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WEEKLY FELLOWSHIP! JOIN AROUND THE CAMPFIRE!
Sundays at 11:30 AM ET. Click here to join via Google Meet!
What’s the weekly mettle maker?
Training tips and educational info in support of our free programs, that’s what! What’s mettle? Mettle is, “The ability to meet a challenge or persevere under demanding circumstances; determination or resolve.”
What’s new?
Our program is now called HERITAGE ROUGH ‘N’ TUMBLE. To understand why we’ve made this change, read this post .
Skin in the game is now required. The program is still free if you can’t afford a donation of $1/month — but you have to at least hang out with the crew each week or volunteer to be a social media promoter, blogger, researcher, newsletter editor, fundraiser, mentor, artist, or even come up with your own idea.
weekly fellowship Sundays at 11:30 Am et. click here to join via google meet!
The hawk feather I found while feather-questing. Note: It’s illegal to possess bird feathers in the United States. Take pictures instead!
Mettle maker #408: The Boundless Feather Quest
Put a gallon of water and a snack in your backpack and go for a hike. Don’t come home until you find a feather. You can only call it quits if you reach your physical limits, nightfall comes, or you have to fulfill an obligation. If you have to head home before you find one, take up the quest again the next day — and every day thereafter, rain or shine! — until you find a feather. Hear are just a few of the things you stand to learn from this exercise:.
Sink-or-swim skills. If you have a short attention span, poor observation skills, and/or you know nothing about the the habits of birds in your local area, it’s going to be long day (or maybe even several long weeks). But there ain’t no school like the school of hard knocks. By the time your quest is over, you’ll be better at all three.
Comfort with uncertainty. Open-ended challenges are far more taxing mentally than ones that are bounded. Learn to get comfortable with not knowing.
Patience. No matter how long the quest takes, maintain an equanimous disposition. There is a huge life lesson in this. Being grumpy and frustrated are not going to help you find a feather.
Nature appreciation. You’ll get more comfortable being outside and gain an appreciation for the illusiveness of birds
Note: The possession of feathers and other parts of native North American birds without a permit is prohibited by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA). This protects wild birds by preventing their killing by collectors and the commercial trade in their feathers, and extends to all feathers, regardless of how they were obtained. There is no exemption for molted feathers or those taken from road- or window-killed birds. More information on the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and the list of MBTA-protected species can be found here.
Take a picture instead. To identify a feather you found visit use the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Feather Identification Tool.
Interested in a totally free program that incorporates self-defense, fitness, outdoor skills, and spiritual development? Sign up for our free Rough ‘n’ Tumble Distance Learning Program!
Holy Eucharist is LIVE on YouTube every Sunday at 10 am EASTERn. Click HERE to watch live. To view and print a copy of the program for holy Eucharist, CLICK HERE.
Homily for the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, Sunday 6/2/24 – Father Mitch
Readings: Ex 24:3-8, Ps 116:12-13, 15-16, 17-18, Heb 9:11-15, Lauda Sion, Mk 14:12-16, 22-26
Mark 14:12-16, 22-26 World English Bible
12 On the first day of unleavened bread, when they sacrificed the Passover, his disciples asked him, “Where do you want us to go and prepare that you may eat the Passover?”
13 He sent two of his disciples and said to them, “Go into the city, and there a man carrying a pitcher of water will meet you. Follow him, 14 and wherever he enters in, tell the master of the house, ‘The Teacher says, “Where is the guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?” ’ 15 He will himself show you a large upper room furnished and ready. Get ready for us there.”
16 His disciples went out, and came into the city, and found things as he had said to them, and they prepared the Passover.
22 As they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had blessed it, he broke it and gave to them, and said, “Take, eat. This is my body.”
23 He took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave to them. They all drank of it. 24 He said to them, “This is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many. 25 Most certainly I tell you, I will no more drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it anew in God’s Kingdom.” 26 When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
To find a place for the Passover meal, Jesus instructs his disciples to look for something very unusual – for a man carrying a jar of water. Why is this so unusual? Because, in those days, in that culture, the carrying and serving of water was the work of women or slaves. Jesus tells them to follow the slave to the house he serves and ask the master of the house where the guest room is so that they can break bread.
Make no mistake. This little event is a spiritual earthquake. In geology, when the earth’s plates shift, land masses move. And as the centuries wear on, mountains are heaved up from the sea, valleys open up, and volcanoes erupt. That is what is happening here, but on a spiritual plane.
When Caesar entered his city, returning after a successful war campaign, his spoils entered before him – slaves, treasure, exotic animals, and so on – followed by his soldiers, and finally, the emperor himself. Caesar rides in his chariot at the rear, pushing as it were, everything ahead of him. But in this narrative, the slave is not a possession that is pushed, but a guide who is followed. This slave is not pitiable – no, no, no! – but enviable! What an honor to have been a servant in the house where the Last Supper was held! Perhaps he even brought the gifts to the table and placed them there for Jesus and the twelve. Perhaps the slave’s jar of water was even used to water the wine at table, a common practice of the day that we honor during our service to this day. This is a social avalanche unfolding in real time. But that’s not all it is, not by a long shot.
That symbol of the earthenware jar of water reminds us of so much. We might consider that, since our bodies are made up of 2/3 water and 1/3 essential elements, we are essentially jars of water. We might see that, as Christian slaves of Christ, our job of service is to carry the Baptismal waters to the unbaptized. We might recall the Samaritan woman gather water at the well to whom Jesus offers a spring of living water welling into eternal life (John 4).
Such a rich symbol! But that’s not all it is. All religions have symbols. That’s not unique. No, what is so shocking and miraculous here is that this is a real person, carrying real water, who fulfills a prophecy in time. Jesus says they will find this slave carrying a jar of water and that he will lead them to their destination. And it happens as Jesus predicted.
There are many symbolic tales and alleged prophets, many sacred books, and symbolic meals. They’re ten for a penny. You can buy them by the pound. But this? This is something entirely different. This is a symbol that is real, a prophecy that comes true, a mythic story that reads like a fairy tale but which happens in reality, documented by eyewitness account.
This slave carrying a jar of water is the foreshock that warns of the coming quake – the first pebble thrown up in a spiritual upheaval, that finally erupts at the point when the bread is broken and the wine is poured. Because when the symbol becomes real, and the bread and wine become the actual Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, the spiritual landscape is forever changed. This is no mere fact of history which we commemorate, but a living, participatory event which, in the Eucharist service, happens over and over again in the here and now.
‡ 28:19 TR and NU add “therefore”