“Christ’s coming into the world was not like that of a sightseer to a strange city, but rather like that of an artist visiting his own studio or an author paging the books he himself has written, for in becoming incarnate, the divine Word was tabernacling Himself in His own creation.” Archbishop Fulton Sheen (In The Fullness of Time)

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This is an old interview but I loved this interview with singer/songwriter Carolyn Arenz because I'm like her with the organizational boxes (put me in the container store, and I'll want everything there) and trying to keep it together with all the busyness, but not quite making it with that...and knowing that you need to Be Still but needing a little help. lol... but then there are the wild things of God that don't fit into the boxes, and the unexpected surprises and things that you think are distractions but may actually be God showing up in the present moment for you to welcome and let in. lol....but you know, I made some progress. I gave away about 20 baskets that were in the closet under my stairs and gave them to Forgotten Angels. I figured someone might need these to put Christmas gifts in. But they had become cumbersome and when I would open the closet they would fly out at me. It's was time to let it all go.

“Poetry listens to me when I am silent and understands me when no one else seems to be able to.”

"No one has ever laughed at a pun who did not see in the one word a twofold meaning. To materialists this world is opaque like a curtain; nothing can be seen through it. A mountain is just a mountain, a sunset just a sunset; but to poets, artists, and saints, the world is transparent like a window pane - it tells of something beyond....a mountain tells of the Power of God, the sunset of His Beauty, and the snowflake of His Purity." ~ Fulton J. Sheen

Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul." ~ John Muir

We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths. ~ Walt Disney

You know what. Sometimes in life, we get so attached to what we know, what we are used to, what is comfortable for us, the order and habits we have set up, that these things become a god to you. We block the Holy Spirit. We create this little predictable world where there are no surprises or unexpected things, and that comes from an anxiety problem where we feel the need to control our environment. But sometimes when you are in the process of trying to control your environment, you miss out on exciting things, like the birth of Christ, or the Risen Christ in disguise as a poor traveler, or creating something new. If you know that God is with you and will never abandon you, and trust in His Providence, it will help you through those times where you need to take a step out in faith into the unknown and walk by blind faith.

Art and prayer both involve trusting in a process. What they share in common is that we don’t know what’s going to happen until we begin, and we cannot control the outcome" - Excerpt from Jeri Gerding’s book, Art as Prayer. Prayer as Art: Drawing to God.

There is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost.” — Martha Graham

“God is really another artist. He invented the giraffe, the elephant and the cat. He has no real style. He just goes on trying other things.” — Pablo Picasso

“Behind all creation is silence. Silence is the essential condition, the vital ingredient for all creation and all that is created. It is a power in its own right. The artist starts with a blank canvas – silence. The composer places it between and behind the notes. The very ground of your being, out of which comes all your thoughts, is silence. The way to silence is through meditation. When you arrive in your own silence you will know true freedom and real power. Stop, take a minute, and listen to the silence within you today. Then be aware of what disturbs your inner silence. It could be negative thoughts, memories, sensations. And when you are aware, you will know what is draining your creative power, and you will know what needs to change…on the inside!” — Relax7.com

A machine-church, whose functionalism takes priority over form, may fascinate the eye and stimulate discussion about the designer's imagination, but this is a different issue from the religious one. Verticality, harmony, symmetry and balance, and proportion of the human form are de-emphasized or entirely absent. Emptiness and architectural nihilism evoke not serenity but madness because the interior is stripped of sensory religious symbolism. Even banks and doctor's offices, decorated with art forms, are not absolute in their functional role. Ultra-abstract church architecture combines secularized Christian art and rationalized religion. Inseparably connected as they are, here the sensory aspect of the Incarnation is denied. ~ Sr. Joan L. Roccasalvo, C.S.J.

While cheap pietistic visuals are not the answer to incarnational theology, neither are antiseptically-stripped churches. ~ Sr. Joan L. Roccasalvo, C.S.J.

Art created a few days ago! I love pink flowers, especially roses.