"Write my answer on a billboard,
large and clear,
so that anyone can read it at a glance
and rush to tell the others."
- Habakkuk 2:2 (TLB)

 Noel (or noël, sometimes written as nowell in English) is an alternate word for Christmas.

The word comes from the French word Noël meaning "Christmas" which derives from the Old French word noël, a variant of nael.

The Latin origin is the word natalis ("birth"). According to the 18th century Irish linguist and historian Charles Vallencey, a more ancient common origin appears in the Hebrew word nolah (Hebrew letters nuwn waw lamed he), meaning "to bring forth young." Subsequently, the Irish named December Mi Nolagh[citation needed], meaning "the month of the newborn." The Irish word for Christmas day was simply Nolagh.[1] Although there is no Biblical use of nolah, another Hebrew word nephel[2] is used Biblically to refer to an "untimely birth."

ขอเป็นอีกหนึ่งเสียงที่ตะโกนลั่นว่า ไม่มีใครสมควรตายจากโรคเอดส์ โรคที่ป้องกันและรักษาได้

Asher Brown, 13

เดือนกันยายนที่ผ่านมา ด.ช.อัชเชอร์ บราวน์ วัย 13 ยิงตัวตาย หลังโดนเพื่อนล้อเป็นประจำว่าเป็นกระเทย


Billy Lucas, 15

Seth Walsh died nine days after hanging himself for a tree in his garden

ด.ช.บิล ลี่ ลูคัส วัย 15 และ ด.ช.เซท วอล์ซ แขวนคอตาย เพราะทนไม่ได้แล้วที่ทั้งโดนล้อว่าเป็นกระเทย โดนคนในโรงเรียนรังแก และไม่มีครูคนไหนคิดจะช่วยเหลือ



Tyler Clementi

อีก คนคือ น้องไทเลอร์ คลิเมนติ เด็กปีหนึ่ง กระโดดสะพานฆ่าตัวตายหลัง โดนเพื่อนในหอแอบถ่ายวีดีโอ ขณะกำลังมีอะไรกับเพื่อนชายในห้องนอน





มีคนที่เรียกตัวเองว่าเป็น "คริสเตียน" หลายคน แสดงทัศนะว่าเด็กเหล่านี้สมควรตายแล้ว เพราะบาปที่เขาก่อขึ้น

ผมอดคิดไม่ได้ว่า ถ้าเด็กสี่คนนี้ และที่จริงอีกจำนวนมากที่ฆ่าตัวตาย เพราะโดนสังคมรังเกียจรังแก ถ้าในกลุ่มเด็กกลุ่มนี้ มีใครบางคนเป็นลูก เป็นหลาน เป็นน้อง หรือเป็นคนที่เรารัก...เราจะรับผิดชอบกับเรื่องนี้ได้อย่างไรบ้าง

ผมรู้ว่าพระเจ้าเสียใจมากที่คริสเตียนเรายังไม่ได้รัก พวกเขาเพียงพอ เพียงเพราะว่าเขาเป็นเกย์ และเราไม่เห็นด้วยกับการเป็นเกย์

ใน ฐานะที่ผมเป็นเกย์ และเป็นคริสเตียนที่รักพระเจ้ามากๆคนหนึ่ง...พระเจ้าครับ สอนผมทีว่า ผมทำอะไรได้บ้างที่จะป้องกันไม่ให้ มีเกย์คนไหน ต้องตายเพราะความเกลียดชัง และความกลัวจากคนรอบข้างที่เขารักอีก

พระเจ้าครับบอกผมที

พระเยซูตรัสว่า “เราบอกเจ้าแล้วมิใช่หรือว่า ถ้าเจ้าเชื่อเจ้าก็จะได้เห็นความยิ่งใหญ่ของพระเจ้า”

ข้ายอมทุกสิ่ง จะเชื่อฟังพระองค์ทุกอย่าง
Surrendering I’ll Surrender Everything

สิ่งใดที่ทรงบัญชา
Anything That You Require

ข้าขอทำตาม เมื่อรู้ว่านั่นเป็นน้ำพระทัย (ซ้ำ 2 )
My Heart’s Desire I’ll Leave It On Your Altar’s Fire


ข้ารักพระองค์ด้วยสิ้นสุดดวงใจ
I Love You Lord With All Of My Heart

ข้ารักพระองค์ด้วยสิ้นสุดกำลัง
I Love You Lord With All Of My Strength

ข้าขอเทิดทูนบูชาพระนามพระองค์
I’ll Worship You And Bless Your Holy Name

ข้าขอเทใจออกมาเป็นคำสรรเสริญ
I’ll Lift Up My Hands As Angel Voices Raise

ข้าขอชูมือถวายคำสดุดี
And Pour Out My Heart
As Endless Song Of Praise

ในชีวิตนี้ข้ามีพระองค์ผู้เดียว
In This Lift And Beyond There Is Only

…..เป็นพระเจ้า
One Holy God

en·ter·tain

1. to hold the attention of pleasantly or agreeably; divert; amuse.

2. to have as a guest; provide food, lodging, etc., for; show hospitality to.

3. to admit into the mind; consider: He never entertained such ideas.

4. to hold in the mind; harbor; cherish: They secretly entertained thoughts of revenge.

5. Archaic . to maintain or keep up.

6. Obsolete . to give admittance or reception to; receive.

7. to exercise hospitality; entertain company; provide entertainment for guests: They loved to talk, dance, and entertain.

“Synonyms” 1. beguile, regale. See amuse.

“Antonyms” 1. bore. 3. reject.

It's no accident that so far, I've lived on the top floor of three walk-up buildings in Brooklyn. A friend of mine once compared me to a cat, saying I like to climb up high and feel like I'm the queen of all I survey. I often felt like that when I was writing Mama's Girl - I needed somehow to find a place, a perch that was high enough so I could look at this incredibly painful history...and write about it. I was afraid of digging too deep, that somehow I could lose myself in all the hurt - like so much quicksand. So I would find high places to curl up in like a cat - the loft in my apartment, the roof of my brownstone, even the kitchen counter.

I'm one of the people who think best in the morning. I like to wake up ready to go, and to know that during that whole day the phone wouldn't ring, the doorbell wouldn't ring - even with good news - and that nobody would drop in... I don't care what the temperature is. I don't care where I am or what room I'm in. I'd just get up and get my coffee and an ordinary breakfast and go to work, And just have that whole day! And at the end of the day, about five or six o'clock, I'd stop for good that day. And I'd have a drink, a bourbon and water, watch the evening news...and then I could do anything I wanted to

I just discover a prayer for writers... It was written by Samuel Johnson on April 3, 1753, the day on which he signed a contract which required him to write the first complete dictionary of the English language. He was praying for himself. Anyway, this is the prayer: "O God, who hast hitherto supported me, enable me to proceed in this labor, and in the whole task of my present state, that when I shall reader up, at the last day, an account of the talent committed to me, I may receive pardon, for the sake of Jesus Christ. Amen."

I surround myself with objects that carry with them a personal history - old books, bowls, boxes, splintering chairs and benches from imperial China. I imagine the people who once turning the pages or rubbed their palms on the surfaces while they were thinking - thinking what? And then I hear my pappy little dog. Bubba Zo is my distraction, my reminder to get up and go for a walk before he pees on the carpet. I now include a lot of dog metaphors in my writing.

A girl pushing a carpet sweeper under my type-writer table has never annoyed me particularly, nor has it taken my mind off my work, unless the girl was unusually pretty or unusually clumsy. My wife, thank God, has never been protective of me, as, I am told, the wives of some writers are. In consequence, the members of my household never pay the slightest attention to my being a writing man - they make all the noise and fuss they want to. If I get sick of it, I have places I can go.

I always get up and make a cup of coffee while it is still dark - it must be dark - and then I drink the coffee and watch the light come... For me this ritual comprises my preparation to enter a space that I can only call nonsecular... Writers all devise ways to approach their place where they expect to make the contact, where they become the conduit, or where they engage in this mysterious process. For me, light is the signal in the transition. It's not being the light, it's being there before it arrives.

Whether you're at your desk or not when a poem's under way, isn't three that constant eddy in your mind? If it's strong enough all sorts of random flotsam gets drawn into it, how selectively it's hopeless to decide at the time. I try to break off, get away from the page, into the kitchen for a spell of mixing and marinating which gives the words a chance to sort themselves out behind my back. But three's really no escape, except perhaps the third drink.

Getting started is partly stalling... But once something is really under way, I don't want to do anything else. I don't go out, much of the time i forget to eat, I sleep very little. It's a very undisciplined way of working and makes me not very prolific. But I'm too interested in many other things.

Writing requires huge amounts of solitude. What I've done to soften the harshness of that choice is that I don't write all the time. I like to go out... I like to talk. I like to listen. I like to look and to watch. Maybe I have an Attention Surplus Disorder. The easiest thing in the world for me is to pay attention.

I work on what's important to me in the morning, for three hours. Usually, in the afternoon, I have what I call my "toy truck," a story that might develop or might not, but meanwhile it's fun to work on. I begin to pile up some pages, and eventually it'll get shifted over to the morning...

Working on a new idea is kind of like getting married. Then a new idea comes along and you think, "Man, I'd really like to go out with her. "But you can't. At least not until the old idea is finished. I don't take notes, I don't outline, I don't do anything like that. I just flail away at the goddamned thing.

I work on what's important to me in the morning, for three hours. Usually, in the afternoon, I have what I call my "toy truck," a story that might develop or might not, but meanwhile it's fun to work on. I begin to pile up some pages, and eventually it'll get shifted over to the morning...

Working on a new idea is kind of like getting married. Then a new idea comes along and you think, "Man, I'd really like to go out with her. "But you can't. At least not until the old idea is finished. I don't take notes, I don't outline, I don't do anything like that. I just flail away at the goddamned thing.

Separated from night
You spoke and then there was light
They point to You

Divided water from land
Bowing to Your command
They point to You

The sun that’s blazing at noon
And every phase of the moon
They point to You.

A baby’s cry and the way
A sunset closes the day
They point to You.

*For You’re the only One worth praising
More radiant than earth and sky
And everyday that I survey Your creation
I see why I see why

**God of everything I see,
Come create again in me
You were yesterday
and You will always be
So take each breath that I breathe
And be the life that I bleed
Create again in me

The storm that’s raging at sea
The little child on her knees
They point to You

Your grace that’s poured out on me
The sacrifice on a tree
They point to You

Your Word vaults across the sky
From sunrise to sunset
Melting the ice, scorching the desert
Warm our hearts to faith...

create again in me...

Create Again
Aaron Shust