Happy Thanksgiving Dan and everyone. I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving and that everyone got their Black Friday deals and fill of football (mixed bag in Michigan – Lions won, Wolverines lost). I did not have as interesting a Thanksgiving as Stu did (thankfully no one was hurt). I had lots of time with family and not much time to write.
It is now the First Advent. I think that many of our Church Advent meditiations that we get in booklets, pamphlets etc. are somewhat saccharin. Most of the time, we approach spirituality with good feel affirmations. This goes only so far. We never get to the harder part of spirituality, the part that can truly change us. In this we are a lot like children who will eat the ice cream but not the vegetables. Consider when of our better known prayers – The Serenity Prayer – “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the different.†Most of us stop here. We never get to the nutrient loaded vegetables of the prayer. If only we would continue further on to this part “. . . accepting hardship as the pathway to peace.†For this reason I like to read Father Alfred Delp’s Advent homilies and thoughts.
Alfred Delp was a Jesuit priest executed by the Nazis in 1945. He was a member of an anti-Nazi resistance movement, the Kreisau Circle, whose members included Helmuth James von Moltke. They were planning the moral rebuilding of Germany that would have to follow after the Nazis were gone. After the failed assassination attempt on Hitler by Von Stauffenberg, members of the Kreisau Circle were arrested tried and executed and the broad sweep that followed. Alfred Delp was caught up in this sweep. He knew nothing of the assassination plot and the charges against him for involvement were eventually dropped. He was, however, convicted of treason and sentenced to death. After being severely tortured by the Gestapo, he was imprisoned in Tegel Prison in Berlin. With his hands in handcuffs, he wrote his thoughts which were smuggled out with the laundry. Also, between 1941 and 1944, Delp had preached a series of homilies on Advent that were pointed at the moral crisis in Germany. Delp also criticizes the path Western civilization in general (the Occident) had taken. A criticism that is still relevant today. These thoughts and homilies have been published in a book: “Alfred Delp, Priest and Martyr, Advent of the Heart, Seasonal Sermons and Prison Writings, 1941 – 1944.†Published by Ignatious Press.
In his homily for the first Advent, Father Delp states that we need to be deeply shaken in so that we can awaken to ourselves. We have all been shaken by the events of this year especially by those in Paris. Here is this excerpt from Delp in Tegel Prison: “And along with these thoughts comes the memory of an angel that a good person gave me for Advent two years ago. It held the banner: ‘Rejoice for the Lord is near.’ A bomb destroyed the angel. A bomb killed the good person, and I often sense that she does angel services for me.â€
I recall several years ago seeing the first Advent candle being lit on a very dark, gloomy morning. What made its light so beautiful was the dark, gloomy morning. A candle can only produce this light by consuming its substance. Alfred Delp was just such a candle. He was executed on February 2, 1945. February 2 is the day on which the Church blesses candles.
Out here on Long Island we had a little surprise for our turkey day. A small airship crash landed safely in a school ball field on Thanksgiving day. The airship was a single engine, open seat affair, kind of like a ultralight float plane fuselage attached to a helium gasbag. The airship was on an advertising task for a local college financing company with it’s banner pinned to the sides of the hull. (see the story at newsday.com) The pilot, who was from Atlanta, was into his third hour of flight after departing from Republic Airport in Farmingdale when the winds picked up and things got lumpy.
He turned back to Republic airport and was starting to run short on fuel as the winds buffeted the airship. He chose first a small field to attempt a landing in but decided at the last minute to shoot for the school ball field nearby. He valved off some helium to lower his altitude and drifted over the rooftops near the hopeful landing site, unable at this point to make Republic safely due to the loss in control of his airship as a result of loss of pressure. Local residents, preparing their Thanksgiving dinners were startled at the low-flying airship buzzing their rooftops and came out to follow the airship on its wayward course.
Like in the early days of airships over a hundred years ago, the pilot yelled down from his perch aloft to gather up a makeshift ground crew who met the blimp at the ball field. The neighbors grabbed the bow mooring lines and managed to wrestle the airship under control while the pilot vented the envelope completely, marking the end of a harrowing four hour tour of duty. No one was injured in the incident and the airship’s envelope was unharmed. The neighbors all returned to their dinners, and the pilot bade them a grateful farewell. The blimp’s support crew eventually found the wayward blimp and packed it up onto a truck to take back to Republic airport, only a mile or so away. She was then laid out again, checked for damage and re-inflated for tomorrow’s job with another pilot.
So that was a turkey of an airship adventure on Long Island, one that a few households just west of Republic airport in Farmingdale will long remember with a chuckle and a laugh. Being that Long Island has a rich aviation history (F-14 Tomcat, A-10 Warthog were built here) which included the first landing of a rigid airship in the continental USA (R-34 crossing from England to Mineola. Long Island), this little incident is another little chapter to a rich heritage.
Reminds me of the time back in 1990 Detroit Thanksgiving Day Parade when Chilly Willy the Penguin balloon escaped from his handlers and headed off to Canada.
Happy Thanksgiving Dan and everyone. I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving and that everyone got their Black Friday deals and fill of football (mixed bag in Michigan – Lions won, Wolverines lost). I did not have as interesting a Thanksgiving as Stu did (thankfully no one was hurt). I had lots of time with family and not much time to write.
It is now the First Advent. I think that many of our Church Advent meditiations that we get in booklets, pamphlets etc. are somewhat saccharin. Most of the time, we approach spirituality with good feel affirmations. This goes only so far. We never get to the harder part of spirituality, the part that can truly change us. In this we are a lot like children who will eat the ice cream but not the vegetables. Consider when of our better known prayers – The Serenity Prayer – “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the different.†Most of us stop here. We never get to the nutrient loaded vegetables of the prayer. If only we would continue further on to this part “. . . accepting hardship as the pathway to peace.†For this reason I like to read Father Alfred Delp’s Advent homilies and thoughts.
Alfred Delp was a Jesuit priest executed by the Nazis in 1945. He was a member of an anti-Nazi resistance movement, the Kreisau Circle, whose members included Helmuth James von Moltke. They were planning the moral rebuilding of Germany that would have to follow after the Nazis were gone. After the failed assassination attempt on Hitler by Von Stauffenberg, members of the Kreisau Circle were arrested tried and executed and the broad sweep that followed. Alfred Delp was caught up in this sweep. He knew nothing of the assassination plot and the charges against him for involvement were eventually dropped. He was, however, convicted of treason and sentenced to death. After being severely tortured by the Gestapo, he was imprisoned in Tegel Prison in Berlin. With his hands in handcuffs, he wrote his thoughts which were smuggled out with the laundry. Also, between 1941 and 1944, Delp had preached a series of homilies on Advent that were pointed at the moral crisis in Germany. Delp also criticizes the path Western civilization in general (the Occident) had taken. A criticism that is still relevant today. These thoughts and homilies have been published in a book: “Alfred Delp, Priest and Martyr, Advent of the Heart, Seasonal Sermons and Prison Writings, 1941 – 1944.†Published by Ignatious Press.
In his homily for the first Advent, Father Delp states that we need to be deeply shaken in so that we can awaken to ourselves. We have all been shaken by the events of this year especially by those in Paris. Here is this excerpt from Delp in Tegel Prison: “And along with these thoughts comes the memory of an angel that a good person gave me for Advent two years ago. It held the banner: ‘Rejoice for the Lord is near.’ A bomb destroyed the angel. A bomb killed the good person, and I often sense that she does angel services for me.â€
I recall several years ago seeing the first Advent candle being lit on a very dark, gloomy morning. What made its light so beautiful was the dark, gloomy morning. A candle can only produce this light by consuming its substance. Alfred Delp was just such a candle. He was executed on February 2, 1945. February 2 is the day on which the Church blesses candles.
For more on Father Alfred Delp:
http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20100202_1.htm
For more on the Kreisau Circle:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kreisau_Circle
Happy Thanksgiving to you as well Dan.
Out here on Long Island we had a little surprise for our turkey day. A small airship crash landed safely in a school ball field on Thanksgiving day. The airship was a single engine, open seat affair, kind of like a ultralight float plane fuselage attached to a helium gasbag. The airship was on an advertising task for a local college financing company with it’s banner pinned to the sides of the hull. (see the story at newsday.com) The pilot, who was from Atlanta, was into his third hour of flight after departing from Republic Airport in Farmingdale when the winds picked up and things got lumpy.
He turned back to Republic airport and was starting to run short on fuel as the winds buffeted the airship. He chose first a small field to attempt a landing in but decided at the last minute to shoot for the school ball field nearby. He valved off some helium to lower his altitude and drifted over the rooftops near the hopeful landing site, unable at this point to make Republic safely due to the loss in control of his airship as a result of loss of pressure. Local residents, preparing their Thanksgiving dinners were startled at the low-flying airship buzzing their rooftops and came out to follow the airship on its wayward course.
Like in the early days of airships over a hundred years ago, the pilot yelled down from his perch aloft to gather up a makeshift ground crew who met the blimp at the ball field. The neighbors grabbed the bow mooring lines and managed to wrestle the airship under control while the pilot vented the envelope completely, marking the end of a harrowing four hour tour of duty. No one was injured in the incident and the airship’s envelope was unharmed. The neighbors all returned to their dinners, and the pilot bade them a grateful farewell. The blimp’s support crew eventually found the wayward blimp and packed it up onto a truck to take back to Republic airport, only a mile or so away. She was then laid out again, checked for damage and re-inflated for tomorrow’s job with another pilot.
So that was a turkey of an airship adventure on Long Island, one that a few households just west of Republic airport in Farmingdale will long remember with a chuckle and a laugh. Being that Long Island has a rich aviation history (F-14 Tomcat, A-10 Warthog were built here) which included the first landing of a rigid airship in the continental USA (R-34 crossing from England to Mineola. Long Island), this little incident is another little chapter to a rich heritage.
Happy Thanksgiving Day everyone.
Reminds me of the time back in 1990 Detroit Thanksgiving Day Parade when Chilly Willy the Penguin balloon escaped from his handlers and headed off to Canada.
http://mittenhistory.com/2012/11/22/americas-thanksgiving-day-parade/
I also heard a story about Chilly Willy spooking a private pilot during this incident who thought he saw a UFO. 🙂