Skip to main content

Epiphical

"On the twelth day of Christmas...I finally took down the decorations, and a partrige in a pear tree."

  When I was younger, Christmas always started just after Thanksgiving and ended the day after Christmas on the 26th of December. However, there were times when the real tree that was taken down was left in the yard for at least a month. =) But, things have changed. Christmas starts on the 25th of December and ends on January 6th...the day of Epiphany.
    Although we have nativity scenes that depict the wise men at the birth of Christ, it is a well known and widely accepted fact that the wise men didn't arrive to bring Christ gifts until he was around the age of 2. So, on this day, January 6th we celebrate the coming of the 3 wise men.
    Epiphany: a moment in which you suddenly see or understand something in a new or very clear way. This moment, of the bearing of gifts to Christ, is the first acceptance or knowledge of the Savior to the Gentiles or Eastern world. Around the world, this holiday is celebrated in many different ways.  
    Such as in: Bulgaria, a wooden cross is thrown into a lake or body of water by a priest and young men then race to get the cross. This is considered an honor to whichever young man retrieves the cross. In India, it varies as to the festival, but it is most usually called the Three Kings Festival, with parties and families coming together to cook porridge. In Wales, they celebrate with the baking of bread into a large loaf. This loaf is cut up into three pieces representing Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the 3 wise men.
    Christians around the world celebrate this feast day very differently; however, the meaning is the same. It is the moment Christ transcended the small town of Bethlehem into the rest of the world. It is a representation of the vastness of Christ's reach.
    Also, on this day, we remember the 3 gifts that were brought by the wise men. First, gold which was a representation of the kingship of Christ. They also brought frankincense which is a symbol of high quality or deity. Lastly, the myrrh which was an embalming oil used for the dead. All three of these gifts were representations of the life of Christ: His kingship, His deity, and His death.
     What a beautiful holiday that we embrace and celebrate. Happy Epiphany everyone!
   

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Tiger must stay in your backpack...

   I'm not that parent. The one who gloats too much, and shows off all the pictures. The parent who relays every detail of their kid to let others know how incredible I think they are. Perhaps it is a flaw. Who knows. And I also pride myself in not being a helicopter parent. I teach and let go. I discipline and let go.    And I thought I would be ready for this: first day of Pre-K. I have been very positive and uplifting and have wanted my son to be extra ready to go to school. We have talked about it for months! I am ready... Or so I thought.  This morning, as white boy was leaving to take them to daycare, he said to Owen, "You can't take Tiger to school tomorrow or he will have to stay in your backpack, so do you want to take him to daycare today?" I thought little of it, but as Owen threw him down on the ground and turned to head out the door, my throat hitched. "Are you sure you don't want to take him today?" He said no. It was a sense of finality.  ...

A goodbye love letter to you...

  I sat across from my dad at lunch, yesterday, and asked him, "Do you know what tomorrow is?" He said, "Yeah. 1 year." And his eyes grew damp. "I'll never forget walking into that room..." He didn't continue. I didn't ask him to. "I'll never forget the police officer banging on my door at 1130 at night..." I didn't continue. He didn't ask me to.  "This journal was given to me several years ago by my children. I know they wanted me to write down my thoughts to get through the rough times I was going through at the time. I did not start this at that time. Why am I starting it now? Well, I only thought I had been through hell back then, but now I realize I didn't have any idea what heartache was until Aug 15, 2010 -"   This is the beginning of one of my mother's journals. A journal she started a little over a month after Andy died. And she wrote it--to him.  "Dear Mother - Today is the day before Mothe...

Arithmetic of Purpose

   By nature, humans will, at one point in their life, ask the question, "For what purpose? Why am I here? What am I meant to do?" Okay, maybe they will ask themselves more than 1 question...but at least around the same theme. "Who am I, and why am I here?" It is built in our very DNA. Growing up, I didn't ask this often. I had a loving family who went with the current. Who I was and why I was here was bound up in my place in my family of 4. I was comfy. I was loved. I was secure. But alas...the question presented itself.   I first asked myself this question walking down the streets of Rome. I was alone, I was 21, and I was lost. I had just finished AmeriCorps and felt like I wanted something, but wasn't sure what that was. I had found my faith, at last, and realized that perhaps I wanted to be a bigger part of the Church collective. I felt meaning to my nothingness. I went home with direction. I graduated from college, finally, and started grad school to be...