I’ve never heard it used to mean anything other than taking time off work but staying home, with or without a day trip or two. Using it to mean staying in the country would be odd in an American context, as only a small percentage of American vacations in any given year involve leaving the country.
I’ve never heard it used to mean anything other than taking time off work but staying home, with or without a day trip or two. Using it to mean staying in the country would be odd in an American context, as only a small percentage of American vacations in any given year involve leaving the country.
Back at school in the 70s we sometimes sang what I think must have been a contemporary worship song. The only thing I remember is that it began something like "How many times..." and the refrain was "Courage my friend, my spirit I send." Google is convinced I'm looking for a South African freedom song, which I am not and it doesn't match. Does it sound familiar to anyone?
Dang it, it does sound familiar. It is tickling the edges of my memory. Dum dum my friend, dum dum, de send, (higher notes) dum de dum dum de dum de dum de you.
Oh, that is going to annoy me now.
Never mind. Further searching convinces me that I was thinking of Spirt and Grace. Not the same thing at all.
Not having been brought up in a hymn singing tradition, I only know these things if they made it to the rugby pitch... Having said that, might be worth checking out the St. Louis Jesuits?
The first 3 words made me think of "Blowin' in the Wind". I wonder if it is the same tune. "Courage my friend, my spirit I send." fits with the tune.
I agree. I suspect someone at school came up with the words to turn 'Blowin in the wind' into a worship song. In our CU we used to sing 'Lord I want to sing your praises' etc to the tune of La Bamba!
The first 3 words made me think of "Blowin' in the Wind". I wonder if it is the same tune. "Courage my friend, my spirit I send." fits with the tune.
I agree. I suspect someone at school came up with the words to turn 'Blowin in the wind' into a worship song. In our CU we used to sing 'Lord I want to sing your praises' etc to the tune of La Bamba!
This was the thought that occurred to me also. We used to sing one at Sunday school to the Match of the Day tune that went something like this -
'Why don't you put your trust in Jesus,
He's more than just a friend,
For he will guide you and protect you, Uphold you to the end'.....
OMG there's a group called Apologetix that takes secular songs and makes them into religious ones, though sadly they're kind of fundamentalist (anti-evolution songs, etc.). Really good production values, though.
William Booth encouraged people out of the pubs and into the Salvation Army meetings by putting christian words to pub songs. If you listened carefully you could hear both sets of lyrics at the same time. He is supposed to have said "why should the devil have all the good tunes?" which Larry Norman expanded on.
William Booth encouraged people out of the pubs and into the Salvation Army meetings by putting christian words to pub songs. If you listened carefully you could hear both sets of lyrics at the same time. He is supposed to have said "why should the devil have all the good tunes?" which Larry Norman expanded on.
I wish I had remembered that when our minister announced, "I'll have no bar-room songs in my church!" after I commented that some of the best modern hymns were set to folk song tunes.
I agree. I suspect someone at school came up with the words to turn 'Blowin in the wind' into a worship song. In our CU we used to sing 'Lord I want to sing your praises' etc to the tune of La Bamba!
Memory unlocked!
And the Pharaoh song to Louie Louie.
Pharaoh Pharaoh
Oh, baby, let my people go
Yeah yeah yeah yeah…
I agree. I suspect someone at school came up with the words to turn 'Blowin in the wind' into a worship song. In our CU we used to sing 'Lord I want to sing your praises' etc to the tune of La Bamba!
Memory unlocked!
And the Pharaoh song to Louie Louie.
Pharaoh Pharaoh
Oh, baby, let my people go
Yeah yeah yeah yeah…
We also had “Match of the Day” in Girls’ Brigade, but different words:
Why don’t you put your trust in Jesus
And ask him to come in
He saw your need from up in heaven
And died to bear your sin
Why don’t you take him as your Saviour
And let him hold your hand
He will cleanse and guide and keep you
Till you reach the Promised Land.
@Aravis , thé version I learned went something like this:
I’m going to live and work for Jesus,
And serve him every day.
I’m going to live and work for Jesus
And follow in his way.
I’m going to try my best to please him
Who is my Lord and King
For he died and rose to save me
And I owe him everything!
We also had “Match of the Day” in Girls’ Brigade, but different words:
Why don’t you put your trust in Jesus
And ask him to come in
He saw your need from up in heaven
And died to bear your sin
Why don’t you take him as your Saviour
And let him hold your hand
He will cleanse and guide and keep you
Till you reach the Promised Land.
It’s not one I would consider reintroducing…
We had that one in 'Crusaders', early 80s. Along with the 'fruits of the spirit' song which I am grateful has stuck in my mind. I wonder if it was the chorus to something longer.
Edit: the one above might have had a verse 'da da da da ...temptation's hour, da da da ...light and power?' Maybe that was something else.
What a good idea. Or, for those who wish to preserve anonymity, just point out some of the obvious ones...
You can sing Ave, verum corpus to the chorus section of the Dambusters March.
I was reading about an interesting kind of Catholic liturgical reform in Vietnam, where the Lunar New Year has been Christianised and has become part of the local Catholic liturgical year. I wondered if @Lamb Chopped knew of similar efforts by other denominations either in Vietnam or amongst Vietnamese migrants elsewhere.
I was reading about an interesting kind of Catholic liturgical reform in Vietnam, where the Lunar New Year has been Christianised and has become part of the local Catholic liturgical year. I wondered if @Lamb Chopped knew of similar efforts by other denominations either in Vietnam or amongst Vietnamese migrants elsewhere.
Okay, that Wikipedia page is a tad oversimplified.
What's going on is the usual process of the Gospel encountering aspects on a culture, some of which are perfectly fine and innocent, some of which are completely taboo to Christians (generally idolatry) and some of which can be finessed with a lot of thinking and care. Tet (the Vietnamese New Year) isn't one custom or cultural "bit," it's a conglomeration--probably the LARGEST conglomeration--of smaller customs, habits, stories, and so forth. And you can find examples of all three categories under that umbrella.
A lot of what was mentioned in that article, no Christian group has trouble with. Examples would be the food (banh Tet and the like), the flowers (yellow, very pretty, we grow them at home), the fancy clothes, the parties, and so forth. Things that are outright forbidden across the board regardless of your Christian group are the out-and-out idolatrous rites that go on at (say) our local high school auditorium, sponsored by the local Buddhist temple. (We are not talking the more philosophical kind of Buddhism here, we are talking the folk Buddhism that the common people practice, with all of its saints, superstitions, hells, folk tales, and so forth. It has a LOT of crossover with animism and spiritism, and also with ancestor worship. We're talking the level of thing that causes a 100-year-old woman with floor-length hair (of which she is very proud!) to shave her head after an attack of pancreatitis, in spite of the heartbreak, "so that the evil spirits won't recognize me." The kind of thing that causes people to name their children "trash" or "shit," for fear that the evil spirits will realize the child is actually treasured. That causes families to refer to their eldest as "anh hai" (that is, Second Brother) for just the same reason, and to put that son in girl's clothing regardless of his own wishes for fear of the spirits, etc. etc. etc.
You begin to see the amount of fear that underlies these practices, and perhaps to understand the relief that people feel when they become Christians and trust that Jesus Christ will protect them from evil, even if they choose to name their children (as my father-in-law did) names like Rose, Lily, Pearl-of-Great-Price, and Grace-of-Heaven. Did he ever catch it from the neighbors! But he stood up to them, because he said, "Jesus is stronger than the spirits." They prophesied death for the children, but it didn't happen.
Now what the Catholic church has done openly is to try to map out a pathway coping with the third set of practices, the ones that can be problematic or fine, depending on how they are handled. This means primarily rituals designed to honor older family members, living and dead. Christ has nothing against us honoring such people--in fact, he commands it in Exodus, the Fourth Commandment!--but there is often an idolatrous cross-over when people take it too far--when they give (usually the dead) a level of honor, trust, and obedience that belongs only to God.
This is the "ancestral rites" controversy that has been such a problem for Catholicism in China and Vietnam for maybe 500 years now. It looks like the Catholic church has more or less tried to lay out a roadmap that allows people to practice all the harmless bits of culture surrounding the huge cultural nexus that is the New Year; that provides substitutes (mainly Mass) for the straight-up idolatry; and that redirects or offers guidance for the could-be problematic bits (that is, the respect/veneration of family and ancestors).
Now to the question you actually asked me (sorry!)-- have others tried to take on this task? Surely. Every Christian, foreign or native-born, who has ever had to do with Vietnam has faced these issues and come down with different choices and strategies. In our own family, we enjoy the harmless stuff (most of it), and we finesse the problematic stuff by putting a huge emphasis on the Fourth Commandment in our church (which incidentally, serves as a comfort for the non-Christian family members of converts, who are reassured that Christianity is not in fact the straight road to juvenile delinquism!), we make Mother's Day and Father's Day near-liturgical holidays, and we offer substitutes for the really problematic bits. Which means that we have in our house a picture wall full of family and ancestors, all centered around a cross; and we encourage those who maintain a more shrine-like thingamabob to place a cross or picture of Jesus in the highest and central position. We tend to discourage the offering of incense and mangoes etc. in front of said pictures, though we don't object to the common electric candles. And we suggest to Christians who are being pressured to take place in idolatrous worship at funerals and weddings that they take on humble positions of service which incidentally also prevent them from being able to take part--that is, we suggest they mind the kitchen, where food and drink is always available to mourners; we have them handle transportation or comfort the worst-stricken mourners, or suggest they volunteer to sit with the demented or to serve the wheelchair-bound, and so on and so forth. In fact, we suggest they do this as part of their daily Christian lives--it's that much harder to run down the one child out of nine who is a believer if he also happens to be the only one who's willing to take Dad to his chemo treatments!
Sorry about the long screed. TLDR: We want people to enjoy as much of their own culture as they can, and we try to keep people from getting persecuted; but we can't always manage it.
Okay, that Wikipedia page is a tad oversimplified.
What's going on is the usual process of the Gospel encountering aspects on a culture, some of which are perfectly fine and innocent, some of which are completely taboo to Christians (generally idolatry) and some of which can be finessed with a lot of thinking and care. Tet (the Vietnamese New Year) isn't one custom or cultural "bit," it's a conglomeration--probably the LARGEST conglomeration--of smaller customs, habits, stories, and so forth. And you can find examples of all three categories under that umbrella.
A lot of what was mentioned in that article, no Christian group has trouble with. Examples would be the food (banh Tet and the like), the flowers (yellow, very pretty, we grow them at home), the fancy clothes, the parties, and so forth. Things that are outright forbidden across the board regardless of your Christian group are the out-and-out idolatrous rites that go on at (say) our local high school auditorium, sponsored by the local Buddhist temple. (We are not talking the more philosophical kind of Buddhism here, we are talking the folk Buddhism that the common people practice, with all of its saints, superstitions, hells, folk tales, and so forth. It has a LOT of crossover with animism and spiritism, and also with ancestor worship. We're talking the level of thing that causes a 100-year-old woman with floor-length hair (of which she is very proud!) to shave her head after an attack of pancreatitis, in spite of the heartbreak, "so that the evil spirits won't recognize me." The kind of thing that causes people to name their children "trash" or "shit," for fear that the evil spirits will realize the child is actually treasured. That causes families to refer to their eldest as "anh hai" (that is, Second Brother) for just the same reason, and to put that son in girl's clothing regardless of his own wishes for fear of the spirits, etc. etc. etc.
You begin to see the amount of fear that underlies these practices, and perhaps to understand the relief that people feel when they become Christians and trust that Jesus Christ will protect them from evil, even if they choose to name their children (as my father-in-law did) names like Rose, Lily, Pearl-of-Great-Price, and Grace-of-Heaven. Did he ever catch it from the neighbors! But he stood up to them, because he said, "Jesus is stronger than the spirits." They prophesied death for the children, but it didn't happen.
Now what the Catholic church has done openly is to try to map out a pathway coping with the third set of practices, the ones that can be problematic or fine, depending on how they are handled. This means primarily rituals designed to honor older family members, living and dead. Christ has nothing against us honoring such people--in fact, he commands it in Exodus, the Fourth Commandment!--but there is often an idolatrous cross-over when people take it too far--when they give (usually the dead) a level of honor, trust, and obedience that belongs only to God.
This is the "ancestral rites" controversy that has been such a problem for Catholicism in China and Vietnam for maybe 500 years now. It looks like the Catholic church has more or less tried to lay out a roadmap that allows people to practice all the harmless bits of culture surrounding the huge cultural nexus that is the New Year; that provides substitutes (mainly Mass) for the straight-up idolatry; and that redirects or offers guidance for the could-be problematic bits (that is, the respect/veneration of family and ancestors).
Now to the question you actually asked me (sorry!)-- have others tried to take on this task? Surely. Every Christian, foreign or native-born, who has ever had to do with Vietnam has faced these issues and come down with different choices and strategies. In our own family, we enjoy the harmless stuff (most of it), and we finesse the problematic stuff by putting a huge emphasis on the Fourth Commandment in our church (which incidentally, serves as a comfort for the non-Christian family members of converts, who are reassured that Christianity is not in fact the straight road to juvenile delinquism!), we make Mother's Day and Father's Day near-liturgical holidays, and we offer substitutes for the really problematic bits. Which means that we have in our house a picture wall full of family and ancestors, all centered around a cross; and we encourage those who maintain a more shrine-like thingamabob to place a cross or picture of Jesus in the highest and central position. We tend to discourage the offering of incense and mangoes etc. in front of said pictures, though we don't object to the common electric candles. And we suggest to Christians who are being pressured to take place in idolatrous worship at funerals and weddings that they take on humble positions of service which incidentally also prevent them from being able to take part--that is, we suggest they mind the kitchen, where food and drink is always available to mourners; we have them handle transportation or comfort the worst-stricken mourners, or suggest they volunteer to sit with the demented or to serve the wheelchair-bound, and so on and so forth. In fact, we suggest they do this as part of their daily Christian lives--it's that much harder to run down the one child out of nine who is a believer if he also happens to be the only one who's willing to take Dad to his chemo treatments!
Sorry about the long screed. TLDR: We want people to enjoy as much of their own culture as they can, and we try to keep people from getting persecuted; but we can't always manage it.
Concerning the current heatwave in Europe I've read that in France some people use blanc de Meudon (fine chalk powder basically) to paint on the outside of windows facing the sun to help relfect some of the sun's heat.
Anyone got any experience of using this or similar?
Blanc de Meudon is supposed to be quite effective, although I've not tried. Taping one of those foil survival blankets onto your window also works quite well, apparently.
ETA if possible you want your heatproofing on the outside of the window.
Concerning the current heatwave in Europe I've read that in France some people use blanc de Meudon (fine chalk powder basically) to paint on the outside of windows facing the sun to help relfect some of the sun's heat.
Anyone got any experience of using this or similar?
Yes, the gym I use which is an old church complex, has used chalk paint on some of the windows and it seems quite effective. The former chuch is always very cool because of the high ceilings and narrow lancet windows, but some of the associated buildings are squat and with larger windows. Those of a certain age may remember this is the sort of paint once used by green grocers to advertise their goods ( aberant commas and all). Important to paint the outside of the windows to facilitate easier removal with a hose.
If it does prevent a useful amount of heat getting through glass windows I'm surprised it's not widely sold and promoted, trialled etc. Too simple for people to believe in??
I think it's one of those old fashioned things that people had forgotten about. Also in the hottest parts of France like the South, most homes are fitted with shutters, which are by far the easiest way to keep the heat out. It's now infernally hot everywhere, so the shutterless are trying anything they think might work to make the temperatures a bit more bearable.
I've lived in a number of hot country towns here in Oz and my sister still resides more inland than I do. She has nifty little scarves that she puts in the freezer and ties around her neck to wear in the hot weather, they have the blue stuff like an icepack in the centre. I suppose similar could be achieved with icecubes and a self-seal bag. On very hot days we leave the windows open at night and close up during the day. I know in cold winters a tip is to stick bubble wrap to your windows with water for extra insulation, I wonder if it works also to keep the heat out, like a cheap form of double glazing suitable for rental properties.
We are also fans of portable fans with a water section in the base to be able to mist oneself in the hottest part of the day. I have heard of putting sheets in the freezer for an hour or so before bed. I imagine pjs in the fridge might work too. Friends of ours who had an old Victorian house had a winter and a summer bedroom. The winter one was smaller and easier to heat and doubled as a study. The summer bedroom had lots of windows and was on the southern side of their home. Try to pick the coolest room to sleep in. I was always anxious about fans running all night, so we had some with timers so they would only run for a couple of hours when we were first trying to get to sleep.
Comments
I've got one.
When did "staycation" change its meaning from "staying at home and having day trips" to "a regular holiday that happens to be in your own country"?
When newspaper editors realised they could make copy out of it that way.
Shows how little I know!
Having said that, it maybe only applies if you're in the habit of taking foreign holidays.
I think it’s the pre/post COVID thing for many.
We've never heard it used.
No. It is not that. It was something the nuns taught us to sing.
Oh, that is going to annoy me now.
Never mind. Further searching convinces me that I was thinking of Spirt and Grace. Not the same thing at all.
I agree. I suspect someone at school came up with the words to turn 'Blowin in the wind' into a worship song. In our CU we used to sing 'Lord I want to sing your praises' etc to the tune of La Bamba!
This was the thought that occurred to me also. We used to sing one at Sunday school to the Match of the Day tune that went something like this -
'Why don't you put your trust in Jesus,
He's more than just a friend,
For he will guide you and protect you, Uphold you to the end'.....
I wish I had remembered that when our minister announced, "I'll have no bar-room songs in my church!" after I commented that some of the best modern hymns were set to folk song tunes.
Memory unlocked!
And the Pharaoh song to Louie Louie.
Pharaoh Pharaoh
Oh, baby, let my people go
Yeah yeah yeah yeah…
Hadn't heard that!
Did worship used to be fun ?!!
Why don’t you put your trust in Jesus
And ask him to come in
He saw your need from up in heaven
And died to bear your sin
Why don’t you take him as your Saviour
And let him hold your hand
He will cleanse and guide and keep you
Till you reach the Promised Land.
It’s not one I would consider reintroducing…
I’m going to live and work for Jesus,
And serve him every day.
I’m going to live and work for Jesus
And follow in his way.
I’m going to try my best to please him
Who is my Lord and King
For he died and rose to save me
And I owe him everything!
Same tune, same sentiments different words…
I'd lay money 99%+ of football fans couldn't hum the original.
We had that one in 'Crusaders', early 80s. Along with the 'fruits of the spirit' song which I am grateful has stuck in my mind. I wonder if it was the chorus to something longer.
Edit: the one above might have had a verse 'da da da da ...temptation's hour, da da da ...light and power?' Maybe that was something else.
Isn’t that to be sung to the “Hawaii-5-0”? Some of it anyway.
You can sing Ave, verum corpus to the chorus section of the Dambusters March.
Fits the Muppet Show theme tune better I think
Edit - bugger, no, that's Oh Jesus I Have Promised
I was reading about an interesting kind of Catholic liturgical reform in Vietnam, where the Lunar New Year has been Christianised and has become part of the local Catholic liturgical year. I wondered if @Lamb Chopped knew of similar efforts by other denominations either in Vietnam or amongst Vietnamese migrants elsewhere.
That sounds awesome to me!
What's going on is the usual process of the Gospel encountering aspects on a culture, some of which are perfectly fine and innocent, some of which are completely taboo to Christians (generally idolatry) and some of which can be finessed with a lot of thinking and care. Tet (the Vietnamese New Year) isn't one custom or cultural "bit," it's a conglomeration--probably the LARGEST conglomeration--of smaller customs, habits, stories, and so forth. And you can find examples of all three categories under that umbrella.
A lot of what was mentioned in that article, no Christian group has trouble with. Examples would be the food (banh Tet and the like), the flowers (yellow, very pretty, we grow them at home), the fancy clothes, the parties, and so forth. Things that are outright forbidden across the board regardless of your Christian group are the out-and-out idolatrous rites that go on at (say) our local high school auditorium, sponsored by the local Buddhist temple. (We are not talking the more philosophical kind of Buddhism here, we are talking the folk Buddhism that the common people practice, with all of its saints, superstitions, hells, folk tales, and so forth. It has a LOT of crossover with animism and spiritism, and also with ancestor worship. We're talking the level of thing that causes a 100-year-old woman with floor-length hair (of which she is very proud!) to shave her head after an attack of pancreatitis, in spite of the heartbreak, "so that the evil spirits won't recognize me." The kind of thing that causes people to name their children "trash" or "shit," for fear that the evil spirits will realize the child is actually treasured. That causes families to refer to their eldest as "anh hai" (that is, Second Brother) for just the same reason, and to put that son in girl's clothing regardless of his own wishes for fear of the spirits, etc. etc. etc.
You begin to see the amount of fear that underlies these practices, and perhaps to understand the relief that people feel when they become Christians and trust that Jesus Christ will protect them from evil, even if they choose to name their children (as my father-in-law did) names like Rose, Lily, Pearl-of-Great-Price, and Grace-of-Heaven. Did he ever catch it from the neighbors! But he stood up to them, because he said, "Jesus is stronger than the spirits." They prophesied death for the children, but it didn't happen.
Now what the Catholic church has done openly is to try to map out a pathway coping with the third set of practices, the ones that can be problematic or fine, depending on how they are handled. This means primarily rituals designed to honor older family members, living and dead. Christ has nothing against us honoring such people--in fact, he commands it in Exodus, the Fourth Commandment!--but there is often an idolatrous cross-over when people take it too far--when they give (usually the dead) a level of honor, trust, and obedience that belongs only to God.
This is the "ancestral rites" controversy that has been such a problem for Catholicism in China and Vietnam for maybe 500 years now. It looks like the Catholic church has more or less tried to lay out a roadmap that allows people to practice all the harmless bits of culture surrounding the huge cultural nexus that is the New Year; that provides substitutes (mainly Mass) for the straight-up idolatry; and that redirects or offers guidance for the could-be problematic bits (that is, the respect/veneration of family and ancestors).
Now to the question you actually asked me (sorry!)-- have others tried to take on this task? Surely. Every Christian, foreign or native-born, who has ever had to do with Vietnam has faced these issues and come down with different choices and strategies. In our own family, we enjoy the harmless stuff (most of it), and we finesse the problematic stuff by putting a huge emphasis on the Fourth Commandment in our church (which incidentally, serves as a comfort for the non-Christian family members of converts, who are reassured that Christianity is not in fact the straight road to juvenile delinquism!), we make Mother's Day and Father's Day near-liturgical holidays, and we offer substitutes for the really problematic bits. Which means that we have in our house a picture wall full of family and ancestors, all centered around a cross; and we encourage those who maintain a more shrine-like thingamabob to place a cross or picture of Jesus in the highest and central position. We tend to discourage the offering of incense and mangoes etc. in front of said pictures, though we don't object to the common electric candles. And we suggest to Christians who are being pressured to take place in idolatrous worship at funerals and weddings that they take on humble positions of service which incidentally also prevent them from being able to take part--that is, we suggest they mind the kitchen, where food and drink is always available to mourners; we have them handle transportation or comfort the worst-stricken mourners, or suggest they volunteer to sit with the demented or to serve the wheelchair-bound, and so on and so forth. In fact, we suggest they do this as part of their daily Christian lives--it's that much harder to run down the one child out of nine who is a believer if he also happens to be the only one who's willing to take Dad to his chemo treatments!
Sorry about the long screed. TLDR: We want people to enjoy as much of their own culture as they can, and we try to keep people from getting persecuted; but we can't always manage it.
❤️🙏🕯 and hugs.
Anyone got any experience of using this or similar?
ETA if possible you want your heatproofing on the outside of the window.
Yes, the gym I use which is an old church complex, has used chalk paint on some of the windows and it seems quite effective. The former chuch is always very cool because of the high ceilings and narrow lancet windows, but some of the associated buildings are squat and with larger windows. Those of a certain age may remember this is the sort of paint once used by green grocers to advertise their goods ( aberant commas and all). Important to paint the outside of the windows to facilitate easier removal with a hose.
We are also fans of portable fans with a water section in the base to be able to mist oneself in the hottest part of the day. I have heard of putting sheets in the freezer for an hour or so before bed. I imagine pjs in the fridge might work too. Friends of ours who had an old Victorian house had a winter and a summer bedroom. The winter one was smaller and easier to heat and doubled as a study. The summer bedroom had lots of windows and was on the southern side of their home. Try to pick the coolest room to sleep in. I was always anxious about fans running all night, so we had some with timers so they would only run for a couple of hours when we were first trying to get to sleep.
Go without her - she'll soon join in. I find Mr Boogs never likes my ideas until I execute them. 🙂🙂
Be glad. You wouldn't want her too keen on the idea of you moving into the garage.