Fort Snelling State Park

May the One Who creates every moment be blessed
May the One Who sustains us forever be blessed
May the One Who surrounds and protects us be blessed.
Photos from Fort Snelling State Park, prayer by Danny Maseng, from an interfaith Haggadah created by the St. Paul Interfaith Network. Almost all of the snow has melted around town now, though there are still some large, dirt-covered piles in the corners of parking lots. Those are so well insulated with muck that they might not melt till June. Well, or maybe this week, since it's supposed to get into the middle 60s.

I've mentioned my Goodle Alerts and the interesting tidbits they turn up from time to time. Today I got one with a link to a certain Catholic blog, which I shan't name or link to, gloating over the fact that a young Jesuit has recently quit blogging because he's tired of the negative sniping it attracts. He'd started blogging as a way to try to bridge some divisions. I never had read his blog, so I can't say whether his posts were really ordered to that end, but it makes me sad when I run across people publishing blogs or websites that are all about judgment, petty harassment, gloating, contempt, and sometimes outright slander. So self-righteous, some of these folks, from one end of the spectrum to the other. I wonder, do they really think that's what life in Christ is about? Where's the love? The charity? The kindness? The prayer? Not so evident in many of them. No wonder people have strange ideas about us. Hope the SJ can let go and move on without bitterness.

On a happier note, the first ship in the Duluth harbor, the Gadwall, from Hong Kong,arrived this weekend. The First Ship ceremony is tomorrow. And the first tow to make it to St. Paul for 2008, the David J. Griggs, pushing 15 barges, arrived Friday, which incidentally is the latest opening of the spring navigation season ever.

Today I'm grateful for: access to good healthcare and for my good health; the crocuses blossoming by our back door; my friends and family; the novels of Mary Doria Russell; BL's good cooking, especially the polenta! and good conversation besides; the beautiful bridges in St. Paul; the leaf buds appearing everywhere.
Holding on prayer today: PC struggling with health issues and the changes they mean in her life; JK,MK and all facing surgery this week; LM's big project; all people engaged in sincere interfaith dialogue; people suffering because of predatory lending practices, and the people who have engaged in predatory lending; the Sisters of St. Joseph in Gambia.