THE GREAT CONJUNCTURE: Being together, apart…
December 21 | 5:30-6:00 pm
What you will need: Scripture reading: Isaiah 9: 1-2 (below); poems (below, if you so choose) binoculars (if you have/want them); a clear view of the southwest sky at dusk;
We invite you to join with others at St John on Monday, December 21st 5:30-6:30, as we watch and wait, continuing to prepare for the Light of Christ that is coming into the world. This year, the winter solstice and “the great conjunction” of Jupiter and Saturn occur on the same day. Below is a short background of each:
The winter solstice marks the exact moment when half of Earth is tilted the farthest away from the sun. It usually happens on December 21 or 22, at the exact same second around the world.
Because less sunlight reaches Earth, the winter solstice is also the day of the year with the least amount of daytime, known as the shortest day of the year. But the good news is that every day after the winter solstice will be a little longer, until we reach the day with the most hours of daylight. Called the summer solstice, it usually occurs between June 20 and June 22.
In a rare occurrence, it also happens that tonight, December 21st, Jupiter and Saturn – which are actually more than 400 million miles apart, are expected to appear closer to each other in the night sky than they have for centuries. Journalist Colin Dwyer says “at this proximity, the planets will appear to touch or even form one large, brilliant star in the sky… in what astronomers call a “great conjunction”. In the same article he quotes an astronomer at Rice University “you’d have to go all the way back to just before dawn on March 4, 1226, to see a closer alignment between these objects visible in the night sky”.
As a way of being apart together and of celebrating the light coming into the world, we encourage you to get outside and take in the offering of the night sky. To take a moment this Advent to be “lost in wonder, love and praise” (Charles Wesley, Love Divine, All Loves Excelling) as we all share in the splendor of God’s creation. We have included the reading below and some prayers one written for Advent and another celebrating the Creator.
Isaiah 9: 1-2 “But there will be no gloom for those who were in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he will make glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness – on them light has shined.“
Advent, Divine Light,
Lover of the universe
Love incarnate
Love that is alive all over
our world today:
Warm our hearts and
melt our indifference.
Ignite love within us
that is big enough
to overcome our
smallness, and
big enough to extend
to all the earth
and all our
more-than-human
neighbors.
Luminous Love,
shine deep within,
with a light that
shares the darkness
with a graciousness that
does not overpower.
May we, too, be bearers of the Light. Amen.
- Wendy Janzen, Burning Bush Forest Church
Whichever Way We Turn
Whichever way we turn, O God, there is your face
in the light of the moon and patterns of stars
in scarred mountain rifts and ancient groves
in mighty seas and creatures of the deep.
Whichever way we turn, O God, there is your face
in the light of eyes we love
in the salt of tears we have tasted
in weathered countenances east and west
in the soft skin glow of the child everywhere.
Whichever way we turn, O God, there is your face
there is your face among us.
