Remembering Dad, Happy Father’s Day
Category: Holidays
Stories concerning holidays and seasons
Flag Day Honors Unity
Flag Day Honors Unity
By Bob Small
Today is Flag Day.
The Second Continental Congress passed a resolution on June 14, 1777 by approving the design of New Jersey delegate Francis Hopkinson for the American flag.
The first time this flag over a foreign territory was in early 1778 at Nassau, Bahamas, upon capture of a British Fort.
Presidents Coolidge and Wilson both issued proclamations for Flag Day but it only became official on Aug. 3, 1949 when President Harry Truman signed the law approved by Congress.
It is not an official federal holiday, however.
Did Betsy Ross sew the first flag? The claim was circulated by her descendants, citing her previous business dealings with George Washington.
This can’t be established with certainty but it is plausible and consistent with the evidence .
In Betsy Ross’s Philadelphia our truth is “Betsy Ross made the flag. This is our story and we’re sticking to it.”
Some, notably Colen Kaepernick and the Southern Poverty Law Center, object to display of the 13-star flag claiming it symbolizes hate. They cite its use by some extremist groups.
Others point out that any symbol can co-opted and the overwhelming number of those who fly the original do so out of sincere patriotism.
Maybe we should honor both our founding and the multi-race, multi-faith country we have
Happy Mother’s Day
Happy Mother’s Day
A mother’s love means a life’s devotion – and sometimes a life’s sacrifice – with but one thought, one hope and one feeling, that her children will grow up healthy and strong, free from evil habits and able to provide for themselves. Her sole wish is that they may do their part like men and women, avoid dangers and pitfalls, and when dark hours come, trust in Providence to give them strength, patience and courage to bear up bravely.
Happy is the mother when her heart’s wish is answered, and happy are sons and daughters when they can feel that they have contributed to her noble purpose, and in some measure, repaid her unceasing, unwavering love and devotion.
–Anonymous
Spring 2023 Starts Now
Spring 2023 Starts Now –According to our server’s clock it is now 5:24 p.m. EDT, EDT, March 20, which means the vernal equinox is happening and Spring 2023 has begun.
Equinox is Latin for “equal night.” Days and nights are approximately equal everywhere and the Sun rises and sets due east and west, explains The Old Farmers Almanac. At the equinoxes, the tilt of Earth relative to the Sun is zero, which means that Earth’s axis neither points toward nor away from the Sun.
Vernal comes from the Latin vernalis which means spring.
Christmas Pagan? Nope
Christmas Pagan? Nope — Conventional wisdom has become that the holiday celebrating the birth of Christ is something the early Christians co-opted from a pagan celebration of the Winter Solstice.
A Muhlenberg College history professor says that is completely backwards.
William J. Tighe, an associate professor at the college in Allentown, says that Christmas really was thought to be the date of the Lord Jesus’ birth.
The thinking then was that great Jewish prophets died on the date of their birth or conception.
The date of Jesus’ death can be calculated from Gospel accounts.
The faction using the Latin calendar wound up placing the Crucifixion at March 25, according to Tighe. This was the faction that became dominant in the West.
The Latin church determined that was also date that the Archangel Gabriel announced that Mary was with child. Nine months later, on Dec. 25, would be the Lord’s birth.
March 25 is still celebrated as the Feast of the Annunciation.
Tighe notes that Rome didn’t celebrate Dec. 25 as a pagan holiday until the anti-Christian Emperor Aurelian declared it to be the festival of the “Birth of the Unconquered Sun” in 274. By then, Christianity was already making its impact well felt on the Empire.
Tighe is also a faculty advisor to the Catholic Campus Ministry and a member of St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church in Bethlehem.
Christmas Pagan? Nope
Christmas Pagan? Nope
Hat tip Bob Guzzardi
Autumn 2022 Starts Now
Autumn 2022 Starts Now — The 2022 autumnal equinox is right now 9:04 p.m., EDT, Sept. 22 according to the Old Farmer’s Almanac as the sun crosses the celestial equator. Fall has arrived in the Northern Hemisphere, and the days are now shorter than the nights and will continue to be so until the spring equinox.
The celestial equator is a circle concentric with the actual equator that extends infinitely to space. As the Earth has a 23 degree tilt the the northern half tilts towards the Sun during half its orbit and away the other half. The equinoxes occur when tilt switches.
Autumn 2022 Starts Now
Seasonal Lag William Lawrence Sr Omnibit
The first day of summer is the longest day of the year but it is rarely the hottest due to seasonal lag. The extra daylight is heating the atmosphere but is also being absorbed by the earth and water. It won’t be for another month or so when the earth and water reach equilibrium with the atmosphere and start releasing back the heat they had been storing.
And that is why July and August have the reputation for being the hot months rather than June.
Seasonal Lag William Lawrence Sr Omnibit
Summer 2022 Starts Now
Summer 2022 Starts Now — Summer 2021 starts 5:14 a.m. EDT , June 21, which is right now if our internet service provider’s clock is accurate.
This means that tilt of Earth’s semi-axis is most inclined to the sun in the Northern Hemisphere which is a solstice.
The axis will in a few moments slowly start reversing itself until it is the Southern Hemisphere that is most inclined to the sun.
This would be the start of our winter (and Argentina’s summer).
Today is the longest day of the year.
Summer 2022 Starts Now
Media Memorial Day 2022
Media Memorial Day 2022 just ended and featured a parade of antique cars, fire trucks, military vehicles, the Penncrest Marching Band and the Media Little League. It was followed by a moving ceremony which remembered those who died to keep America free, along with tributes to Ukrainians fighting to keep their nation free.
The ceremony was emceed by Media Mayor Bob McMahon, a Vietnam veteran.
Retired Army Major Patrick Creed, who had returned the day before from the Ukraine where he spent 70 days assisting that nation’s military, spoke of the heroism of the Ukrainian soldiers.
Father Daniel Troyan of Holy Myrrh-Bearers Ukrainian Catholic Church described the overwhelming response by Delaware County residents when it became known that his parish was collecting relief for the embattled nation. He also noted human traffickers are targeting Ukrainian refugees, notably if they are women and children traveling without a husband and father.
Alexandra Kurlowicz, a member of Holy Myrrh-Bears and the daughter of Soviet-era refugees from the Ukraine, spoke of the nation’s long history of suffering.
Bill Lovejoy, commander of Clayton T. Smith-John M. Howard American Legion Post 93, paid tribute to Gladys Mae Martin, long-time post member who was active in the Pennsylvania Veterans Museum, 2 E. State St., Media. Mrs. Martin died, May 26. She was 99.
Congresswoman Mary Gay Scanlon (D-Pa5) told how she was the daughter, sister and granddaughter of veterans, and showed the Gold Star medal her great-grandmother was presented when she went to France after World War I to visit her son’s grave.
State Rep. Jennifer O’Mara (D-165) paid tribute to her husband who served two combat tours.
Also speaking were Delaware County Vice Chairwoman Elaine Schaefer and State Sen. Timothy Kearney (D-26).
Ashli Rice performed beautiful renditions of patriotic hymns.
Father Dan sang the Ukrainian national anthem, also beautifully.
Media Memorial Day 2022
Christos Voskrese 2022
Christos Voskrese 2022 — Christos voskrese, which means Christ has Risen, is the Easter greeting in Church Slavonic which brings the response Voistinu voskrese or Indeed, He has risen.
Easter, of course, celebrates the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus and the salvation of Man. The date for Easter is the Sunday following the first full moon after the spring equinox, which is always reckoned, regardless of astronomical observations, to be March 21 as per the Western churches that use the Gregorian calendar, so Easter always falls between March 22 and April 25.
The dating for Easter correlates with the means the Jews once used to set the date for Passover, which correlates with Scripture since Scripture indicates that the Crucifixion of the Lord occurred as the lambs were being slaughtered for the celebration of that holiday. In fact, in most Western languages the name for the day is a cognate of the Pesach which is the Hebrew name for Passover. In Latin it would be Pascha so Paschal lamb would be Passover lamb.
In English and German, the word comes from Eostre month, which was basically April, and which the pagans who spoke Germanic languages had named for the goddess Eostre much as our own March and April are named for the Greek god and goddess Mars and Aphrodite, respectively. In Slavic, the holiday is called “Great Night” (Velikonoce in Slovak) or “Great Day” (Velikden in Ukrainian). There are some caveats regarding the date. The Eastern churches that use the Julian calendar set the equinox at April 3, and, of course, the spring equinox is based on that of the Northern Hemisphere.
So, Christos Voskrese 2022.