Still

I want to spend some time this late afternoon, 4:00 post meridian, sitting in a worn wooden rocking chair, it's varnish totally ground away by three years of rains and snows and wind and morning sun, with a cup of Two Leaves and a Bud green tea with Italian orange essence.

I brew my tea - boil water to warm the mug. Fresh water to just a scant boil for the tea. Four minutes to steep, in a mug with flowers made of little hearts and the words, "I love you" scrawled on it.

After the brewing, I take my mug, and a volume by Lauren f. Winner (she uses the lower case for the "f"). The book is Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis. I sit on the porch with my tea, sipping it and reading. I read about six pages.

The breeze is a bit too brisk, the cold too sharp. I give up, and I give in the the compulsion to write - anything, this note.

I chose the stopping place. The writer is explaining Epiphany, the season in some Christian faith expressions, and specifically the Episcopalian expression of the Christian faith, and why the baptism of Jesus is the first gospel we read in this season. "Epiphany (the word comes from the Greek for 'to manifest' or 'to show forth')..." she writes, "...is a season of questions and answers: who is Jesus...how can we bear Jesus' light in the world?"

Then the official reason for including the baptism of Jesus as an Epiphany story, it is "that after Jesus is baptized, a dove alights, and a voice comes from heaven declaring, 'This is my beloved Son...' "

But, the author wonders, is this is the prime meaning of including the baptism of Jesus in Epiphany. She reminds us that at Christmas we recognize Jesus as Emmanuel, God-with-us. And she says, there he is, in the line with all the other sinners of the world, waiting, like them, to be baptized. He is truly with us, in the midst of us, "...the One who stands with humanity in this line that is all about our sinning...".

Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis - by Lauren f. Winner, Copyright (c) 2012, HarperCollins Publishers, New York, NY.

I pick up my mug, cup it in my hands, feel its warmth, and sit and drink.