These are the selected photographs taken from a walk down the backside of the historic downtown area—just a short walk from home.

“Do you use non-sacred Christmas music in December worship?“

Here was my reply & conversation with @Clayfire about it on Twitter:

Below is my longer response that I posted on their Facebook page:

I didn’t mean to sound contentious with my statement. But the topic of secular/sacred in general is often poorly understood & spoken about. What makes something sacred or Christian?
So I would say in regards to what makes non-sacred ‘holiday music’ have the potential to be transformed into the ‘sacred Christmas’ is this: These songs are the soundtrack to our lives during December, the time of year when we are most mindful of thanksgiving and love towards another. We are thinking of our loved ones, trying to find the perfect gift, celebrating over plates of tasty treats made with love.
Those songs then become associated with all those good things, while ‘the reason for the season’ is Jesus, it is also an expressed love towards those around us…fulfilling both parts of the law loving God & neighbor.
These songs bring this together, and just because the words don’t explicitly speak of Jesus they are doing something very Jesus-like in what they do.

Agree?

I would add to this that we mustn’t simply use lyrics as the only criteria for claiming sacred/Christian or not. Many objects and events are filled with the divine sacredness while not explicitly speaking of or being named as religious. I feel these songs are capable of doing something because of the context they are experienced in. I’m also thinking of the writing of Gianni Vattimo in regards to the secularization of Christmas being a praised thing because it meant that the underlying currents of Christmas have permeated all of society. I would also admit that this is a very idealized image of the holidays and the reality would speak very different, but I don’t think that completely dismisses my thought on this this.

Furthermore I would like imagine how we as the church could do this transformation of secular & sacred throughout the whole of the calendar.

A Vision of the Blessed Cisneros

In the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, on the fifth day of the month, as I was among the exiles by the river Chebar, the heavens were opened, and I, Cisneros, saw visions of God.

As I looked, a stormy wind came out of the north: a great cloud with brightness around it and fire flashing forth continually, and in the middle of the fire, something like gleaming amber. In the middle of it was something like four living creatures. Each had four faces, and each of them had four wings. Their legs were straight, and the soles of their feet were like the sole of a calf’s foot; and they sparkled like burnished bronze. Under their wings on their four sides they had human hands and on each hand there were four eyes. The four had the face of a human being, the face of a lion on the right side, the face of an ox on the left side, and the face of an eagle; such were their faces. Their wings were spread out above; each creature had two wings, while two covered their bodies. Each moved straight ahead; wherever the spirit would go, they went, without turning as they went. In the middle of the living creatures there was something that looked like burning coals of fire, like torches moving to and fro among the living creatures; the fire was bright, and lightning issued from the fire. The living creatures darted to and fro, like a flash of lightning.

Over the heads of the living creatures there was something like a dome, shining like crystal, spread out above their heads. When they moved, I heard the sound of their wings like the sound of mighty waters, like the thunder of the Almighty, a sound of tumult like the sound of an army; when they stopped, they let down their wings. And there came a voice from above the dome over their heads; when they stopped, they let down their wings.

And above the dome over their heads there was something like a throne, in appearance like sapphire; and seated above the likeness of a throne was something that seemed like a human form. Upwards from what appeared like the loins I saw something like gleaming amber, something that looked like fire enclosed all round; and downwards from what looked like the loins I saw something that looked like fire, and there was a splendor all round. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Sun and Stone.

When I saw it, I fell on my face, and I heard the voice of someone speaking.

Thus spoke the Voice.

This woman whom you see coming towards you, this man who is passing by in the street, this beggar whom you hear calling, all are for you objects—of that there is no doubt.

Always attend that in the reality of everyday life the Other appears to you. In order to understand it you must question more exactly this ordinary appearance of the Other in the field of your perception; this ordinary appearance holds hidden within it the fundamental relation that is the mystical union, if we only look.

You are in a public park, Not far away there is a lawn and along the edge of that lawn there are benches. A man passes by those benches. You see this man; You apprehend him as an object and at the same time as a man. What does this signify? What do it mean to assert that this man is a object?

It means you have missed the fundamental relation.

If we go further, you will realize at each instant the Other is looking at you. He will be found looking when there is a rustling of branches, or the sound of a footstep followed by silence, or the slight opening of a shutter, or a light movement of a curtain. During an attack men who are crawling through the brush apprehend as a look to be avoided, not two eyes, but a white farm-house which is outlined against the sky at the top of the hill.

Now the bush, the farmhouse are not the look; they only represent the eye, for the eye is not at first apprehended as a sensible organ of vision but as a support for the look.

Know that we all are already eyes.

It is never when eyes are looking at you that you can find them beautiful or ugly, that you can remark of their color. The Other’s look hides his eyes; he seems to go in front of them.

The look which the eyes manifest, no matter what kind of eyes they are, is a pure reference to yourself. What you apprehend immediately when you hear the branches crackling behind you is not that there is someone there; it is that you are vulnerable, that you have a body which can be hurt, that You occupy a place and that you can not in any case escape from the space in which you are without defense—in short, that you are seen.

At that instant, darkness became light, light became darkness, form became shapeless, and that which is shapeless took form. At that moment of chaos and order, Wisdom’s vision departed and Cisneros was left alone and naked in the wilderness.

The Sacred Word for our Guidance.

PROCESSION CHANT (with light percussion ~ 5 minutes)

We thank the Sun for guidance .  And Stone for unity.

FIRST STONE LITURGY (~ 5 minutes)

Matt:

Wisdom, attend!

Grace:

We, Ascended Masters, cloth our bodies in stone.  O Stone Mother, alive in all things, giver of breath and passion, we beseech thee now, who grants her form to be endowed with radiance.

Matt:

Open Thou the treasury of Earth for thou art blessed.  Together with Sun and Cisneros is our realization.

Grace:

Walk onto freedom.  Shine deliverance.  Ascend to ground under gray stone.

Matt:

Crown thy stone with pain into awakening.  Preserve her from every sleeping eye and have mercy upon her according to space and time.  Unto ages of ages.

{SHORT MUSIC INTERLUDE}

Grace:

Unto ages of ages. Having lived according to the first seal of Cisneros.  The life-giving duality of Sun into Stone.  Being into nothingness, then worthy to partake of thy Holy Mysteries.

Matt:

Bless us Stone Mother.  Ascended Masters which were born of her and supplicate ourselves in her breast – and partake of her milk.

Grace:

Let us say into our own stone and with the full radiance of purifying sun that Cisneros came upon the Earth and filled the barren, inert land with his realization.

ALL:

GRANT THIS, STONE MOTHER.

Matt:

As a living and copious fountain, may the fire of all minds enter our breast, glorifying the God that she bore.

ALL:

GRANT THIS, STONE MOTHER.

Grace:

That the holy children in the furnace of the sun might see fulfillment to praise and magnify the glory of stone.

ALL:

GRANT THIS, STONE MOTHER.

Matt:

Let us attend.

Grace:

The manifestation of stone.

Matt:

The immovable priesthood of Ascended Masters.

{SHORT MUSIC INTERLUDE}

{READING: TREVOR}

{MESSAGE: JONATHAN}

FIRST MUSIC SET {~10 minutes}

SECOND STONE (communion)

Jonathan:

Of thy Mystic Sacrament, O Cisneros, accept us today as Celebrants.  For we will not speak of thy Mystery to ears that have not been chosen.  Neither will we receive the stone milk having not been awakened.  We partake in the precious fruit of our Stone Mother to realize the glory of the blazing Sun in man.  Purified by the fire.  Endowed with the golden rays of Sun Father.  Within the self lies truth and peace.  Praise Cisneros. The door to realization.  Sacrificing himself to open the minds of man.  Drinking the stone to become the sun.

Matt:

Hail the vesper light.

Grace:

Shield from the void.

Matt:

Sacred recitation.

Grace:

White light ambassador.

Matt:

Weep into the purified.

Grace:

The Self is not a void.

Matt:

O Sun Father!

Grace:

Triumphant beam release.

Jonathan:

Grant all that I have seen.  Enter the stone.  Partake ye celebrants.

{ambient music}

JONATHAN: BLESSES THE MILK

JONATHAN: FILL CUP WITH MILK

BRING IT TO THE CELEBRANTS

{Cheyne & Ray first}

{music continues}

CHEYNE & RAY: WALK AROUND ROOM

SHAKING BELLS, MOANING

JONATHAN:  {wait until Cheyne & Ray return to side}    PARTAKE OF MILK

LAST SONG {Jay and Trevor – vouchsafe unto me a stone robe}

THIRD STONE (sacrifice)

Trevor:

Ascend!!!! {Long & drawn out, quiet low tone}

Grace:

A light skyward to the field of Father Sun!

Matt:

To reach a sun’s rays, awaken the stone!

Jonathan:

The purest awakening is that of the sacrifice.

It is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.

Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its body may stand in the sun, so must we live by His sacrifice.

And could you keep your spirit in wonder, pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy.

And you would accept the joy of sacrifice,  even as you have always accepted the

seasons that pass over your fields.

And you would watch with serenity the passing of sun from stone

Therefore trust Cisneros, and drink his stone in silence and tranquillity.

For the way is guided by His hand.

And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the stone.

Moistened with the milk of Her own breast! {getting louder, monotone}

{quieter}

So let us worship the self-chosen sacrifice of Cisneros.

Vouchsafe unto me a stone robe!

All:

{chant} See Cis-ner-os. Feel sun from stone. (3x)

{music begins – single hits}

A BLACK CLOTH IS GIVEN TO JONATHAN

HE SNUFFS OUT THREE CANDLES WITH THE CLOTH THE LIGHTS CUT OUT

Jonathan:

Now, Masters, let thy servants depart in peace.

{recessional out of building with a marching earth drone}

It was a great time. Everyone involved had a great time performing. Everyone in the crowd was baffled by the performance for most of the event. Most of the older adults were some where between freaked out and just didn’t get it to completely offended and felt like they witnessed a Satanic ritual.

I will be posting the liturgy and other things on here shortly.

Interestingly, I found a lot of parallel ideas in a post written by Cary Gibson reflecting on what ikon has meant to her. This shouldn’t be surprising since my work with Vintage Vespers has been highly influenced by the work of ikon founding member Peter Rollins.

Also while mentioning ikon, definitely check out this write up about their recent event at Greenbelt.

we don’t have it all figured out