Wishing you light, joy, and a healthy heaping of hope…

I’m sitting on a train to Berlin, listening to Christmas carols (all the oldies from my childhood), and sipping a “Lebkuchen” (aka. Gingerbread) latte. It’s my favorite time of the year filled with all my favorite things – cue Julie Andrews – and all should be right with the world.

And yet…

This season of so much light, cheer, sugar, and spice has also been a reminder that all is not right in the world. Political, racial, and national divides paper my Facebook news feed. Bombs fall on Aleppo as young and old upload their final goodbyes to Youtube. And the news screens in the subway show images of a truck plowed into a Christmas market in Berlin. Homeless men and women huddle into sleeping bags under bridges and my migrant students’ phones and ID-cards are stolen from the locker room during gym class – their connection to the homes they’ve left behind and their new identities and claims to a new life in a new home.

In a time when we are singing about joy and peace, we desperately wish for the world to be well, to be whole. But the reality is staring us in the face – just behind the veil of crowded shopping malls, twinkling lights, and honeyed hams – the world is sick and broken.

So what do we do? Do we cancel Christmas? Unplug the lights, drag the tree to the curb, throw some mothballs on the Christmas sweaters, and unstuff the stockings?

As someone who spends the entire year looking forward to the holiday season and all its traditions, I don’t think that’s the answer.

But I do think we need to reorient our season on hope – not just finding it for ourselves, but embodying it for others.

The past few Decembers (and the other eleven months when I think no one is listening), I’ve become enamored by a particular Christmas song.

O come, o come Emanuel

And ransom captive Israel

Who morns in lonely exile here

Until the son of God appears

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emanuel

Shall come to thee, o Israel.

With it’s soft, minor harmonies, this song gets me right in the feels every time. It’s a song of solitude and yearning – a song of wandering in the darkness and looking for a light.

One of my neighbors down the street started putting a lantern with a large pillar candle out on their stoop a few weeks back. It reminds me of the ancient traditions throughout northern Europe of creating light as the nights got longer. It’s a little flickering reminder of the spirit of the yule log – light and warmth burning through the longest night. As a Christian, it reminds me of the light of a little child born in Bethlehem – a light in the darkness, a hope for healing, a savior for the lost. Life breathed into God-made-man, God-with-us – Emanuel.

And such is the challenge for all of us – not only during the holidays, but throughout the year. What are we doing to bring light and hope to the lives of others – our loved ones, friends, neighbors, and even our enemies?

As we sit with our families this Christmas, as we bask in the lights of our Christmas trees, and as we test the human limits of Christmas cookie consumption, think about those who are hurting in the world. Think of those who are alone, those who need someone to reach out to them. And then, reach out. Donate, visit, pray, write, call, embrace. Be aware – even if it’s painful – of those who need the warmth, light, and hope of this season, and explore how to embody that hope.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a hopeful year ahead.

Is it Christmas yet?

Imagine for a moment that you’re driving home for the holidays. You’re stuck in traffic, gifts are piled in the trunk, and the radio fills the car with old-timey carols and ads for deals at Best Buy. And then a voice breaks through the idling engines and jingling bells: “Are we there yet?”

And in similar fashion began the advent wreath right here in Hamburg, Germany.

The year was 1839 and Johann Hinrich Wichern was pastor of the Rauhes Haus mission school. Every day the children would ask him if it Christmas yet, and Wichern (like generations of parents have aspired to do before and after) devised a clever way to end the nagging. He fashioned the first ever advent “wreath” out of an old cartwheel by turning it on its side and affixing 24 small red candles and four large white candles. Each day of the week, a small red candle would be lit – except on Sunday, when a white candle was set ablaze.

A large wreath hangs in St. Michael’s Church, Hamburg

Red and white candles harken back to the original Wichern’s original wreath.

A large wreath outside city hall.

Eventually, evergreen boughs were added and the candles were reduced to only four, for the household sized wreaths we know today.

Whether simple or ornate, many candles or few, the advent wreath is a fun and meaningful way to count-down to Christmas.

We all have unique holiday traditions, but there are also many that we share. The tradition of the advent wreath can be found in many countries in homes, churches, and even public spaces. It is something that teaches us to bring light into darkness, to look forward to the future, and to connect with those near and far. And to learn that it all started right here in Hamburg was a real Christmas treat!

Bucket List: Borobudur

By Gunawan Kartapranata (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

When I first found out that I was going to Indonesia, I immediately thought, “That archipelago I learned about in 9^th grade – Cool!” But after my first stroke of high-school recall, I truthfully knew very little about this island nation. In fact, when I told my boss (Hi, Dr. Coffey!) at work the following day where I was headed and he mentioned something about Jakarta, I smiled and nodded – caught up in my own excitement – only to later ask myself, “What the heck is Jakarta?!” (It’s the capital of Indonesia.)

I don’t know if these are reflections on American education or my terrible memory, but knowing so little about Indonesia, I had a fairly non-existent bucket list of things I wanted to do here (beyond eat something new and see a volcano erupt, both of which I accomplished in my first week of training).

The upside of my general ignorance has been the pleasure of constantly allowing myself to be surprised, cobbling together a bucket list as I go along.

Stupas atop Borobudur.

Soon after arriving at site, Flores – with its mountains, beaches, and dragons – took the top spot on my list. Flores was closely followed by Yogyakarta – home of sultans and cultural heart of Java. My site is located fairly close to Yogya, and I have had a number of opportunities to go there, but somehow I always missed what is arguably the #1 attraction of the Yogyakarta area (technically located in Magelang): Borobudur Temple.

Peaceful Buddha.

School trips went to different Yogya destinations, plans fell through, and time slipped away. At one point I wondered if I would ever make it, but the visit of a fellow volunteer’s friend from America finally provided the perfect opportunity this past January!

Old fashioned selfie – I made it!

Borobudur temple is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is frequently found on lists of places you should see before you die. I have been to other temples on Java and Bali, all memorable and unique in their own way, but Borobudur takes the crown for its sheer size and mass.

The 9^th century Buddhist temple is stacked in nine symmetrical layers to create a giant stupa. By walking around each layer in a clockwise direction, one symbolizes the ascent from Earth to Nirvana. Constructed completely from stone as a walk-through mandala, the lower levels feature carved reliefs depicting scenes from the Buddhist-Javanese narrative, while the upper layers are dotted with smaller stupas, each housing a Buddha.

Buddha chillin’ in a stupa.

With its flocks of tourists and students asking for pictures, the temple is no longer a peace-seekers paradise, but we were able to beat the majority of the crowds by splurging on the sunrise tour (entry before the main gates open is well worth waking up early and shelling out the extra cash).

Borobudur is as exquisite in its detail as impressive in its size, and I feel I found my own little piece of bucket list nirvana while watching the stones and their stories reveal themselves in the morning mist.

Reog Ponorogo

There are some things in our lives that draw us towards them with an irresistible force of curiosity – things that we know we must explore, discover, and experience. We aren’t sure exactly what to anticipate from these things, but we know that they are pieces that were somehow meant to fit into the grander schemes of our lives.

When I heard stories about dancers who hold giant masks in their teeth, I knew I had to see them.

Reog Ponorogo is a dance that encapsulates much of Javanese culture. While watching it, I felt that my experiences on this island fell into context – a bright, elaborate, colorful, blaring context.

The king’s mask, held in the performers hand just as the story begins to unfold.

The dramatic dance tells the story of a king on his way to propose to the princess of a neighboring kingdom. The king is pompous and proud as he tames trotting horsemen, spinning witch-doctors, stomping ruffians, and giant peacock-lions on his way to the princess – eventually assembling them into a great performance in her honor. And I thought popping the question was nerve racking!

Although the details of the story portrayed in the dance may vary, every full performance contains these four elements. Each group takes the stage to show off their stuff – movements refined to the nature of the performed personalities. The riders expertly mimic the playful movements of their bamboo horses. The witch-doctors shake their shaggy heads as they somersault across the stage. The ruffians frown and spar with one another. But the show stopper is always the peacock-feathered lion.

Peacock, lion, tiger, man.

The lion (or tiger, depending on whether you want to focus on the strips or the mane…either way there is a lot going on here) masks are recognized as the largest masks in the world. This fact makes it all the more impressive that the dancers, while balancing the mask on their heads, must hold it steady in their teeth. Talk about a dentist’s nightmare!

This feat of physical strength is so otherworldly that many of these dancers are credited with supernatural powers, and it isn’t uncommon for dancers to enter a trance-like state as they turn, nod, collapse to the ground, and rise up again across the stage.

As if the weight of the mask wasn’t enough, some peacock-lion dancers will even allow a person to sit atop the lion head. While this is often a child or adolescent, sometimes it is also a full grown man. Here is a segment of video I took at the 2015 Reog Ponorogo Festival…

In case you didn’t catch how insane what you just watched is, that is a full grown man atop the world’s largest mask balancing in someone’s teeth.

Reog Ponorogo has largely become a performance-based art, but it comes out of a tradition that firmly believed in spirits, possessions, and the super natural power of trance. And when you watch today’s performances, you get it. The drums beat, shrill voices flood your ears, shaggy-masked acrobats fly through the air, ranks of horses charge by, stout men stomp and yell, and the peacock-lion flutters and looms into your view. The impossible unfolds before you in a tidal wave of color, movement, and noise. The rhythm tugs you in and you are there, submerged in the heady intoxication of Java.