“On New Year’s Eve, at about quarter to twelve o’clock at night, the master of the house and all that are with him go about from room to room opening every door and window, however cold the weather be, for thus, they say, the old year and its burdens can go out and leave everything new for hope and for the youth of the coming time. This also is a superstition, and of the best. Those who observe it trust that it is as old as Europe, with roots stretching back into foreign times.”
Hilaire Belloc, A Remaining Christmas
In this new year, may we be relieved of the burdens of the past year, while taking with us the fruits these burdens have borne. May our homes be renewed in hope, becoming ever more places where the youth of the coming time may blossom, and flourish.
Working by Hand: Reconnecting with Our Humanity
“In all manual work we find the primal phenomenon of culture that is human but close to nature.” “The sphere in which we live is becoming more and more artificial, less and less human,” Romano Guardini, Letters from Lake Como We have lost something today, but we can...
Cherishing Your Spouse in Your Children
“Goodbye Aeneas. Cherish our love in the son it gave us.” Virgil, The Aeneid This stunningly powerful goodbye between spouses says so much. A son, it says, was ‘given’ to a couple by the love they bore one another. Love between spouses is already itself a gift. That...
Is Love Irrational?
“And yet, to say the truth, reason and love keep little company together nowadays. The more the pity that some honest neighbors will not make them friends.” Shakespeare (Bottom, in A Midsummer Night’s Dream) Lovers can be notoriously irrational. But is true love...
Husband, father, and professor of Philosophy. LifeCraft springs from one conviction: there is an ancient wisdom about how to live the good life in our homes, with our families; and it is worth our time to hearken to it. Let’s rediscover it together. Learn more.
I’ve always been fond of Belloc’s Christmas wish. Are you familiar with it?
I don’t think I am, and I’d be most grateful for you to share it, if feasible.
Dear Prof. Cuddeback: Given your blog’s subtitle and your New Year’s Day wish that we all may “be relieved from the burdens of the past year,” please allow me to invite you to listen to my New Year’s Day homily (in observance of the Roman Catholic Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God): http://buff.ly/1hZkb9b. It speaks of the power of words to create frames of reference and of relationship. That perspective sparks an invitation for parents to be mindful of how they can bless their children by speaking well of them to other people, and 2) for spouses, of blessing each other in the same way. Then I invite everyone to the process of freeing themselves of disappointments or hurts from 2013 partly by invoking a biblical blessing (Numbers 6:22-27) on behalf of those who disappointed or hurt them last year.