Category: Lent

Featured

Dickensian Dollar Store Christmas

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Capitalism, Chicago, Christmas, Cities, City of Chicago, december, Essay, from the inner city to outer rural, Gold, inner city, kinship, Lent, Portage Park, UrbanLeave a comment

a version of this essay was first published December 8, 2015

“Christmas is coming, 
the goose is getting fat, 
please put a penny in the old man's hat, 
if you haven't got a penny, 
then, a half-penny will do, 
if you haven't got a half-penny, 
then God bless you.”

I went to the nearest Dollar Store to buy old-fashioned, stringy, silver tinsel for our christmas tree.

All that glitters is not silver or gold, is never ever golden, whether you buy your pretty ornaments or wrapping paper for a buck – or two at Dollar Tree, Walmart, Target, Macy’s or Saks for $5, $10, $30 or $50. The only difference is the retailer’s profit margin — very rarely is there a difference in quality when it comes to seasonal items, disposable items and sundries.

The season of peace and beauty feels very false once you know and remember to never forget that all those beautiful ornaments and decorations adorning almost every American home, restaurant or holiday venue are made by women, children, or men in sweatshops who are breathing in lead dust, paint fumes, plastic glitter, chemicals and pigments often for less than $30 per 12-hour shift; all that beautiful crap then warehoused, shipped, stocked and sold by non-living-wage, multi-job workers in the U.S.

Yet, while I’m there roaming the aisles or in the long line to check-out, I feel an overwhelming sense of community with my fellow city dwellers — the shoppers, the store’s workers and with all the workers of the World — particularly those in Yiwu, Zhezhang, China who are mass-producing a vast majority of all of this shit.

silver tinsel, aka Icicles,
ironically & hilariously,
still made in the USA!

I also feel an overwhelming revulsion of the systems of ‘growth’ and development: capitalism, consumerism, and human and natural resource “management” which are uniquely undeniable in the fluorescent, depressive uniformity of the minimally staffed chaos found in a busy, urban dollar store,

Continue reading “Dickensian Dollar Store Christmas” →

Stationed on the Crosses

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Crone, Crone Consciousness, Gnosis, Her, Lent, maiden, Mary Magdalene, Mother, Sacred Feminine, Tradition As Violence, Tradition Is Violence, womenLeave a comment

The CruX: historically, continually, and invisibly stationed by, and on the crosses of, men

women, womxn, womqn, womyn and girls have been both the cross-bearers and the crucified – ever since the unnatural and unholy “conception” of the Roman Catholic Church and all its subsequent patriarchal, misogynist Christian derivatives.

“Christa” – Edwina Sandys, 1975

maundy thursday, daily

On By ©️K.T. 2025In exposition, Gnosis, Lent, Mother, Motherhood, NarrativeLeave a comment

mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos

As I sat on the maple floor of my kitchen in Chicago on a Thursday evening in 2017, voluntarily polishing my son’s chukka boots for the weekend — it became a meditation on my own father, who was actually my second father, who would often offer to polish or freshen up my scuffed, dirty shoes

— first, my white Keds-knock-offs from Zayre, Venture or Jupiter — the canvas stiffened bright white, an unnatural brand new/ the scent of that liquid polish and sponge instantly conjured/ me smiling/ did I remember to say thank you? did I know (how) to?

later, when I was in high school, he would clean and polish my beloved and preciously expensive pair of Stan Smith white leather Adidas /or were they leather Tretorns? then, when I was in college and always pressed for time or conversation, I began expectantly asking if he could please polish my black heels or black boots for work – but more importantly for the weekend — he always, obliging me.

she was not quite as good at it as he was,
but she tried, and she got better, each time

Every act:

Continue reading “maundy thursday, daily” →

palm sunday : hosanna in the highest

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Lent, Poem, poet, poetry, SundaysLeave a comment

sometimes i touch my own face
with my palm
to remember
that i am also soft

& Holy

Hosanna in the highest, truest Light of Self.

"The triumph of the Light before its obscuration is an expression of the divine, royal Selfhood within each one of us, that is so powerfully obscured by mundane and conventional reality. There are times when we want so badly for that light to shine out of us, for it to be recognized by the world. When the only vehicle for expression is the ego-personality our strivings to be seen are usually in vain. Personality actually comes from the Greek “persona” meaning “mask.” While in this terrestrial incarnation, we are like the Count of Monte Cristo in The Man in the Iron Mask; our behavioral gyrations and efforts to have others recognize our light only serve to convince them that we are egotists, madmen or charlatans. Often we create a false glamour that is not our true Self; we put on an entertaining song and dance act; we live a lie and shine forth a false light: or we simply forget about our light and live our lives as if it had never been.
When we are not anxiously attempting to show forth our light, we are often acting in fear of the consequences of letting our light shine. We either turn down our light or turn it off completely, so that we might pass unseen through this world. Yet, “Within a man of light, there is light, and he lighteth up the whole word. If he does not shine, he is darkness.” This is the sham, the cover up, that we are either parading a false light or hiding our light beneath a bushel. The issues are not safety or creative self-expression, the core issues are authenticity and consciousness. We must be conscious of who we really are as spiritual beings and not let either fear or love of the world pervert or hide the authenticity of our own true Self.”

- excerpted from the Homily for Palm Sunday
by Reverend Steven Marshall, 
Ecclesia Gnostica, Gnosis.org

and regarding charity, saviorism, law, justice and martyrs:

Continue reading “palm sunday : hosanna in the highest” →

4th sunday of lent : refreshment sunday

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Gnosis, Gnostic, Lent, QuoteLeave a comment

There is something we were never told, and this is that there is a tradition of no tradition.

A tradition of Wild Mystics or Wild Gnostics, that don’t fit into any theological or academic classification: A tradition of spiritual nomads that would not be shackled to any system or scripture; that would write their own myths and stories with the blood of their own experiences, which source can be found within their own entrails, within the marrow of their bones; within the dust of the grave, beyond what can be called experience, but that comes within their every breath.

These mystics recognize and borrow everything that speaks true to the reality of their bones without binding themselves to the rest of their traditions, but most of all, they speak with their own voice. Their voice cannot be classified or pegged to any known tradition.

tradition is violence

As soon as a scholar thinks he or she has found their source, another scholar finds that they were mistaken; for scholars, as St. John of the Cross said, argue long but never leave the ground.

Scholars speak of Gnosis and of dualism and try to explain Gnostic writings without ever having experienced gnosis, and therefore, gnosis remains unfamiliar to them and to their poor mislead readers.

Their arguments are filled only with words and a reasoning that can make a case, but that fails the source and has no substance. That is a tragedy, for they not only don’t know, they don’t even know what they don’t know, and that they don’t know.

— Tau +Rosamonde Ikshvàku Miller+,
Ecclesia Gnostica Mysteriorum, 2018
Continue reading “4th sunday of lent : refreshment sunday” →