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A MALTESE POODLE CHRISTMAS

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THE CULT OF MARY : THE FOCUS IS ON ONE PARTICULAR CULT : MAGYAR AMERICAN FILM REVIEW

MEDJUGORJE ORG


NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC - THE CULT OF MARY

I was disappointed in this Documentary from National Geographic, but maybe it's because I expected a broader meaning of the world CULT.  This one focused on a particular cult associated with the years long visions of Mary and devotion to her in Medjugorgie.  Now, I'm afraid of cults because I've known people who got into them and never seemed to get out.  It was clear they had gone through some sort of dramatic change in which they turned their backs on everything they used to believe.  However, while the particular group that this film focused on does seem to have cult features, most likely what came first is a person's utter devotion to Blessed Mother of Jesus, Mary.  Some people are concerned that since Mary is not considered divine, that this is displaced loyalty, since the focus should be Jesus.


That said, consider all the people in the world who are not Christians of any sort and how weird they must think Christians are.  It's easy for Non-Catholic Christians to condemn any sort of saint worship.  There are those who think that even Jesus is a small player in the Great scheme of things, that prayer is to go directly to his Father, GOD.


Ah well, this cult is tame compared to what you've read about Scientology.  People give up everything they own and are to spend most of their days in the worship of Mary, along with some every day work, just like so many orders of Nuns, Priests, Sisters, Monks, Monastics.
There is a long tradition of that.  The people are not locked up.  They can drive away.  They don't. So what we're talking about is not wanting to or fearing it. 

So why didn't national Geographic properly title this DVD to be something like "A Blessed Mother Cult in Medjugorgie."  because this is NOT a film about the worship of Mary throughout Catholicism, nor does it discuss other cults, or other Holy Orders who have spent much of their time in prayer, meditation, or Gregorian chants.


As a side, there is also a film bonus called "The Secret Lives of Jesus."  I'm not one to think that if Jesus did spend time in India learning from Hindus or Buddhists there before he began his preaching at age 30, that it's a bad thing.  However, after the Dan Brown fiction novels that so many Catholic haters have referenced, thinking the fiction is fact, I'm sensitive to the issue of Catholic's being understood accurately.

C 2016  All Rights Reserved

CROWNED RABBIT IMAGE FROM RUSSIA

SPRING - PLANS FOR A GARDEN - YOU TOO CAN MAKE SEED BALLS and PROVIDE BUTTERFLY and BEE FRIENDLY FLOWERS

MY GARDEN is starting to spout,

 including some plants that made it through the winter

that were only doing so so last year, including

YELLOW CALENDULA, PALE PINK PERFUMED SNAPDRAGONS, RED GERANIUM,

a single SUNFLOWER, and, the secret of whatever seeds I put into a SEED BALLS.

Since I posted on the heat wave, we finally got hit by a few rain showers locally. We will still attempt to conserve water. 

I attended a SEED BALL MAKING WORKSHOPS for ADULTS at a local LIBRARY here in Southern California a couple weeks ago.  The idea is to make these seed studded clay balls, then drop these them here, there, and everywhere there is a need for plants that butterflies and bees love .  (Try not to waste them by planting them where gardeners wack down anything they don't recognize as a weed!  But consider old graveyards, along certain road sides or crossings, between buildings... places were there is some land where they can grow as nature allows.)

You need to buy water based modeling clay such as the Crayola Air Dry Clay brand, which is the dough kids use to make little sculptures and comes in quart sized plastic buckets.  It turns out that this clay, water based, can harden but also resoften in the rain, or when you water it and the ball provides a good seed sprouting environment. 

You will also need some peat moss and some seeds.  We used Calfornia poppy seeds as well as a package of bird and butterfly mix.

Take about a quarter cup of this clay, roll it around into a ball, then flatten it like a pancake.  Sprinkle a generous amount of peat moss on it, and then a few seeds.  Roll this again into a ball, and roll the ball in more peat moss.  Viola!  You have a seed ball.

One thing California and Hungary have in common is POPPIES.  Our native poppies, a brilliant gold color, are our state flower, and one of the reasons that California is called The Golden State.   (The other reason is that by summer much of the once-green landscape is covered with golden dried out vegetation.)  We had some rain, finally, and the desert, including various succulents and cactus,  should be blooming brilliantly very soon. 

I made eight balls in fifteen minutes.  You do not need to dig deep to plant these balls.  Just a little scoop out or simply place them on furrowed ground.  Four of them I planted along an old abandoned rail road track that has a path past it.  So far, I have not seen anything sprouting when I walk past this area, but you never know.  Because of the rains there are the native California mustard plant (short, unlike the Spanish mustard the Spanish explorers are responsible for, as they claimed the country for Spain by throwing their own mustard seeds), as well as native wild geranium (rarely do these survive long enough to bloom out due to all those wackers!), mint, and a number of small yellow flowered and purple flowered ground covers that seem to hibernate for years just waiting for enough rain to sprout.

The four balls I left in a bag to be planted later all sprouted in the bag and have been transferred into a large pot.  I cannot wait for one or all of them to grow into beautiful plants that I can try to identify!

I found this link that will explain more about seed balls PERMA CULTURE - ANCIENT METHOD OF NO TILL AGRICULTURE



SNAPDRAGONS GREW AT MY BEST LITTLE GIRLFRIENDS HOUSE

As a child, my best little girlfriend had a garden that featured bright red snapdragon flowers. When I think back to being a child in the summers, I think of how aware we were of all the plants and trees and even the weeds!  Maybe because we were short enough and low enough to the ground to notice them!

 

I was lucky to have a rural existence as a child.

 

My girlfriend's father was German and her mother was Croatian.  He taught her which plants were edible, which were poison, and which were just for picking. 

C 2015 Magyar-American BlogSpot

 

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