…celestial love…

Posted on February 15, 2016 by Virginia

Here’s a prayer to warm our hearts on this Lenten Monday…

“Father in Heaven!  You have loved us first, help us never to forget that You are love so that this sure conviction might triumph in our hearts over the seduction of the world, over the inquietude of the soul, over the anxiety for the future, over the fright of the past, over the distress of the moment.  But grant also that this conviction might discipline our souls so that our hearts might remain faithful and sincere in the love which we bear to all those whom You have commanded us to love as we love ourselves.”

Søren Kierkegaard, The Prayers of  Søren Kierkegaard

NASA_Rose_Made_of_Galaxies_Highlights_Hubble's_21st_Anniversary_jpgPhoto:  “A Rose Made of Galaxies”  (NASA’s Hubble, 17 December 2010)

Looking at this Hubble photograph, it’s like God is saying “I LOVE YOU” across the vastness of the universe. How can we forget?

grace, peace & spectacular roses, spectacular love

Virginia : )

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love, love, love…

Posted on February 14, 2016 by Virginia

Here in the U.S. it’s Valentine’s Day, a special time to dose your sweethearts and mates with some extra loving.  But Valentines love can also be shared with your family & friends.  Don’t forget roses! & chocolates! (always top of the list for Virginia, your Roses in the Rubble blogger.)  Since this year Valentines falls on SUNDAY, even though it’s Lent chocolate treats are back on the menu (just for today.)  YAAAY!

One year back in my 20’s (when dateless Valentine’s days mattered) I decided to proactively flip singleton pitypartyitis  & focus on LOVE, because it comes in all shapes & sizes, not just the romantic kind.  After printing out  I Corinthians 13 on bright pink paper I sent it with Valentines cards out to all my family & friends.  Just to say, ‘hey, i love you!  … and BTW, thanks for all the love you have shared with ME!’

“If I speak with the eloquence of men and of angels, but have no love, I become no more than blaring brass or crashing cymbal. If I have the gift of foretelling the future and hold in my mind not only all human knowledge but the very secrets of God, and if I also have that absolute faith which can move mountains, but have no love, I amount to nothing at all. If I dispose of all that I possess, yes, even if I give my own body to be burned, but have no love, I achieve precisely nothing.

This love of which I speak is slow to lose patience—it looks for a way of being constructive. It is not possessive: it is neither anxious to impress nor does it cherish inflated ideas of its own importance.

Love has good manners and does not pursue selfish advantage. It is not touchy. It does not keep account of evil or gloat over the wickedness of other people. On the contrary, it is glad with all good men when truth prevails.

Love knows no limit to its endurance, no end to its trust, no fading of its hope; it can outlast anything. It is, in fact, the one thing that still stands when all else has fallen.

For if there are prophecies they will be fulfilled and done with, if there are “tongues” the need for them will disappear, if there is knowledge it will be swallowed up in truth. For our knowledge is always incomplete and our prophecy is always incomplete, and when the complete comes, that is the end of the incomplete.

When I was a little child I talked and felt and thought like a little child. Now that I am a man my childish speech and feeling and thought have no further significance for me.

At present we are men looking at puzzling reflections in a mirror. The time will come when we shall see reality whole and face to face! At present all I know is a little fraction of the truth, but the time will come when I shall know it as fully as God now knows me!

In this life we have three great lasting qualities—faith, hope and love. But the greatest of them is love.”   (I Corinthians 13, J B Phillips Translation)

At the end of the day, what matters is how we love.

Valentine Rosegrace, peace & Happy Valentine’s Day

Virginia : )

Dear Jesus, please fill us with Your love anew, that we may be Your love anew this day.

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winter, winter… winter blues!

Posted on February 13, 2016 by Virginia

Brrrrrizzzy!  It’s cold here with temps dropping down to 12 degrees Fahrenheit tonight.  For Virginia (the State) that’s pretty cold, but for Virginia (the person) that’s REALLY cold! Yesterday while zipping about town in icy, damp weather (all bundled up in warmest winter sweaters) it took a long time thawing out at each destination.

It didn’t help that the temperamental heat in my car DIDN’T WORK.  (To be sure, it now tops the get-fixed-quick list!)

Ecclesiastes 3:1 says, “There is a season for everything.”   Believe me, I am looking forward to SPRING!  Winter can be such a drag. Sure it’s nice to drink copious amounts of hot tea (always a pleasure.) But now, since Lent has knocked hot chocolate off the menu (a daily delight) winter woes abound. It’s too cold to go for a long walk – and what about enjoying the flowers? hey? And the birdies?

But wait, in the bleak cold dreariness of yesterday TWO BLUEBIRDS came to visit our backyard. Maybe the same two my sister-in-law Lynn spotted on Sunday (while visiting for Super Bowl festivities.)  We were floored then & I was completely captivated yesterday. Don’t recall ever seeing bluebirds in the winter here — spotting them in the spring and summer was, and is, a special occasion since they were Mama’s favorite.

What a blessing! Double!!  On the dreariest of dreary winter days!!

Sometimes we hunker down in winter and we don’t look up or out.  Heads up – look around (or you might miss visiting bluebirds.)

Spiritually?  Guess stuff is growing in the winter seasons of our hearts (although it’s hard to tell when there’s frost & snow on everything.)  Our hearts may need extra mittens of God’s mercy and warm coats of His grace as we shiver closer to the warm heater of His love (the closer the better.)  And we better keep the eyes of our hearts open to catch bluebirds of God’s joy sent our way, even on the bleakest days.

“Spring will come in our souls if only we have the patience to last out the winter under the cold snow.  A good winter is the best preparation for a good spring.”  Carlos G. Valles, SJ

snow in Feb

grace, peace & winter blues

Virginia : )

p.s. STAY WARM!!!!!

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watch out, waves astern!!

Posted on February 12, 2016 by Virginia

Not just little ‘ole waves, but GIGANTIC 60-footers knock brave boaters about in the movie, “The Finest Hours.”  My brother and I saw it in the theater last weekend. What a fine movie!  (Fine because it’s called The Finest Hours – get it? blame that on my punner brother!)  Seriously, it’s a great movie with a classic 1950’s feel, lots of edgy excitement, with a love story mixed in (a great pick to see on Valentine’s Day.)

It’s also VERY inspirational, based on the true story of the heroic rescue effort off the coast of Massachusetts on 18 February 1952 when a terrible nor’easter split the huge SS Pendleton tanker in half, stranding over 30 crew members.  U.S. Coast Guard coxswain Bernie Webber took a crew of three in a 12-seater lifeboat through 60 foot waves, hurricane-force winds, and perilous sand bars to save them.

There are two stories – how Bernie Webber (Chris Pine) navigates (without navigation) through the storm to reach the shattered ship, and how Ray Sybert (Casey Affleck), the First Assistant engineer on the Pendleton struggles to keep the crew together & afloat in the middle of a huge storm.

I’m not a boater, but i noticed that Bernie sometimes let the lifeboat coast over the waves and at other times he used the motor to gun right through them, temporarily submerging the boat. It seemed like a tricky use of the motor, especially getting over the dangerous ‘bars’ where many boats capsized.

Meanwhile, the crew of the split tanker exerts everything working to stay above water.

So, a Lenten application? Going deeper with Jesus sometimes we encounter internal storms where everything seems topsy turvy (or maybe that’s our current lifescape – tidal waves on the horizon!)

Using the engine of faith, let Jesus guide our boats up, over and through the waves to the other side.   Trust Him to know the what and when (& help with the HOW!) …

And, like Bernie Webber and the crew of the Pendleton, keep on going!

“Keep going. If you make a mistake, get up and keep going: that is the way.  Those who do not move because they are afraid of making a mistake, they are making a more serious mistake.”    Pope Francis (from Encountering Truth)

Niagra Fallsgrace, peace & inspirational wave management

Virginia : )

p.s. click here to check out more of VA’s stormy weather management

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…on responding (Quickie Quote)

Posted on February 11, 2016 by Virginia

Here’s a short quote from Madeleine L’Engle for our minds (& hearts) to munch on today:

“To refuse to respond is in itself a response… Like it or not, we either add to the darkness of indifference and out and out evil which surrounds us, or we light a candle to see by.”  

rose and candleHere’s to lighting a few candles this Lent…

(& sharing a few roses!)

grace, peace & candle-responders

Virginia : )

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…going deeper…

Posted on February 10, 2016 by Virginia

It’s Ash Wednesday… and so Lent begins.  Last year @ Roses in the Rubble we started out by opening our hearts to be embraced by God (click here to check out how) then moved into the desert to see how God’s embrace could keep us going in dry places (click here for desert how to’s..)

FL SA boat tour lighthouse lots of water (2)This year instead of navigating dry desert landscapes, let’s contemplate setting out into deeper waters of our faith, by faith.  Sure, the shore seems safer and our fears may keep us tethered to the pier.

Going deeper, after all, is not without risk.

When I was five-years old, I accidentally slipped into the deep end of a pool at my Aunt Ruth’s home in Pennsylvania.  Not good for a child who didn’t know how to swim!  As noisy family reunion interactions distracted the usually vigilant adults, they didn’t notice when I started drowning.  Thank God, my cousin Jill jumped in and saved my life.  Just two years older, she somehow grabbed my red pigtails & pulled me out of the deep end.

Life is a gift!  (thanking God for with-it cousins!!)

The thing about going deeper this Lent – yes, it’s risky. Our fears like the pier. Everything is so easy to see in the shallows. It doesn’t require much effort to stay afloat when our feet can still touch the ground.

Going deeper requires stronger strokes of faith as the ground beneath us disappears.

Moving into the deep with the life-preserver of Jesus Christ’s love surrounding us, we don’t have to be afraid. His grace & mercy will keep us afloat.

At church today Msgr. Timothy Keeney threw down several challenges: Lent is a time for new beginnings, metanoia – a chance to change.  We should be joyful (for Lent? while fasting? with ashes and all that?)  Yes, JOYFUL (he said it, i didn’t!)  Because? Receiving God’s mercy is a gift. Receiving God’s grace is a gift.  Receiving both should set us off rejoicing.

Kind of like how happy I was as a five year old when my cousin saved me from drowning (still rejoicing, many years on.)

FYI, remember Jesus is with us in the deep-ends of whatever we may be facing, always there to pull us out.

Yet, going deeper with Him this Lent, “do not dare not to dare.”  (C.S. Lewis)

grace, peace & deeper waters

Virginia  : )

p.s.  Here’s a peek at last night’s blueberry pancakes (my brother Dwight’s plate)

Blueberry pancakesProbably not a fastingly good idea to share when you’re hungry, (now i know!) but hey, they were pretty tasty  : )

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blueberry pancakes (for dinner!)

Posted on February 9, 2016 by Virginia

Shrove Tuesday is here (already!) and that means?

PANCAKES FOR DINNER!!

oh …and Lent starts tomorrow.   Ashes, fasting, 40 days til Easter?

But today, sometimes called “Fat Tuesday,”  it’s still ok to whoop it up with yummy eats whether you’re doing Mardi Gras down in New Orleans, finishing Fasching in Germany, celebrating the last day of Carnival in Rio, or just slushing through another dreary winter day.

For some reason lots of folks eat pancakes.  Years ago my church in DC always had pancake suppers on Shrove Tuesday, a tradition begun in the Middle Ages to empty out rich ingredients before the onset of Lenten fasting.

Hey, why not? Pancakes are pretty tasty! Added to finishing off the chocolate stash, it’s a recipe for a super sugar buzz.

A few weeks ago I made blueberry pancakes as a treat during a snowed-in weekend (10 inches in our back yard with ice betwixt & between.)  Getting back into the blueberry pancake grooves, my eyes misted over with the realization that I had not made them since my Papa passed.

Papa loved blueberry pancakes! He so looked forward to the special occasions when I whipped them up (since he was a diabetic, not too often.)  But his numbers didn’t go too crazy with sugar-free syrup & plenty of accompanying protein (lite turkey sausages, what he didn’t know, right? Even his favorite meatballs were made from ground turkey.)

sneaky.  sneaky.  (the turkey thing!)

Back to pancakes – a few weeks ago my eyes may have leaked a little over the griddle, but the blueberry pancakes sure tasted good.

So tonight, we’re having blueberry pancakes.

I’m sure Papa would approve!

blueberriesgrace, peace & blueberry pancakes*

Virginia : )

(*with some grits!)

p.s. Your humble blogger’s visions of grandeur (ie, that post-a-day gig during Advent) went bust with only ONE blog posted.  Missing Mama, ’twas hard going & doing.  Last year she hung out with me in the study, propped up on the comfy sofa while i typed away – she also served as a model, helped with photo shoots (click here to see!) & cheered me on (especially to finish so we could move on to our fun goings & doings!)  I miss her so much! …but here’s to trying a post-a-day gig this Lent.

Sometimes we focus so much on what we give up for Lent we forget it’s also about what we do.  (You can do something this Lent – read my blog each day! Oh, how shameless.)  But I will try to do something each day in the Blogosphere – a quote, pic, thought – hopefully something that inspires our faith walk (which shouldn’t be just talk, altho at times we balk!)

Now on to stalk the rest of that chocolate!  : )

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Advent-ish rainbows

Posted on December 6, 2015 by Virginia

Shocked to see a blog from Roses in the Rubble? Me too! Blogger Virginia has been off the posting grid for MANY MONTHS.  Yes, it’s already the 2nd Sunday of Advent so making that previous post-a-day Advent goal is bust.  But hey, a week late, and here we are.

My brother, Dwight, & I returned last week from a 10 day visit to Florida – 7 nites in New Smyrna Beach, 3 nites in St. Augustine.  Last year we missed Papa at Thanksgiving and Christmas, but we had Mama.  This year we miss them both so much!!

So, we celebrated Thanksgiving on the beach (literally.) As we sat in our comfy beach chairs recovering from a jam packed excursion to Epcot (where we had suitably celebrated Thanksgiving with an amazing 2 hour 5-star lunch the day before!) I was thinking about Mama & Papa when Dwight said, “Look!”

FL NSB rainbow thanksgiving close up

“A RAINBOW ON THANKSGIVING!”

We whipped out our handy iPhones to capture the moment, but even now it doesn’t capture how special we felt. Dwight said he had been thinking about Mama & Papa, too. Then, there’s this gorgeous rainbow.  In Florida… on an almost-deserted Apollo Beach.

To me, rainbows are about hope. Isn’t that kinda what Advent is about? Faith (obviously) and hope, because as the author of Hebrews reminds us, “faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we cannot see.”

So, my question this Advent, what are we hoping for this year?  In the deepest core of our hearts, in the corners, are we ready?

Closing with the words from a famous hymn we sang to Mama in June during her last week with us:

“Be still, my soul! Thy God doth undertake

To Guide the future, as He has the past:

Thy hope, thy confidence, let nothing shake,

All now mysterious shall be bright at last.”

(by J. Borthwick)

FL NSB rainbow thanksgivinggrace, peace & hope-filled rainbows

Virginia

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peace-packed music for the spirit…

Posted on June 9, 2015 by Virginia

After the post-a-day Lent gig here @ Roses in the Rubble, Virginia (your other-wised occupied blogger) took a wee blogcation.  To get back into the blogging grooves, how appropriate to share a piece of peace-packing music for the spirit…

While getting my precious Mama ready for bed each night we often sing hymns together (or sometimes she just hums along to my bombastic soprano.)  Last week when she requested that wonderful old hymn, “Dear Lord and Father of Mankind,” we didn’t get much past the first line (even with bombastic soprano goings on.)  Ooops – another oldie but goodie forgotten.  The next day we tackled memorizing the first verse from the Hymnal (turns out the only remembered words came from the last verse : )  ….and today we finished out the remaining verses.  Powerful, powerful words that really moved my heart & spirit today as Mama sang along. (Memorizing words & music for me now requires quite a bit of repetition, verse by verse, so we had a go at this hymn quite a few times!)

Here are the words for our hearts & spirits to munch on today (don’t forget the mind-munching part, too.)

Dear Lord and Father of mankind,
Forgive our foolish ways;
Reclothe us in our rightful mind,
In purer lives Thy service find,
In deeper reverence, praise.

In simple trust like theirs who heard,
Beside the Syrian sea,
The gracious calling of the Lord,
Let us, like them, without a word,
Rise up and follow Thee…

Drop Thy still dews of quietness,
Till all our strivings cease;
Take from our souls the strain and stress,
And let our ordered lives confess
The beauty of Thy peace.

Breathe through the heats of our desire
Thy coolness and Thy balm;
Let sense be dumb, let flesh retire;
Speak through the earthquake, wind, and fire,
O still, small voice of calm.

Words: John G. Whittier (1807-1892)  (We like the Frederick C. Maker music version.)

Bruton Parish flowers May 2015grace, peace & quiet dews

    Virginia : )

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…easter alleluias…

Posted on April 5, 2015 by Virginia

CHRIST IS RISEN!!! Alleluia, Alleluia…

Easter flowers DOG Street40+ days ago we began our Lenten journey in the desert looking for the embrace of Christ & landed yesterday in eternal waterfalls of His love and mercy that never run dry.

Through the Cross and Resurrection we ARE embraced by the love of Jesus Christ. Love adorned with thorns, lashed & nailed to a rugged Cross: forgiveness for us, each one, a steep price. Yet freely given, for God’s love did not stay entombed.

“Now you are ready for Resurrected Life, which will allow you henceforth to read your life backward and understand, and read it forward with hope. Hope is not some vague belief that ‘all will work out well,’ but biblical hope is the certainty that things finally have a victorious meaning no matter how they turn out. We learn that from Jesus, which gives us the courage to live our lives forward.”   Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM (Wondrous Encounters: Scripture for Lent)

On Thursday when Mama & I went out to Memorial Park (where Papa’s grave lies) I took this picture of flowers bursting into bloom…

Memorial park pagoda flowers During our last visit on March 8th everything still looked winter-bleak.  Yet spring comes bringing new life …

Papas graveBecause Jesus Christ rose from the grave, we know Papa is not there (alleluia!) he’s with Jesus, resting in the Everlasting Arms of God.  That’s Easter faith – filled with Resurrection alleluias.  That gives us the strength to die in hope and live with hope as we open our hearts wider to embrace & be embraced by Jesus Christ.

His Sacred Heart beats with love for each one of us…

“I invite all Christians, everywhere, at this very moment, to a renewed personal encounter with Jesus Christ, or at least an openness to letting Him encounter them; I ask all of you to do this unfailingly each day. No one should think that this invitation is not meant for him or her since no one is excluded from the joy brought by the Lord.”  Pope Francis

It’s Easter… and oh, how we miss Papa! But the verses that best describe his life are also hope for us today and every day….

“Why do you complain, Jacob?  Why do you say, Israel,  “My way is hidden from the Lord; my cause is disregarded by my God”?  Do you not know?  Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.  He will not grow tired or weary, and His understanding no one can fathom.  He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.  Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.” Isaiah 40:27-31

Easter blessings & Resurrection hope to all!!

Easter Crossgrace, peace & Easter alleluias

Virginia : )

p.s. this concludes the Lenten challenge (Lent+ Holy Week + Easter Triduum) post-a-day gig here @ Roses in the Rubble.  Virginia, your humble blogger, hopes that you may have been blessed (somehow.)  She will now get back into her regular blogging grooves – one post per week (if that!) maybe 2 if she’s feeling really prolific!

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