Well, this looks interesting:

This January, we are proud to announce a new addition to the Formations line of curriculum resources. Available as a digital download, Formations for Youth is an engaging, low-prep curriculum resource for Middle and High School youth groups. The lessons in this resource begin with activities that ask youth to consider a common theme in their relationship with God and their everyday lives. Then questions help youth explore those themes more deeply in discussion.

I’m proud of Michelle Meredith, the editor of this new offering from NextSunday Resources, and of all the great work she has put into making Formations for Youth happen!

You’d better watch out…

Happy Krampusnacht to those celebrating…or cowering under their beds in terror!

For those who don’t know, Krampus is Santa’s demonic henchman. He’s a figure in Germanic folklore, generally from Alpine regions such as Austria.

Here are some fascinating facts about Krampus from mental_floss:

December 5 is Krampusnacht, when Krampus reigns. In the real world, people might attend Krampus balls, or young men from the local Krampusgruppe might don carved wooden masks, cowbells, chains, and elaborate costumes to run through town in a Krampuslauf (Krampus run), frightening and sometimes beating bystanders. According to legend, Krampus will spend the night visiting each house. He might leave bundles of sticks for bad children—or he might just hit them with the sticks instead. He might toss them into a sack or basket on his back and then throw it in a stream, or he might straight-up take them to hell.

The next day, though, is Nikolastaug, St. Nicholas’ Day—the same St. Nicholas whose Dutch name, Sinterklass, evolved into “Santa Claus.” In other words, it’s time for presents for all the little girls and boys … that is, all the ones who haven’t already been beaten, damned, or drowned.

And here’s a post on Krampus I wrote a couple years back.

Fascinating article from Meghan Walsh at Ozy.com:

So what does God have to do with all this? In his quest for answers, [physicist Jeremy] England, of course, finds himself at the center of the classic struggle between science and spirituality. While Christianity and Darwinism are generally opposed, Judaism doesn’t take issue with the science of life. The Rabbinical Council of America even takes the stance that “evolutionary theory, properly understood, is not incompatible with belief in a Divine Creator.”

For his part, England believes science can give us explanations and predictions, but it can never tell us what we should do with that information. That’s where, he says, the religious teachings come in. Indeed, the man who’s one-upping Darwin has spent the past 10 years painstakingly combing through the Torah, interpreting it word by word much the way he ponders the meaning of life. His conclusion? Common translations are lacking. Take the term “creation.” England suggests we understand it not as the literal making of the Earth but rather as giving Earth a name. All throughout the Bible, he says, there are examples of terms that could be interpreted differently from what we’ve come to accept as standard.

Now we know.

The ideal bed time story should be just 8.6 minutes long, feature a dragon, a fairy and a wizard and be set in a castle, the Telegraph reports that new research has revealed. Many a parent has melded the literary greats with the themes of Hollywood blockbusters to create bedtime stories to tell their young ones.

But now the formula for the ultimate bedtime tale has been revealed for the first time. A new study of 2,000 parents and their children has shown that the ideal story should last just 8.6 minutes long.

Characters should include a dragon, a wizard and a fairy, said the families who participated in the survey, and should ideally revolve around a mythical castle.

Children said that they enjoyed a brief moment of peril where the hero is endangered before ultimately triumphing over the forces of darkness. A happy ending is essential, according to nearly all of those surveyed with most children shunning love stories in favour of fantasy.

For what it’s worth, the fourth installment in the Into the Wonder series, with the working title The River of Night, will include a faery (lots of them, actually), a wizard, and a dragon. A visit to something that might be construed as a “castle” will also be featured. So other than the time restriction, I’m good to go. 🙂

Photo from Karri_and_Steve via TripAdvisor.com

“Haint” (or “hant”) is most likely related to the word “haunt.” In Gullah folklore, a haint is a frustrated spirit caught between life and death that looks for a place to haunt. In other words, they’re pretty much the same as restless or wandering ghosts from many other cultures.

There are some distinctive features, however. For one thing, haints are unable to cross water. This gives rise to perhaps the most notable feature of haint-lore: painting one’s shutters, window frames, door sills, etc., blue in hopes of tricking the haint into avoiding the house, thinking it is prevented from getting in.

This practice is evident, for example, on St. Simons Island, and the color used is darker than the traditional “haint blue” one sees further up the coast. See, however, this post that suggests what is traditionally called “haint blue” is not the ghost-repelling color of Gullah folklore! (The blue window pictured above is from St. Simons.) The practice is also slightly different. In South Carolina, the idea seems to be that either (1) the blue color makes the haint fly up through a porch ceiling thinking it is ascending to the sky (and thus leaving the house alone), or (2) that there is something about the color blue that is itself repulsive to haints.

In any event, driving away haints by means of the color blue is a practice first brought to North America from Angola in the 1700s. “Haint blue” (whatever its authentic hue) is often seen in areas that were strongly influenced by African folklore, including coastal Georgia, coastal South Carolina, New Orleans, and the Caribbean.