God, Belching

In the Hanukkah-ish realm of steady and even fierce Light, RantWoman is grabbing these two items from the Barclay Press

Read this one for the belching reference in the title
Where do we hear God s voice?

I Can't Sleep

Is RantWoman LOOKING for signs?

Where does RantWoman come down on the Run with Christ / It's all God within spectrum? RantWoman takes note of the dance in and out of Quaker worship.

The first Fourth Saturday Worship was a gift: RantWoman feels well-rewarded for being faithful to her Light; thoughts of people wanting to talk about prayer. In the future RantWoman will issue several specific invitations; RantWoman will also offer another opportunity to distribute invitations.

There was an image, partly about centering in worship: if you want to dance, you have to roll up the carpets and clear the floor. RantWoman can go SEVERAL directions with that.

RantWoman is left with questions and thoughts about worship and middle-schoolers that probably belong only in email. For her own part, RantWoman was pretty much a nerd at middle school age. First, the RantFamily moved to MT when RantWoman was in 6th grade. Junior High was grades 7-9.  Fitting in was not going to happen in school, and the church where RantDad was choir director already had its cliques too.

RantWoman blesses Sunday school teachers for being shining positive presence and gently biblical lessons; RantWoman would not say they were gifted about child development issues, but Sunday school was pleasant enough. Objecting to going to church would not have been received well; plus for RantWoman church through much of childhood was far preferable to the kid supervision options. RantWoman kind of dug the metaphors of the hymns. A number of feisty women who had worked in nearby Native communities (indian country, in modern usage; thank you Twitter.) kept things lively. At some point RantWoman realized that she naturally has some double-vision and when the service got too dull, RantWoman would spend time tracking the same objects in different images. So RantWoman finds herself just wondering about current local expectations from various directions.

And in the realm of what Lydia X Z Brown calls body-minds and being present with what they do or do not do, RantWoman offers observations from a recent Quaker Christmas pageant.

--RantWoman is grateful for Friends who described what everyone was laughing about: the baby Jesus proxy entered the stage stuck up Mary's shirt and arrived by the shortest and least bodily substance infused delivery ever.

--RantWoman spent time during the performance kind of rolling her eyes because one actor could barely be heard. RantWoman, though, is VERY glad she kept her mouth shut: RantWoman had been at an event where the presenter, someone on the autism spectrum, asked people please not to clap because she finds such sounds disturbing. The presenter asked everyone just to do the Deaf people wave hands thing. Okay sure, but if RantWoman does not have some kind of audio cue, she could be waving her hands all day.

After the holiday pageant, RantWoman learned that the person she was rolling her eyes about is the person whose mother awhile ago sent out an email on her son's behalf asking Friends for awareness and patience. RantWoman is guessing from the email that even standing up and saying a few lines was outside the son's comfort zone. RantWoman can encourage without traumatizing. No just yelling "Louder." Not obvious what to do if one can't hear. Luckily in this case the pageant was not going to be long and Divine mercy can cover conflicting accessibility needs. Luckily.