rocks - not pretty ones or rare ones, just rubble that you might have picked up while prepping the garden.

Still, given that I consider Easter to be the most religiously significant holiday, I don't feel right about completely ignoring the religious side in my decorating. So I have now made it my goal to find at least a couple tasteful decorations that I can get out and display in my home specifically for the Easter season.

In God We Trust

Our closing hymn in sacrament meeting today, in recognition of Independence Day, was The Star Spangled Banner. We sang all three of the verses included in our hymnal. When we got to the line saying "And this be our motto, in God is our trust," I wondered how many people in the United States would currently take that as their motto.

In my Book of Mormon institute class (the first half), we were discussing Mosiah 29, where it talks about how when the people were righteous, they would tend to choose righteous laws and leaders. But when they started choosing iniquity, the time had come to meet God's judgments. At that time, we felt that about half the country was righteous. Our teacher said that when he was growing up, most of the country was living in righteousness. I don't know if our answer would have changed since that time.

But back to the motto. We don't really hide it. It's written on all our money, for one thing. But I wonder how many people are really aware of it. And I wonder, if we consistently sang every verse of the national anthem every time, would that have a noticeable effect on the religiosity of American citizens? Or would it just lead to more protests against state-supported religious displays?

Re-Framing

They're at it again. The Valentine haters, I mean. I'm not surprised; they make their fuss every year. I've written a little about my feelings about Valentine's Day before, here and here, and I thought I didn't have anything more to say. But it turns out I was wrong.

I recently read  an article online that said, "Valentine's Day is a warm, happy, romantic, charming day for nearly everyone. Everyone except people who are divorced, widowed, unhappily married, never married, fighting with their significant other, working overtime, struggling with morning sickness, in the hospital, in Afghanistan, on a business trip or can't afford a present. In other words, everyone except nearly everyone."

This wasn't really a Valentine's Day bash. It's more about handling loss. You can read it here if you want. But I didn't care much for her opening.

Sure, Valentine's Day is legitimately hard for a lot of people. I'm thinking mainly of those who are missing their loved one - the same people who have a legitimately hard time at any other holiday. But you don't hear so much about "Christmas/Easter/Thanksgiving is a happy day for everyone except nearly everyone."

The summer of 1999 I got a bit depressed at my grandpa's annual 24th of July party. It just wasn't the same as previous years, somehow. Well, my aunt talked to me then about how when you get older, a lot of holidays change, and you need to find a meaning and a way of looking at them that works for you. And that's the way it goes. Santa and presents lose their magic? Re-frame how you look at Christmas. Think of the joy of giving, think of baby Jesus.

Well, I think some people really should re-frame how they look at Valentine's Day. It doesn't have to be about the romance. It definitely doesn't have to be about gifts and money. What works for me is to see it as a reminder of all the people I love - especially my friends. Maybe not everybody can see it exactly that way. But the holiday is going nowhere. And I think being happy will come easier if they find some new meaning than if they continue seeing it as a couple's day.

Jolly Old St. Nicholas

Last night was our ward Christmas party. We were told over the pulpit to come in our pajamas, but most of the adults didn't. Sinners.

Anyway, we had the usual dinner, then the Taylorsville Madrigals came and did their program. I mouthed the words to a lot of the songs, but there were a couple new ones I didn't know, too. And then Santa came.

After the party was over, I felt a twinge of wrongness about the Santa thing. Every so often the idea of having such big institutionalized lies bothers me a little. Especially when it's supported at church. But at the same time, I think that Santa and the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy bring a lot of fun to childhood, and will probably do them for my own children.

And then I remembered something else that has bothered me about Santa. The gift requests. No, not the making of the requests. But that you write a big letter to Santa telling him everything you want for Christmas, but then when you sit on his knee at the mall or at the ward Christmas party, he asks you what you want. Shouldn't he know from the letter? I'm not sure when I first thought of this, but I'm pretty sure at least once I purposefully told him something I left off of my letter to keep from being redundant.

More recently, though, I've felt like the child in the song Jolly Old St. Nicholas, who says in the last line, "Choose for me, dear Santa Claus, what you think is best." I don't really have a lot of real material desires. Sure, I enjoy new books and movies, but I have a library card that serves me very well. And I can listen to music online. And a lot of the time, I don't even remember what it was that looked good by the time my birthday or Christmas comes around. So I eventually created a file on my computer to list things I liked, so I could later pull from that list to make my gift request lists and give my family something to work with.

There are a couple things that have been in my letters for Santa for a very long time out of tradition. I've been asking for a Gameboy since I was about six, and don't intend to stop. And I've been requesting a tiger for a few years now. This year, I'm adding a sonic screwdriver. And it just may become one of those traditional items. But maybe not.

Happy Birthday

I notice significant-to-me dates. These are mostly the birthdays of people I feel close to. I often think things like, "Oh, the third season of Buffy is going on Hulu on so-and-so's birthday" or "This invoice was sent on other person's birthday". That can be helpful if I want to remember when the third season of Buffy is going up. But sometimes what I'm noticing is that a letter was written on my birthday, thirty years before I was born. It isn't a particularly helpful thing to notice in this case, but I notice it all the same. And sometimes I think about how whoever was writing the letter had no idea that the date Ocober 27 would mean anything to me. After all, they didn't even know about me.

And then sometimes I start to wonder which dates that feel so ordinary to me now will become significant later on. What will be my wedding date? When will my kids be born? Is today a significant date that I'm just not aware of yet?

Keeping Holidays

As I've stated before, I really like Valentine's Day as a day to appreciate everybody you love- friends and family included. And I hate it when anybody calls it Singles Awareness Day.

Now, Singles Awareness Day is not the only complaint I've heard about the holiday. Like most other holidays, sometimes people complain about the commercialization. And I think some guys spend more than they really need to. The point is not the money- the point is to show that you care. And I'll leave it at that for now.

The other objection is that you should be aware of the people you care about always, and that it shouldn't take a special day to show that you care. And that is true. But the same can be said about Christmas and Easter and Thanksgiving and pretty much every other holiday out there. Except Halloween, since it's pretty much meaningless these days to most people I know. And the way I look at it, human nature being what it is, we do tend to forget about these things without occasional reminders. Most of the time, we get some just living our lives. But I don't think it hurts anything to have a special day or season of reminder unless we start to think that we can only acknowledge love on Valentine's Day and our Veterans on Veterans' Day. And I always love an excuse to celebrate. So I say keep the holiday.

Holiday Blahs

For the first time in my life, I am not looking forward to Valentine's Day.

Valentine's Day has been my favorite holiday for a few years. I think of it as mostly a friendship appreciation day, and it has always bothered me to hear others refer to it as Singles Awareness Day. After all, we celebrated in elementary school by giving cards and decorating cookies and the like, and it had nothing to do with romance. And through high school, my friends and I exchanged cards and cookies with each other. Same with my family- my mom and sisters and I gave out cards and candy to each other as an expression of our love. Even seeing all the boys getting things for their girlfriends never bothered me. If anything, it made me look forward to the day when some man would be doing something sweet for me.

But this year, I just don't care. It's not really bitterness. I still don't like the Singles Awareness Day thing. Although I won't deny the possibility that a tiny amount of regret or disappointment is lurking in there somewhere. I just am not at all excited. The same thing happened for Christmas last year. I never wanted to go shopping for presents, I didn't care about my own, and I did not at any point feel the Christmas spirit. I guess I'm just having an off year for holidays.

Lazarus

A couple years ago, as I was listening to one of the short talks during our ward Easter program, I had a new thought about Lazarus.

When Jesus left for Bethany after Lazarus died, he told his disciples that Lazarus was dead, then said, "And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe; nevertheless let us go unto him ." (John 11:15) His disciples had already had many opportunities to see his power and believe in his divinity, so I think there was something more going on here.

Another excerpt I think illustrates my idea comes later in the same chapter, when Christ was speaking to Mary.

Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise again.
Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.
Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this? (John 11:23-26)

It is not long after this that Christ raised Lazarus from the dead.

Well, the thought that came into my head about this story is that here, Christ is very clearly showing his power over death. In fact, he comes straight out and says, "I am the resurrection and the life." Just a few days before the crucifixion, he is showing his disciples that when he dies, that is not the end. He can and will be back.

Easter Sunday

A while ago, I made a post in which I talked about my envy for other religions that have special services on Christmas day or Christmas Eve. Well, I feel like today, being Palm Sunday, would be an appropriate time to follow up on that.

First, I found an old entry at the Feminist Mormon Housewives blogs on a similar topic.

And the Waters of Mormon blog had a post not too long ago that questions why Christmas emerged to be the main Christmas holiday of the year instead of Easter. After all, Easter celebrates the atonement, which is what Christianity is all about, and Christmas celebrates the birth of a baby. This birth was needed for the atonement to take place, after all, but the focus is more on the birth than on what the birth eventually brought about.

Well, I think he has a point. And I think that is actually a good reason for things to shape up the way they did. On Christmas, we make it a point to think about Christ more than usual. But the focus is largely on family, as fits with a celebration of a baby.
And we usually do not hold church services.

But on Easter, we go to church for the full three hours. And that seems appropriate for the more religiously significant holiday.

Holy Envy

The first time I remember hearing of Holy Envy was while watching a video in some Institute Leadership meeting. In it, there was a clergyman of another faith who said he envied the Mormons for our belief in eternal families and desire to work to save our ancestors. His definition of holy envy was finding something in another religion that you can admire and maybe even learn from.

In December, Mitt Romney expressed such admiration in his Faith in America speech:

I believe that every faith I have encountered draws its adherents closer to God. And in every faith I have come to know, there are features I wish were in my own: I love the profound ceremony of the Catholic Mass, the approachability of God in the prayers of the Evangelicals, the tenderness of spirit among the Pentecostals, the confident independence of the Lutherans, the ancient traditions of the Jews, unchanged through the ages, and the commitment to frequent prayer of the Muslims. As I travel across the country and see our towns and cities, I am always moved by the many houses of worship with their steeples, all pointing to heaven, reminding us of the source of life’s blessings.

And now I will move on to the reason for this post. There is one practice completely absent from the church that I would love to borrow- Christmas services. At one point, this would have been the last thing I wanted. After all, church or mass on Christmas means that much less time for the fun aspects of Christmas. But the last year Christmas fell on a Sunday, we went to church, and that Christmas was probably the most meaningful Christmas I have experienced.

So, I suppose I should take from this an effort to put more of Christ in my own Christmasses. I'll have to consider how to best do that when I set up traditions for my future family. Until then, meditation and scripture study will have to do, unless the Church does start to have Christmas services as well.

I Resolve

I just noticed the word solve is in Resolve. Sometime I'll have to think of something profound to say about that.

I didn't want to make a resolutions post too close to the new year, because I'm sure everybody does that and I like to be a little bit different. But I don't want to put it off much longer.

My philosophy of new years resolutions is a bit mixed. Setting goals is good. I like goals. And the new year is a natural time to think about doing that, because of the fresh start and clean slate and all that stuff. An unsullied year to fill up with better things than last year. But our culture has just about accepted a new year resolution as something that will be broken, and probably within the month. Well, I would rather not set any goals if they are just doomed to failure. Unless it's a goal to gain 10 pounds this year. That's something to think about next year...

So, I don't really set new years resolutions. But I do often set goals that coincide with the new year. After all, with so many people thinking about what to do better next year, it is hard to avoid thinking about it myself. But if I never come up with something, I don't worry about it. And, besides renaming the thing, I have one other method of keeping myself from breaking my "resolutions" immediately: I make them more flexible. Instead of setting a goal to go running for a half hour twice a week, I decide where I want to be by the end of the year. That way, I won't miss two weeks in January and be done for the rest of the year. After all, I have 11 more months to work on it.

I did think of a couple things to work on this year during the last couple days of December. My official New Year's Goal is to get in the habit of writing in my journal at least once a week. And during the first week of January, I also decided to work on learning to play my guitar. Hey, I have the instrument. I really ought to be able to have fun with the thing.