A New Hope for A New Year

by The Rev. Connie Yost

 I am a bit late coming to this New Year 2024 blog post, but my thoughts about it have been welling up as we enter this election year.  I admit I approach 2024 with fear – fear that the onslaught of election news will wear me down, and a greater fear that a candidate will win the Presidential election who will further degrade not only our democracy but humanity itself.  I long for God in all of this, for those people who can lift up and further the attributes of my God – kindness, strength, hospitality, equality, creativity, beauty, truth, love.

Of all the religious holidays we celebrate, I have come to resonate most deeply with Epiphany. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines Epiphany as “January 6 observed as a church festival in commemoration of the coming of the Magi as the first manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles or in the Eastern Church in commemoration of the baptism of Christ.”  For Western Christians, this is the day that three wise men or Magi, guided by a star, discovered the baby Jesus, born in a barn to poor people who soon became refugees to protect Jesus from the murderous King Herod.

January 6 – Epiphany – is the day Christians celebrate the light in the darkness.  How very terrible that it is now inextricably bound up with the day a mob descended on the US Capitol with murderous intent to stop the certification of electoral college votes in the 2020 Presidential election.

And yet, because the vile act of January 6, 2021 happened on Epiphany, I find it even more important to remember the message of Epiphany.  The Magi were not Jews, they were Gentiles, and yet they traveled far to find a new revelation of God in the Jewish baby Jesus.  They bridged divides and hardships to join in this revelation, this new light in the world.

The word epiphany comes from the Greek epiphaneia, meaning “manifestation.”  The Merriam-Webster dictionary further defines the manifestation as:

1.  especially of a divine being

2.  a usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something

3.  an illuminating discovery, realization, or disclosure

4.  an intuitive grasp of reality through something (such as an event) usually simple and striking

5.  a revealing scene or moment

Maya Angelou's defines Epiphany as “the occurrence when the mind, the body, the heart, and the soul focus together and see an old thing in a new way."

Epiphany brings me new hope because it affirms that there is always the possibility of something new happening in our thoughts, in our lives, and in the world.  We just need to pay attention.  We need a spiritual contemplative, meditative practice to help us be attentive.  We need our spiritual practice to ground us where our hope truly resides, in the “power of love and renewal that lives within the universe, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God.” (Sallie McFague).  Jesus as Prophet shows us that “God offers us quiet, contemplative eyes; God also calls us to prophetic and critical involvement in the pain and sufferings of our world – both at the same time.” (Richard Rohr)

For many Christians, Epiphany is not just one day, but the beginning of a season that lasts until the first day of Lent.  For me, the Epiphany season is one of new beginnings, new hope, bringing light to the word, and a time to focus on the attributes of my God in the world - kindness, strength, hospitality, equality, creativity, beauty, truth, love. 

Epiphany asks me these questions:  How am I doing as the manifestation of these attributes in my life?  How can I bring more of these things into my life?  How is my spiritual practice supporting me?  How attentive am I to Spirit’s message of love in the midst of my own pain and the sufferings of the world?  How can I bring the light of Epiphany into the world?

Copyright 2024 Constance B. Yost. All rights reserved.

Happy New Year 2020

Love from me, hanging with the sea turtles on Jekyll Island, Georgia

December 31, 2019
updated January 5, 2020

I told everyone I was leaving Portland to spend the winter in Mexico.  That’s mostly true, but what I failed to say is that first, I am spending 2 weeks on Jekyll Island, Georgia.

I guess I didn’t disclose that part because 1) I love the quiet here and I don’t want everyone in the world to come here and ruin it for me; and 2) West coast people are blissfully unaware of the South, it seems.  The few times I mentioned it, people looked at me blankly, as if I were talking about Soviet Georgia.  No, Georgia, USA, you know?   Jekyll Island, formerly the haunt of the rich, is now thankfully accessible to us ordinary people, and much much more down to earth than say, Hilton Head.  And home to the Georgia Sea Turtle Center which provides medical care and rehabilitation for sea turtles whom they name and display their story of catastrophe and salvation on each of their individual rehabilitation pools.  Who can resist donating or just loving them up?*

I have new turtle earrings, a turtle necklace and a greeting card of turtles from around the world.  I guess turtles are my thing, come to think of it.  I had a tragedy early in life involving a turtle, which I won’t go into here.  Maybe they are my totem; I did see a quite large turtle on the side of the road last June in Wyoming while I was on my way from Custer, SD to Devils Tower National Monument.  What in the world was he doing there?  Although there weren’t many cars on that particular stretch of highway, I worried that he just wouldn’t make it across, if that was where he was headed.  (Later, someone said I should have picked him up and escorted him across the road.  Really?)  Actually, I would have liked to have taken him home, but I don’t really have the means to care for him properly.  But he blessed my life, for sure, and I pray that he is all right.

So, 2019.  My god, what a year!  I guess every year is momentous in its way; but this year was sheer grace and miracle.  It started in 2018 when a Man at Church asked me to house a Speaker he had invited to our church.  Sure, I said.  I have space.  Happy to help out.  A week before the event, Man at Church said, “I hope you’ll be all right, Connie,” alluding to the Speaker being in my house overnight.  Massive PTSD ensued for me; what was he implying?  That I would be raped and murdered in my own bed, and by a highly educated white man and national figure in the progressive camp, someone YOU asked me to house?  What the, what the f---?  

Happy New Year 2015

Ministerial Meditations

by The Rev. Connie Yost

January 4, 2015

Beautiful Big Bend National Park, Texas

New Year's Resolution

Well, I did it again, bringing in
that infant Purity across the land,
welcoming Innocence with gin
in New York, waiting up
to help Chicago,
Denver, L.A., Fairbanks, Hon-
olulu--and now
the high school bands are alienating Dallas,
and girls in gold and tangerine
have lost all touch with Pasadena,
and young men with muscles and missing teeth
are dreaming of personal fouls,
and it's all beginning again, just like
those other Januaries in
instant reply.

But I've had enough
of turning to look back, the old
post-morteming of defeat:
people I loved but didn't touch,
friends I haven't seen for years,
strangers who smiled but didn't speak--failures,
failures.  No,
I refuse to leave it at that, because
somewhere, off camera,
January is coming like Venus
up from the murk of December, re-
virginized, as innocent
of loss as any dawn.  Resolved: this year
I'm going to break my losing streak,
I'm going to stay alert, reach out,
speak when not spoken to,
read the minds of people in the streets.
I'm going to practice every day,
stay in training, and be moderate
in all things.
All things but love.

~ Philip Appleman ~

(New and Selected Poems, 1956-1996)

Here we are at the beginning of a New Year, so let me start by wishing you a Happy New Year.  I’ve long enjoyed the ending of one year and the beginning of another as a time of reflection and discernment of what I want to bring more of into my life this year.

I like this poem because it highlights the pitfalls of the process.  Reflection on the year gone by is necessary so we can know where we’ve been, where we’ve had success, where we’ve had joy, where we’ve gone off-track, and where we need to make amends.  All necessary for our growth, relationships and well-being.