So this was Christmas

And what have you done?

I haven't done much actually, except the usual not-so-interesting stuff. The weather was bad, windy and rainy, so the skiing was disappointing too.

On Christmas Day, I went to church, to watch and listen to the mass in our big medieval cathedral. The cathedral is visited by some 250.000 tourists every year. I've been there many times in the tourist way, to enjoy the architecture, the glass paintings, and the stone carvings, and to climb the stairs to the tower with the kids. But I have never attended a mass. This Christmas I did, just for fun.

I enjoyed the music, the two choirs, and the sound of the big Steinmeyer organ, which has recently been restored. When they read from the Christmas gospel, it came to my mind that this thing about fake news, that we heard about in the US election, is nothing new. Some fake news have been repeated for almost 2000 years, and there are still people believing in it.

I'm not a believer, and I hardly ever go to church. If I do, its only for weddings and funerals. When I was a kid, we had to go to church from time to time. It was part of Christianity class. We're mainly Protestants in this country. Martin Luther was supposed to be our hero. Now it's almost 500 years since the reformation, when the Catholics were kicked out, with their saints and confessions and indulgences. There's no doubt that Luther had a point.

Our protestant church got dull and boring. It seems like the congregations want more show, more like the Catholics do it. I think I noticed, in the Christmas Day mass, that Catholic elements are coming back. The service was performed by an army of clerics. They were parading proudly through the church, behind a guy in white robes carrying a tall pole with Jesus on the cross. There were four priests (two female) and the bishop himself, dressed in white and purple robes. I find it kind of funny that the bishop has the name of the Norse thunder god, Tor.

In our town we have always been somewhat schizofrenic about the Catholics. We have always celebrated our local saint, the king of the vikings, who was killed in battle 1000 years ago. It was noticed (according to the saga) that his nails and hair continued to grow after his death; the sign of a true saint.  Every summer there's a festival to celebrate the holy king, including rock concerts, to attract more people I guess.

Whatever, I have nothing against neither Protestants nor Catholics as such. Religion is just fairy tale to me, and rock concerts are great.

And a happy new year >:)

(I took this picture on New Year's Eve of the public fire works at the old fortress. Sorry about the poor quality. My cell phone camera isn't very good in this kind of conditions. )

Houses of God and cheese and imperial stout

I've been a little bit sick lately, so we didn't go skiing in the mountains this weekend. Today I went for a walk downtown, to return some books to the public library.  The sun was shining, and it was a nice day for walking. Apparently many people thought the same, because the streets were crowded. There were tall people and short people, skinny people and fat people. All of them carrying bags and backpacks with stuff they had bought.

I took a quick tour around downtown. I visited a shop were I bought a camembert cheese, produced by a local farm. Then, in a different store, I bought a bottle of porter and an imperial stout. The porter was from the town were i live now. The imperial stout was imported, brewed in Denver, Colorado, were I lived for a while in the past. It was a great place to live, by the way.

On the way back home, I passed by the old cathedral. On the other side of the street, the Catholics are building a new church. God is absent in both places. He's just a product of human fantasy, unlike the cheese and the beer I bought, which are real.

The old cathedral was Catholic too, from the time it was built 900 years ago, until the last arch bishop fled from the reformation in the 16th century. Now the Catholics are back. That's fine with me. I just wonder why they have to build a new church. We have plenty of churches already. In most of them both the congregation and God are absent. We could rather have given the Catholics one of the existing churches, giving back some of the property they lost in the reformation.

(Picture taken on my walk today. The old cathedral to the right, the new Catholic church, with the scaffolds, to the left). 

A-Z Challenge 10: Jerusalem (and Hollywood)

Jerusalem gave us the Abrahamic religions; Christianity, Islam and Judaism. The true God came to a church or synagogue or mosque near you.

Jerusalem is where Jesus was crucified and resurrected on the third day, and where Mohammed ascended. 

Hollywood gave us superheroes, men (and some women) with supernatural powers. Hollywood is where Superman, Batman, and Spiderman were brought to life, and came to theatre near you.

Hollywood is the Jerusalem of superheroes.

Jerusalem is the Hollywood of the Gods.

Hollywood is still a rather peaceful place. The fans of Superman, Batman and Spiderman don’t kill each other.

Christmas as usual

It’s Christmas, the traditional celebration, as always.

This year we went down south to celebrate with family. All of them live in the south of Winterland. We’re the only ones who moved away.

My father had bought a Christmas tree this year. When I was a kid, we used to steal a tree in the forest. We put on our skis, brought a saw and an axe, cut down the most beautiful little pine we could find and pulled it back home. Not anymore. Even my father is buying the Christmas tree now.

(My father is a cool guy; retired teacher and enthusiastic cross-country skier and writer. He has written his own Christmas song, both the lyrics and the melody. He plays harmonica but he can’t read sheet music. I have to tell more about him some time.)

The meal on Christmas Eve is traditional, but varying around the country. We’re alternating between the sheep rib of the west coast (most years), and the pork rib of the south east (some years), depending on who we’re with.

This Christmas Eve we had sheep rib, dried and salted and smoked, and then watered (to remove excess salt) and boiled and finally fried, served with mushed swede and boiled potatoes. Very good.

After the meal, we were ready for the commercial Christmas orgy (we open the presents on Christmas Eve). Tons of toys and games were unwrapped, a lot more than the kids were able to appreciate.

On Christmas Day, little boy and I watched the Christmas Mass in TV (on public broadcasting). I need to know the stuff I mock and criticize. Recently we got some new liturgy; more music, more show. We’re getting closer to the Catholics. Martin Luther wouldn’t like this, but who cares. People want to be entertained while getting their opium.

We watched the mass for half an hour. Then we zapped to cartoons, The Simpsons, little boy’s favorite. I must admit I enjoy it myself.

In the evening a heavy storm hit the west coast and the south east. We were in a party, and when we tried to drive back an hour after midnight, the roads were blocked by fallen trees. We talked to a police patrol who was out to close roads. He advised us to go to return to where we came from. So we did, and slept over.

Tonight we went back home (no problems with the flight). Tomorrow the real vacation starts. Six days of skiing in the mountains. Great.

It’s Christmas as usual >:)

(Christmas on the slopes, that's the way I like it. Took the picture one year ago, and hope it will be the same this time.)

Let's go to church

The weather was really bad on the glacier today. It was foggy, rainy and strong winds. We skied till noon and got soaking wet. Then we took a break to eat some food, and skied some more, and got even wetter.

We decided to call it a day, at least insofar as skiing was concerned, and went back to the camping down in the valley, a vertical drop of almost a mile down from the glacier.

"What should we do now?" the kids asked.

They were bored in the bad weather, and I needed to come up with some ideas.

"Let's go to church," I said, "as soon as the rain stops."

And that's what we did, the way I go church of course.

Right across the river from the camping, there is an old church, from the 12th century. It's a stave church, built from wood, dark brown from the tar-paint. We walked around the church, and studied the 800-year-old logs and planks, and the dragon heads on the roof. The kids had a competition about who could find the oldest gravestone on the churchyard.

That's the way I go to church, to admire the architecture and the history. It's nice to have some cultural backup when the weather is bad, and there's some time to kill >:)

(Above is a closeup picture of the church, as much as I could capture from inside the fence with my crappy cell phone camera. Both the walls and the roof are made of wood. The oldest part of the church has been dated to 1158. It's assumed that it was completed between 1170 and 1200.)

Fags eat poop

A few days ago, I saw a documentary, on 60 Minutes, about the Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas. They run this website GodHatesAmerica, because America is a doomed country of fags and sodomists. The sodomists include anyone who has anything but simple straight (missionary) sex for the sole purpose of breeding. God probably hates Europe too. I can tell you it’s the same misery over here; fags and sodomists all over the place.

The Westboro Baptist Church has a collection of very creative posters and slogans, like "God is your enemy" and "God hates fags". The highlight is this one: "Fags eat poop". I think God appreciates that one. They probably found it somewhere in The Bible. Jesus is more tolerant. He might hang out with both sinners, tax collectors and poop-eaters.

I know 3 fags, and they are all very nice people. None of them eat poop. I think I should send a mail to the church and ask them to modify their slogan a little bit. Maybe something like "Fags eat poop, except 3 of them, at least".

Do you know any fags that don't eat poop? If you tell me how many, I can eventually add up the numbers and increase the total count, before I mail the baptist church >:)

The noble pornographer

Last night I was re-reading some passages from the works of an interesting author; Marquis the Sade. You know, the guy who got his name immortalized in the word sadism (or sadist).

Marquis de Sade was born in 1740 and died in 1814. He was a gifted writer, but with a somewhat twisted mind. He spent one third of his life in jail (10 years in the Bastille), due to his scandalous lifestyle, and because of the texts he wrote; a mixture of philosophy, pornography and blasphemy.

In the humoristic play Philosophy of the Bedroom, written in 1795, Madame the Saint Ange and Dolmance are introducing the young Eugenie to certain adventures. Here’s an excerpt from the dialogue:

MADAME THE SAINT ANGE: Come Eugenie, let’s not tarry. There’s the pump’s nozzle in the air; it won’t be long before we’re flooded.
EUGENIE: Oh, dearest friend, what a monstrous member! I can scarcely get my hand around it! Dear God, are they all as big as this?
DOLMANCE: Eugenie, you know that mine is inferior in size; such engines are redoubtable for a youngster; you are fully aware such as this could not without danger perforate you.
EUGENIE (already being frigged by Madame de Saint Ange): I’d brave anything to enjoy it!

The most famous work of Sade is the novel Justine, with subtitle The Misfortunes of Virtue, written in 1787. The unlucky girl Justine works as a housekeeper in a house where she is being abused. She escapes and seeks protection in a Benedictine monastery, which turns out to be a change from bad to worse. Here are excerpts from a scene where Justine is in the hands of the superior of the monastery, Dom Severino:

“And placing me upon a couch in the posture expected by his execrable projects and causing me to be held by two of his monks, the infamous man attempts to satisfy himself in that criminal and perverse fashion which makes us resemble none but the sex we do not possess while degrading the one we have … “

When reading the works of de Sade, it’s important to remember that his works were written right before the French revolution, when the lifestyle of the French upper class was at the peak of decadence. In my bookshelf, I have both the English and Winterlandic translations of Justine. One of the translations has an introduction by a wellknown anarchist and author, who writes that “de Sade was imprisoned because he wrote what the upper class did”. And the story about Justine suggests that the recent revelations of abuse in the Catholic Church may have a long history too ... >:)

Zombie skiing

Skiing again today. Took the boys to a freestyle competition in a ski centre one and a half hour drive south of our home town. No serious crashes today. That's the most important, more important than the rank.

Nice but cold, too cold with the wind chill in the upper slopes. My nose was freezing.

They had built a new chair lift. It starts right outside the churchyard. It’s the only church I know with ski-in ski-out. Maybe they want to bring salvation to the skiers? And the zombies can ski all night >:)