Christus mansionem benedicat (D31-J6)
Happy Saturday to you!
Eric, in charge of the ten-second countdown to New Year’s shushed his mom as she asked for the third time that minute if it was time yet. After a pause, the three of us watching the second hand began chanting.
“Ten!” Linda nodded instead of berating her son for shushing her, and flipped her lighter into grip.
“Nine!” About 12 of us had gathered outside of the apartment complex in the wet of midnight, party-drinks in hand with varying levels of alcohol: proper champagne for the proper Germans, and sparkling water with syrup for the rest of us. One bottle was empty, and we were well on our way through the second bottle for the bottle rockets.
“Eight!” A sense of relief began to flood my body. 2023 had been, as exciting and full as it was, an emotional crapshoot. And it, too, shall pass
“Seven!” We walked into church that morning seven minutes late because we insisted on walking instead of packing four of us across the three seats in the back of Mom and Dad’s Speed the Light vehicle.
“Six!” The seconds were slipping away. Linda lit the first batch of fireworks so that
“Five!” by the time the year had finally disappeared,
“Four!” the despair and despondency that had
“Three!” unbearably accompanied it was finally, irrevocably
“Two!” going up in the air to burst into lights
“One!”
Bad firework photography, but accurate to the amount of gunpowder in the streets!
From top to bottom, left to right: Daniel, Beth, Gracie, Eric, and Will. Can you guess which ornament we hung while the parents weren’t looking?
Wiesbaden erupted with cheers and explosions, and with each crack I cheered, clinked my party drink to another party drink and let the joy set in. The smell of gunpowder filled the street as we and everyone else on the street sent hundreds of euros of fireworks up in flames. For the next 30 minutes we lit fireworks in the parking lot, and then for another 30 minutes sat up on the balcony and watched over the city as fireworks continued exploding for a total first hour of the New Year being enveloped with red and green lights, whistling bottle rockets, snapping firecrackers, and the rising scent of gunpowder filling the street.
It was, according to the Catholic calendar, the 7th day of Christmas.
The altar of Our Lady, Comforter of the Afflicted in Luxembourg.
Dad was so proud that he aligned the bridge reflection so perfectly!
I made a clerical error last week when I told you Christmas is over: yesterday was the 12th and final day of Christmastide and today is Epiphany. While Catholics celebrate the birth of Jesus on the first day of the Christmas festival, the Orthodox celebrate it on the last. So: while the Catholic and Orthodox calendar is not on the same day, Merry Christmas!
Epiphany is a feast day to commemorate the visit of the Magi to the newly born Christ, but also his baptism by John and his first miracle at the wedding in Cana.
On this day or in this season (Epiphanytide) above or on apartment doors in all of Christian Europe is written: 20+C+M+B+24. The tradition dates back to medieval Europe when the three kings were named Caspar, Melchior and Balthazaar - conveniently, it matches the Latin blessing Christus mansionem benedicat or, “Christ bless this house.”
The three mythical kings brought gifts to the God-child, and so it really makes more sense to celebrate gift-giving on the last day of Christmas rather than the first. But I do appreciate the sentiment of pushing all of the materialism to the front and letting the last gift be the immaterial but immortal presence of Christ with us, his blessing on the doors of our houses and more importantly, our hearts.
This practice was especially important to Poles as I grew up. Even though we weren’t catholic, our neighbors or the neighborhood priest would chalk all the doors in our apartment. During the communist regime they would write on all the doors to assert their faith and hope against the atheistic overlords.
Eat the rich, haha
Dad called this “old green.” The Black Forest wasn’t super black this time of year…
One thing I appreciate about the Orthodox celebrating Christmas at the beginning of the year is that it combines all of our preconceived notions of New Year’s with Christ’s coming into the world. Whatever you have (or haven’t) newly resolved for the year is paired with the illuminating hope of Emmanuel. Your goals and dreams are formed through the lens of human dependence on God alone.
The relief I felt at the turning of the clock is a realization of the new season. Christ brought with him the new age of closeness with the Father via the outpouring of his Spirit. We are experiencing something that is new to humanity on the whole: unity with the Godhead
I don’t know if that was the epiphany the magi received when they arrived in Israel. I suspect even they couldn’t have imagined, let alone predicted the way Christ would embody the kingship they honored in him. And I suspect that the longer Mary considered these things, the more she understood (even if what she understood was how little she understood). I, for one, don’t mind expanding my schedule to include more Christmas so that maybe I, too, will receive some sort of epiphanic comprehension of goodness through Christ.
I thought my brother looked pretty epic atop this castle in Baden-Baden. We played all of the repetitious Mario Kart levels in its honor: Moo Moo, Ice Ice, Rock Rock, Cheep Cheep…
Say cheeeeese
I’m stepping into 2024 with more trepidation than anticipation. Work ended on quite a sour note, and my vacation has been spent juggling what I want to do (play games and eat too much with people I love) with what I must do to be able to go back to work the day I land (finagling HR meetings, PTO requests, and sleep schedules).
It brings me no small amount of comfort that this too, like 2023, shall pass. And hopefully it shall sooner than later pass that I get to see your lovely faces.
Thank you, by the way, for reading these words of mine. And happy Epiphany!
—Beth
