#Begrudging

[momentsbeforemass]

Christmas Joy?

Thinking up the worst possible outcome.

Maybe even two or three or more ways that it can go wrong. And then getting stuck thinking about them.

It’s one of my least useful skills.

Especially when it comes to imagining how someone is going to respond to something hard. Or how a difficult situation is going to work out.

If you’re like me, then you know how this “skill” can really run you through the wringer. Long before anything has actually happened. Much less anything bad.

One of the worst ways that this plays out? With other people. Especially people we don’t really know. When we have to rely on what someone has told us about them.

Probably the most obvious (and most damaging) example of this is with God.

Here’s why I say that. We live in a culture that’s created a lot of versions of God that are horrible.

And it’s not just people who supposedly hate God. Some of the people who proclaim their faith the loudest proudly show off their petty, vengeful, resentful, hateful versions of God.

So it’s really no surprise that even people who don’t horrible-ize things imagine the worst possible outcomes from any interaction with God. They’ve been given every reason to get stuck thinking about God that way. They’ve been given every reason to stay away.

Except the truth.

Today’s Gospel (Matthew 1:1-25) gives the names of the Son of God – Jesus and Emmanuel.

Jesus means “God saves.” It tells us what God will do through Jesus, and how God works.

Emmanuel means “God with us.” It tells us who Jesus is, and what’s in God’s heart.

That’s the truth about God. How do we know that’s really the truth about God?

Because that’s what plays out in the Incarnation. In the pattern of redemption that runs from Christmas through Good Friday to Easter.

God saves. And He does it by being who He is, by being God with us.

The thing to know is how God does it.

God doesn’t save us begrudgingly. God isn’t the God of “if-I-have-to.”

God doesn’t save us judgmentally (although some of God’s noisiest alleged followers want Him to be). God isn’t the God of condemnation.

So how does God do it?

Isaiah tells us in the first reading (Isaiah 62:1-5), and it has zero to do with anything about what you and I have done. Or how far we’ve wandered. Or how much we don’t fit in someone else’s messed up version God.

Here’s the truth. And it’s the source of the joy of Christmas.

God looks at you and loves you.

God looks at you and gets excited about being with you.

God delights in you.

This Christmas, may God fill your heart with the joy that comes from knowing just how much you mean to Him.

Readings for Christmas Eve

[howifeltabouthim]

I wish I didn't love her, she wrote one day. You can't unlove someone, I wrote. You can only hate them.

Lisa Taddeo, from Animal

[ryopromoter]

ryo making silly faces on live television part one

[lesamis]

are you a Byron or Wilde apologist?

concerned citizens from 1895 are messaging me

[girlzoot]

As a thirty-year-old adult, sitting in Ummi’s kitchen, listening to her tell me these stories, I still felt like a child. I had lived on my own since I was nineteen, but I spent years feeling intimidated by her and one link away from being close to her. Figuring out the right thing to say that wouldn’t sound disgruntled or begrudging was a challenge, because I was both at the time. —N. Jamiyla Chisholm/The Community: A Memoir

[the-muppet-joker]

I have been bailed out of Real Jail. Whoopsie Doodle on my part! Did not know dueling people in the street with knives was Disorderly Conduct!

[evast]

Back on bg3 again

[the-valiant-valkyrie]

tough getting by in a country when you don't know the language

[blighted-lights]

ravage is #1 personal space stealer and heater, 10/10 would recommend having him as an amica. usually he'd be sleeping curled around soundwave's head but the other cassettes are out harassing starscream on patrol, so soundwave's chest is free real estate

anyways send me asks with ur soundwave and ravage hcs and mayhaps i'll draw them soon

[happyvoltz]

gotta keep her on a leash

[momentsbeforemass]

What makes a truly great gift?

What makes a truly great gift?

Cost? Sentimental value? One-of-a-kind? They’ll use it every day? There’s always the cliché – “it’s the thought that counts.”

I struggle with what makes a truly great gift. But I do know how to ruin any gift.

Give it begrudgingly. With an attitude of “fine, if I have to.”

That kind of giving will turn the most amazing, unique, thoughtful gift into garbage.

I don’t know about you, but I would rather get nothing, than have something given to me begrudgingly. I’m not alone in that feeling.

If I do get something that was given begrudgingly, unless I can give it to a parish auction, it’s going straight into the trash.

The thing is, a lot of us have that idea about God’s gift of forgiveness.

That God doesn’t really want to forgive us. And if God actually does forgive us, it’s done begrudgingly.

Because we did something super Catholic. Or met some arcane requirement to receive an indulgence. Basically, we backed God into a corner with His own rules. And now He has to forgive us.

If that’s how it works, it’s unhealthy. To say the least. Why would you want anything to do with something that messed up?

Thank God that’s not how it works!

The thing to know about God is that God isn’t waiting for you to do something super Catholic or to meet some arcane requirement, before He forgives you. God’s waiting for half an excuse to forgive you.

Like a being genuinely sorry for about hurting someone. And asking for forgiveness.

A change of heart. That’s all God’s waiting for.

Because God’s approach to forgiveness is kind of the opposite of begrudging. We see it in today’s first reading,

“Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt and pardons sin? Who does not persist in anger but delights in clemency?”

Translation - You want to see God light up with joy? Ask for forgiveness.

Today’s Readings

[howifeltabouthim]

This is hard for me to write. These words come hard to me; each one begins as a stone in my mouth.

Siri Hustvedt, from The Blazing World

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Lap Pillow

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[automatonwithautonomy]

it doesnt matter if theyre in love because they love each other. do you understand. do you get it.

[flawlessflesh]

more halloween sketches, this time featuring the winged lion

[calcified-fluorited]

Hot take, season 2 feels like piltover apologist propaganda

Piltover has been oppressing and exploiting zaun for who know how long, but the timeline where everything is good, all that had to be different was for hextech to not exist

at several points in the story, including Cait's poison gas mission, enforcers go down there to brutalise people in pursuit of jinx, but all of that unnecessary violence is brushed aside because there is a new Big Bad that we all must unite against. How convenient!

the Big Bad (Viktor) was from Zaun, and we need Piltover's police force to save us from this zaunite. Actually, the previous season's big bad was also from the undercity

zaunites come to help the people who treated them like animals their entire lives AND THEY PUT ON THE UNIFORMS OF PEOPLE WHO OPPRESSED THEM? I'M SORRY WHAT

Sevika who conveniently hasn't spoken a line since what, episode 4? her opinion isn't important, just be happy that she's on the council now.

entirety of act 3 actually

the "dirt under your nails" line. ????? Who wrote this? I want to talk.