I really like those pictures. Glad you are back at church.
I've connected more dots regarding Covid, but will leave it for later.
Now I'm going to look at those photos.
Where two or three are gathered
Thank you nordicwarrior
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I really like those pictures. Glad you are back at church.
I've connected more dots regarding Covid, but will leave it for later.
Now I'm going to look at those photos.
Where two or three are gathered
@Duarte
I share no guilt !
I won’t allow the Media or anybody to play with my emotions, that’s the new thing lately.
I’m not ashamed, and I’m not guilty
This is Saint Sebastian’s church (Igreja De São Sebastião) founded by Italians, in the ‘Barro Preto’ neighborhood, in BH. Simply beautiful. I was born in this neighborhood, although I was not grow there. The ecumenical cult to celebrate my son's degree at the university was in this church. He's half Italian. We need a lot of faith in this difficult time that the world is going through. Tradition is important. I have a big Jewish friend. He is an atheist and practicing Jew. Once time I asked him if it was not contradictory and he told me it was not. I understood why.
PS: São Sebastião is also the patron of the City of Rio de Janeiro and the most famous landmark in Brazil is the Christ the Redeemer statue that embraces the city from the top of the Corcovado hill. Nobody in Brazil would ever think of taking down what is a patrimony of the Brazilian people.
It's partly my sense of aesthetics, and partly my memories of childhood I'm sure, and growing up in a land of beautiful churches, but these large, barn like structures, devoid of ornament, with huge windows of clear glass which were built in the U.S. over the last decades leave me absolutely cold.
There are all kinds of "religious" people, I think: some like the order, the rules, the authority; some like the feeling that here are the answers, and life now has ultimate meaning; some like the social aspects, the sense of community. None of those things were first or even very important to me. I didn't think God cared about nitpicking rules, I didn't and don't like functioning in groups of people, and I always had my doubts about some of the answers, but there are those of us who like the mysticism of it, the sense of communion with what lies beyond the veil. That's why I've always said that were I to become a "practicing" religious person again, the various Protestant churches, no offense meant, hold absolutely no appeal. It would be Catholicism, whether Roman or perhaps even better, eastern rite. All those old rituals like rosaries, chants, novenas, with candles flickering, and the smell of incense, make it easier, for those who have the desire and the ability to do it, to transport elsewhere, to enter into a trancelike state. Asian religious rituals provide that avenue for those so inclined as well.
The tiny church where I was baptized.
The church that we and our children attended, where I even taught theology, all the while being a secret agnostic. I no longer practice. Not like my birth church but not bad.
I would really find it difficult to enter into the right frame of mind in these kinds of churches. The failure may very well be in me, but I could as easily meditate in a meeting room.
Covid cases by province in Europe. It's interactive.
https://www.infodata.ilsole24ore.co...le24Ore&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1593406676
Almost 80% of deaths linked to Covid-19 in Europe were in people over 75 https://wsj.com/articles/new-data-reveal-just-how-deadly-covid-19-is-for-the-elderly-11593250200?shareToken=st980d905a335e4c75b0d5c61695508257… via @WSJ
Biggest block being infected in U.S. today? 20-29 year olds. Probably most don't see their grandparents, so perhaps the impact will be minimal in terms of fatalities
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