Happy Meskal 2006

THE  CROSS  OF  THE  LORD  JESUS  CHRIST

The Mystery of our Salvation is contained within The Cross of our God and Savior Jesus Christ. And it is correct to say the “Mystery of our salvation,” for what is contained there is more than a cosmic transaction (Christ Jesus pays for our sins): it is also the whole of our way of life. It is truly the Mystery of our salvation.

The extent of this Mystery is hinted at in Christ’s admonition: “Whosoever would be My disciple must deny themselves, take up their cross and follow Me.” This clearly goes much further than a single transaction or even our faith in the efficacy of that transaction.

The mystery is again invoked in St. Paul’s statement: “I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live. Yet, not I, but Christ lives in me. And the life that I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”

The clearest statement of this Mystery is perhaps found in St. Paul’s description of the “mind of Christ” in the second chapter of Philippians:

“Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Here the Holy Apostle speaks of The Cross in its universal form – the Mystery is being unfolded. To take up our cross and follow The Lord Jesus is to have within ourselves the “mind which is yours in Christ Jesus.” That “mind” (the Greek work is ‘phronema’) is a complete orientation of our life – a life that understands that only in the path of self-emptying are we to find the path of exaltation. Our salvation – our deliverance from the emptiness of death – is found, mysteriously, in our willingness to be empty for Christ’s sake. The way of The Cross is the way of life, and, a way of life. This is the path that Martyrs have traveled. It is the path that everyone who would know love must travel. For love is found in “laying down its life for its friends.”

What we see in The Cross of The Lord Jesus is surely everything we say of it as the moment of our salvation. There The Lord of Glory – Jesus, died for us. There His blood was shed for us. There His life was poured out for the life of the world. There we were reconciled to God.

But The Cross also stands outside of time and for all time (the Lamb was slain “before the foundation of the earth”). The Cross was always the way of life. Love, self-emptying love, was always the love of God for all mankind – though until He made it manifest in the Cross of Christ we did not know it.

But now we know it. And now it should become our mind.

The Ethiopian calendar date Meskerem 17 – (western calendar date is September 27) is the Feast of the Universal Exaltation of the Life-Giving Cross

An additional thought:

The Orthodox Tradition, as it developed in early Church, had a great devotion to The Cross of Christ. It was believed by the Orthodox in Syria that the Shekinah glory of God, which had once dwelt in the Ark of the Covenant and filled the Temple in Jerusalem, also came to reside in The Cross following Christ Jesus death and resurrection. There was thus a very deep and profound devotion for the Cross (any Cross) within Orthodox Christian practice. It serves, I think, as a reminder that The Cross we wear from our Baptism, the sign of the Cross that we make when we pray, and The Cross wherever it is depicted and displayed, should be approached with great reverence and care. It is not (as the popular culture would make it) jewelry for the decoration of our bodies nor mere art. It is the sign of our salvation and the mystery of its power was ever held in great reverence by early Christians and everywhere to this day by Orthodox Christians.

 

Source

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Anchi Yeleleshi Gize

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Quake-Proof Cathedral Made of Cardboard

You’ll never look the same way at what lies at the centre of a toilet roll. Last week a $6 million “cardboard cathedral” was formally unveiled in Christchurch, New Zealand, replacing the building destroyed by the devastating 2011 earthquake.

Made from 98 giant cardboard tubes, the new Transitional Cathedral will hold 700 worshippers and is designed to last for up to 50 years – until a more permanent replacement can be built. The tubes are coated with three layers of waterproof polyurethane and most are sheltered by the polycarbonate roof, which is translucent and so glows when the cathedral is lit at night.

The cathedral was designed by Shigeru Ban, a Japanese architect who has been building with cardboard since 1986. Since then, Ban has designed everything from an art museum in Metz, France, to emergency accommodation following the Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

He says the new cathedral is earthquake-proof, fireproof and won’t get soggy in the rain. “The strength of the materials is unrelated to the strength of the building,” he told the Japan Times. “The first time I used paper was for an interior, but I realised it was strong enough to be used as a structural element – to actually hold up the building.” He says wood and paper can withstand quakes that would destroy concrete structures.

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Happy New 2006 Year

Happy New Ethiopian 2006 Year!

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This Is How Your Brain Becomes Addicted to Caffeine

Within 24 hours of quitting the drug, your withdrawal symptoms begin. Initially, they’re subtle: The first thing you notice is that you feel mentally foggy, and lack alertness. Your muscles are fatigued, even when you haven’t done anything strenuous, and you suspect that you’re more irritable than usual.

Over time, an unmistakable throbbing headache sets in, making it difficult to concentrate on anything. Eventually, as your body protests having the drug taken away, you might even feel dull muscle pains, nausea and other flu-like symptoms.

This isn’t heroin, tobacco or even alcohol withdrawl. We’re talking about quitting caffeine, a substance consumed so widely (the FDA reports that more than 80 percent of American adults drink it daily) and in such mundane settings (say, at an office meeting or in your car) that we often forget it’s a drug—and by far the world’s most popular psychoactive one.

Like many drugs, caffeine is chemically addictive, a fact that scientists established back in 1994. This past May, with the publication of the 5th edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), caffeine withdrawal was finally included as a mental disorder for the first time—even though its merits for inclusion are symptoms that regular coffee-drinkers have long known well from the times they’ve gone off it for a day or more.

Why, exactly, is caffeine addictive? The reason stems from the way the drug affects the human brain, producing the alert feeling that caffeine drinkers crave.

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