Blog - Joyful Curmudgeon - Blog
A Mary T. Hoffman Commentary from All-Creatures.org

 

"Joyful Curmudgeon" An oxymoron?
No! I see all the beauty of God's creation and I'm joyful.  At the same time, I see all the suffering and corruption going on in the world, and feel called to help expose and end it so that we may have true peace and compassion.

 

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Merry Christmas – 25 December 2006
By Mary T. Hoffman

There is a song called “The Secret of Christmas” on our tape “Christmas with Julie Andrews.” I don’t remember hearing this song anywhere else, but the words convey some very good advice. Here are some of those words:

“The little gifts you send on Christmas Day
Will not bring back the friends you turned away.”

“So may I suggest the secret of Christmas?
It’s not the Christmas things you do at Christmas time,
But the Christmas things you do all year through.”

Before I finish this Blog, I’d like to mention something that I wonder about this time of year: Many people are offended by the use of the word “Xmas”; but I wonder if the origin of this shortened word for “Christmas” is simply the Greek letter “X” (from “Χριστούγεννα” which means “Christ’s Birth”) added to the English “mas” from “Christmas.” (“Christ” in Greek is “Χριστός.”)

The Greek letter “X” (pronounced “hee” but with a hard “h” somewhat like “khee”) is not pronounced as it is in English; but may vary in pronunciation, depending on the word in which it is used, from the “ch” in the German “ich” to the “ch” in the Scottish word “loch.”

Have a Merry Christmas! Καλά Χριστούγεννα!

Go on to: 'Tis the Morning after Christmas - 26 December 2006
Return to: Day Before Christmas -24 December 2006
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