CHRISTMAS CELEBRATIONS AROUND THE WORLD

CHRISTMAS MARKED
AROUND THE WORLD

Agencies - Today Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus around the world. People are celebrating Christmas in ways both spiritual and secular. Here's a look at some of the ways the holiday is being marked around the globe. Thousands of Christians from the over the world packed Manger Square in Bethlehem Monday to celebrate the birth of Jesus in the ancient West Bank town where he was born. For their Palestinian hosts, this holiday season was an especially joyous one, with the hardships of the Israeli occupation that so often clouded previous Christmas Eve celebrations eased by the United Nations' recent recognition of an independent state of Palestine. 
Festivities led up to the Midnight Mass at St. Catherine's Church, next to the Church of the Nativity, built over the grotto where tradition says Jesus was born. Hundreds of people greeted Twal in Manger Square, outside the Church of Nativity, with children dressed in holiday finery or in Santa costumes, and marching bands playing in the streets. 

In the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI lit a Christmas peace candle set on the windowsill of his private studio. Pilgrims, tourists and Romans gathered below in St. Peter's Square for the inauguration Monday evening of a Nativity scene and cheered when the flame was lit. Later, the pope led Christmas Eve Mass in St. Peter's Basilica, prayed that Israelis and Palestinians live in peace and freedom, and asked the faithful to pray for strife-torn Syria as well as Lebanon and Iraq. In Iraq, Christians gathered for services with tight security, including at Baghdad's Our Lady of Salvation church. 
Winners of Spain's cherished Christmas lottery celebrated Saturday in more than a dozen locations where lucky tickets were sold, a moment of uplift for a country enduring another brutal year of economic hardship. It is an annual tradition in Thailand - elephants dressed as Santa Claus on parade, handing out toys to school children. In Mexico, Santa takes a human form, going for a swim with the fishes, delighting children at a zoo or the streets.

Christmas is being celebrated around the world, with Christians exchanging gifts and greetings to mark the traditional date of the birth of Jesus Christ. Wherever Christians live around the world, the routines of daily life are coming to a stop as people pause to celebrate Christmas, sometimes in unique ways. While thousands of pilgrims are gathered in Manger Square in the Palestinian town of Bethlehem, the town where Jesus is said to have been born, others go to pray at various ceremonies and Christmas church services in their local churches. However, many people around the world enjoy the celebration just shopping, going to family reunions or wearing Santa Claus costumes, eating, drinking and sharing gifts.

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US? 

Jesus is a consciousness of God. Of pure delivery to the Lord. Therefore he is a master to these days,  because he has delivered something eternal. ... Thus, remembering Jesus, we also remember all the genuine gurus who have illuminated us on our way, as all form a same family dedicated to bring us to God. ... Let’s hope that on the day of Jesus, more than one soul remember him and not give most attention to the ridiculous Father Christmas. It is a great sadness to see how this day, which should be so sacred for the Christians, has become more and more profane each year. Who will give a present to Jesus? Who will sing to him on his altar? Just a few people are doing it! But we shouldn’t be surprised; this is the effect of Kali yuga. Well the devotees of Krishna, they certainly do celebrate and sing your glories in your divine and wonderful eternal and progressive immortality. Jay, Merry Christmas!

Śrīla Atulananda Ācārya :
“Jesus and His Message of Universal Love”
“Merry Christmas in Krishna Consciousness”
Santiago, Chile - 22 Dec 2005
http://www.vrindanews.com/nectar/christmas.html
http://www.atulanandadas.cl/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1

Published by dasavatara das - "Vedic Views on World News"
http://www.vedicviews-worldnews.blogspot.com.ar/

SAY MERRY CHRISTMAS DURING 12 DAYS !

WHICH ARE THE 12 DAYS
CELEBRATION OF CHRISTMAS?

www.boldsky.com - Before you say that Christmas is celebrated only on 25 December just wait for a while and think, is Christmas just celebrated on one day? The answer is No! Many of us celebrate Christmas for a day or two but do you know that Christmas is a 12-day-celebration? Twelve days of Christmas begins on December 25 and ends just before Epiphany that falls on January 5th or 6th. Epiphany is a Christian feast that is marked to celebrate the 'shining forth' or revelation of God to the whole humankind.  
First Day: In the Eastern Orthodox Church, the great feast that is also known as 'Nativity of our Lord' starts on the Christmas Eve that is 25th of December. The first day of Christmas signifies the Nativity of Christ. Nativity of Jesus, the Adoration of the Shepherds of Bethlehem and the arrival of the Magi all mark the first day of Christmas. Second Day: The second day is referred to as the Synaxis of the Holy Theotokos. It also commemorates the role of Virgin Mary in the incarnation of Jesus' mother. 

Third Day: Third day of the Nativity is also called as feast day of the Protodeacon and the Protomartyr Saint Stephan. Fourth day: 29th of December or the fourth day of Christmas is referred to as the Orthodox Feast of the Holy Innocents. Fifth and sixth day: The after feast of Nativity continues till 31st of December. These days are also known as the Apodosis or leave-taking of the nativity. 
Seventh day: According to the Russian Icon of the Theophany, there was another feast of the Lord on January 1st. This feast is known as Circumcision of the Lord. It is also believed that on the same day Saint Basil also had feast with the common men. And thus the services celebrated on the day are also called as Divine Liturgy of the Saint Basil. Eighth to Eleventh days: January 2nd begins with the Forefeast of the Theophany that lasts for 3 days. Twelfth day: The day is also known as 'Paramony' or the 'Great Blessing of Water' which marks the day when Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist in Jordan River. After this comes Epiphany day, also called The Day of the Kings.

The Twelve days of Christmas are significant as they include the birth of Jesus Christ, his childhood events, and his journey to Baptism. As regards the last day of Christmas celebration, Apoorva Srivastav, author of the article, reports that this twelfth day is a day of fasting. She explains that according Christian mythology the Lord has given order to his people to observe strict fast and not eat until the first star is seen at the night.  After the twelfth day comes Epiphany, normally on January 6, which marks the day when a group of Kings or Magi (Casper, Melchior and Balthazar), as related in the second chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, arrived to worship and bring three gifts to the baby Jesus after following a star in the heavens.

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US? 

We are approaching a very significant date for most people in this world, Christmas. This is a special moment for meetings, joys, gifts, so many feelings that may not commonly occur at other times of year.  ... Christmas means celebrating the advent of a pure and enlightened soul, which descends from the spiritual plane for the sole purpose of spreading among us a message of spiritual love, and then to fulfill its specific mission, returns to his eternal home next to Supreme Being. ... Try to really celebrate Christmas ... and instead of thinking of receive we can want to give; but not to give material elements, but to what Christ and all the great teachers have given us - and what they still continue giving - a message and example of how to mold our lives according to the will of the Supreme.  To the extent that we can assimilate and share these valuable insights, we can strictly say that we are truly celebrating Christmas.

Śrīpad Bhakti Vedanta Padmanabha Mahārāja :
Cierra Tus Ojos y Mira - “Christmas Meditation”
http://suenaverdadero.blogspot.com/
http://suenaverdadero.blogspot.com/2011/12/meditacion-navidena-nos-aproximamos-una.html

Published by dasavatara das - "Vedic Views on World News"
http://www.vedicviews-worldnews.blogspot.com.ar/

I really should give up....

I really should give up this blog. I am such an irregular poster and clearly not committed enough to the cause. However, I am not a quitter and I just love the blog world too much to leave. So, I will continue to attempt this journal while trying not too feel inadequate compared to other blogs glossed with a dash more perfection and a sprinkle more prettiness I will be who I am....imperfect with a heart that always strives to be better.

Holiday baking has commenced at the Bickie Household. It really should be our time of year given the blog name, right? I do love to bake and my family usually enjoys my creations. I always look forward to my book club cookie exchange for the trays and trays of yummy cookies that I bring home. I get a little bored with baking so many of just one kind of cookie. So this year, once again, I am going to make double batches of two different cookie recipes. My pecan bars (click here for the recipe) are already made and in the freezer. Today I am baking Chocolate Mint Creams. The recipe is below. Instead of the meltaway creams I use Hershey Candy Cane Kisses. The recipe is from Holiday Baking 2008. They are delicious. Enjoy!

What You Need

• 1 1/4 c flour
• 1/2 t baking soda
• 2/3 c packed brown sugar
• 6 T butter
• 1 T water
• 1 c semisweet chocolate chips
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• Pastel cream mint kisses (about 48)

What You Do

In a small bowl, combine the flour and baking soda; whisk to combine. Set aside.

In a medium saucepan over low heat, combine the brown sugar, butter, and water. Cook, stirring often, until the butter is melted. Add the chocolate chips and continue to cook over low, stirring often, until the chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth. Pour the chocolate mixture in a large bowl and cool for 10 minutes.

Stir the egg into the chocolate mixture. Stir in the flour mixture until well combined.

Cover the dough and chill for 1-2 hours or until the dough is easy to handle (I chilled the dough for maybe 30 minutes because I am impatient).

Heat oven to 350º. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

Shape the dough into 1-inch balls (I used a tablespoon measure to portion the dough). Place the balls on the cookie sheet, leaving 2 inches between the balls.

Bake the cookies for 8 minutes. Immediately place a mint on top of each cookie. Bake the cookies for another 2 minutes until the edges are set.

Transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool. If you desire, use a small spatula to flatten/spread the melted mint before it cools and hardens.

G Rated

Both the post and the movie we saw this weekend are G-rated :)

We enjoyed The Mighty Macs as a family this weekend. It's so nice to see a G-rated movie that the whole family can enjoy. You can be sure that The Dog (who is 13!) was ducking and weaving not to be seen out to the movies with his family. I think he avoided any and all familiar faces in our back row seats of the dark theatre. I recommend this movie for any family with children 8 - 13 like ours.

I started a little Christmas Shopping this morning. What else do you do on a Monday morning when you should be emptying the dishwasher, making beds, and cleaning up the general chaos that is littered about after a weekend? Don't tell Sweet Pea but I got wind of a promo code for free shipping from American Girl. If you are an American Girl shopper you know that doesn't happen very often. It's good until October 31st and is 172172. Happy Shopping!

Buddy has had stitches for the past 10 days and we are crossing our fingers they come out today. Poor guy landed the wrong way on a pile of flagstone while running an obstacle course with his brother in the backyard. He cut his foot above the arch pretty badly. He has fought off infection and hobbled on crutches for over a week and we think today might be the day! Yeah!

Happy Monday!

The Losing Culture

The Man had asked me to take a ride, he had to drop something off to a particular See You Next Tuesday that neither of us could stand, and he didn't want to deal with her alone. The real issue was that he didn't want to go to jail for hauling off and punching her dead in the face, a very realistic probability. The minute I had gotten into the car my stomach tied in a knot and a deep anxiety over took me.

It wasn't that he can't drive and my life was in danger that did it; he can't, and it was, but that wasn't it. What gave me that uneasiness, I discovered later, was that I despise this person so much that the idea of being around her was making me sick. As soon as he did what he had to do, and we left her at some random ghetto bodega, the anxiety, the knot in my stomach..... they completely disappeared.

James Brown

On the way home, turning to the right to see a woman that looked exactly like James Brown a thought came over me that made many of my recent struggles come clearly into focus. It had nothing to do with the God Mother of Soul. HEH!

Danielle Lloyd

In sports we often talk about certain teams, the ones that never win and seem to always find ways to lose even when the fete appears unthinkable, the franchises that do every thing all wrong and can never end the trend, having what they call "Losing Cultures". These teams are so defined by their losing ways that its all they seem to know how to do. It gets to the point where its all pervasive, it fills every member of the organization, from the front office to the coach and right down to the players themselves.

All one has to do is to watch them once, see the lethargy with which they approach their daily activity and its clear as day.... its as if their will has been broken, that they've lost hope of better days, they've given up. These teams expect to lose, and so they do.

Alessandra Ambrosio

When it comes to turning things around for these franchises they very first thing they do is talk about "Changing the Culture" of the organization. But when people are conditioned to lose on a daily basis its nearly impossible to turn them around and snap them out of it. Just like with social programs such as welfare, psychologically, when people get used to a thing you just can't take it away from them. So the only option left is to dump everyone on the club with that losers mentality and replace them with people who not only know how, but expect to win.

This concept of the Losing Culture isn't exclusive to sports, it infiltrates every group in life whether that be a business, a family, group of friends or anything else. When morale is low it affects everyone. When everyone morale is low its like walking into a dive bar full of old men with no teeth, rancid breath, and all of them passed out with their heads on the counter. There aren't going to be any supermodels walking through that door, no new money coming in, nothing. It just continues to stay the same until those old men die off or the bar goes under. Depressing, isn't it?

I'm always going on about support systems and how imperitive they are to success, yet when I walked into my house and looked around, when I looked back at the groups of people I had surrounded myself with, it struck me that I am currently, and have always been, a member of a losing culture. Not only had I been trained to lose, and to expect to do so every time, but so had everyone else around me.

This is where preachers of the Law Of Attraction and Success Principles the world over will tell you every time that you have to get as far away from negative people as you can, because they will infect you with their losing ways and drag you down with them. The only way to change that, to save yourself and break through to the winning side is to change the culture.

But how does one just cut off their friends? Worse yet, how do they cut off their family? Unless you're just completely cold hearted its all but impossible, isn't it? Its especially difficult when, like you, they too were raised in that same losing culture, and the losing ways were never really their fault.

There are way more people out there in the world that have been subjected to this very thing than there aren't, and the real bitch of it all is that they, more than anyone else, need positive people, positive influences, what we call WINNERS, to help them make that positive change in their lives. Except these winners want nothing to do with them, afterall, who wants their own winning culture to be infected with someone else's losing ways? Who wants to be dragged down? No one.

That right there, my friends, that space in between, is the gap we need to find a bridge to cross if we, as a society, are ever going to close the separation between the have's and the have nots. But it takes real courage from both in order to do so, a social courage that's in short supply in today's world.

One person who doesn't seem to have this problem is University of Georgia Head Football Coach Mark Richt. It had come out that he had been paying is assistants and support staff who make his job possible out  of his own pocket with the school he worked for refused to do so. That's called integrity, and I now have a new, deep respect for this man, and will now root for the Georgia Bulldogs as long as he's a part of what they do there. I hope we can all learn from his example.

On a stranger note, a kid with two heads was born in Brazil recently. You have to read this article, they explain how normally cut off one of the heads very nonchalantly, but couldn't do it with this one because they're both healthy heads.

My final Christmas message to you, my hope, my wish from you all, is that these holidays you change you mind set to be more like Mark Richt. Take it upon yourself to show the people around you who may be down on their luck that they too can be a winner in life, and make sure that you help see them through to the other side. You might not just be saving one life, but changing the culture for an entire troupe of people. And what else could this time of year really be about?

And now Santa and that lovely young lady up top will be moving us towards ringing in that New Year, so I'm out of here for now.

Later People!

Join my fanpage John LaSota - Writer

Or our creative team's page The Mad Doser Presents

And if you need a healthy helping hand from a Personal Performance Consultant

Coach LaSota

Sexy Santa and the Christmas Spirit?

Christmas is already over for me, we had to do the whole family thing this past Saturday due to scheduling and all that, so all I've got to look forward to involves Turduckin, Ringo and The Man

But that doesn't mean that I want to lose that Christmas spirit.

One thing is sure around this time of year, and that's that there are a lot of slutty pictures of ladies trying to be sexy for the holidays. If there's anything to prove how many nameless faces are out there trying to make it on nothing but how they look just Google Santa.

I tried to do it myself once, tried my sexy on for size, this is how it came out...

Yeah, so I had to hit you with that right off the bat. Its your own fault though. Not to worry, there will be plenty to cheer about this week, and that's not just the gifts under the tree. Christmas is supposed to be about family time, staying together....

Like these ladies right here. I'm usually not one for carolers, but if they were to sing at my door I think I could find it in my heart to wrastle up a donation. But its not all about that either. Sometimes we find ourselves in places we don't want to be this time of year, like stuck working, and it feels like we're locked in a dungeon....  often its about finding ways to make the most of things and appreciating what it is that we DO have....

So my cast is finally off, and the doctor hit me with another set back - 6 more weeks where I can't do anything. It makes sense the way this thing feels, my 6 year old niece was able to squeeze a ball that I couldn't do anything with.... my left hand is weaker than a 6 year old girls...

eh, I was weaker than a little girl before the arm thing, so who am I kidding?

Danielle Lloyd

Setbacks aren't an issue, we all have them in life, it's all about how we deal with them that matters. In the passed few weeks while I went ungroomed like some dirty animal I shifted from a restless soul that needed to do anything to get out of the house to one who's perfectly content sitting at home, blocking out anything that might happen in the world outside.

It's both good and bad, but this time its exactly what I needed. Besides.... this spot is all about accentuating the positives, isn't it?



And really, there's a lot to be positive about, little to get upset over.

After about three months I figured it was finally time to get off my ass and get myself a hair cut, and as soon as I walked in my barber started breaking my balls. I looked like a porn star from the 70's without the mustache, so it was well deserved, I had it coming.

Little things like that are what's great about life though, when you're close enough to someone to break balls without it meaning a damn thing, and you can laugh about it.

Maybe that's the New York Christmas spirit. It doesn't really matter to me because I've gotten to a place where I couldn't care less what anyone else thinks of me at all. That's a difficult transition for anyone who counts on whether others like what you have to say or do in order to make a living in the way you want. And it can lead to straight reckless behavior.

Whatever though. There's plenty of time to straighten up, we'll worry about that after the New Year. You've got to love this girls hips.

So the big news across the globe today is that North Korean Dictator Kim Jong Il bought the farm last night. Its ironic, people over there are barely able to eat. This isn't the time of year to talk bad about anyone though, not even violent oppressors, so in an effort to keep spreading cheer, try to find something good to say about the man...

Kim Jong Il was GREAT in Team America: World Police!

What is it about this pose that always seems to work? Ladies, if you can't find a way to look sexy on all fours, there's just no sexy for you at all, is there? Its the first shot they take up at the North Pole. They use this on their I.D. cards in Santa's Sweatshop.

This one doesn't speak any English, Santa gets all of his helpers from the same countries that supply the worlds mail order brides. Who do you think does the mailing? He's got to raise money for all those damn kids toys somehow, right?

In this day and age though, its difficult to give so much love to a fat old man who gets his jollies from little kids sitting on his lap, but luckily for Santa, if the whole Christmas thing doesn't work out, Penn State Football is hiring.

That's not very nice though. I have to work harder at this. Like that fine, upstanding young lady up above, I'm going to get out there, hit the trail, and find that Christmas spirit!

Later People!

Join my fanpage John LaSota - Writer

Or our creative team's page The Mad Doser Presents

And if you need a healthy helping hand from a Personal Performance Consultant

Coach LaSota