Choir of the Eparchy of Tripoli

I’m experiencing a surge of Antiochian Orthodox Christian pride lately, with the election of our new archpastor Saba, and my lenten music listening heavily favors the glorious choir of the Eparchy of Tripoli (Lebanon).

Mother of God

Patty Griffin, giving an impossibly courageous voice to the experience of remembering, processing and moving through a childhood trauma into adulthood. Let the reader understand.

Things can happen that make it hard for us to pray. Why did God let this happen? How is this part of the salvation of the world?

How can we pray to the one whom we feel has betrayed us? Keep singing our shame into the light, sisters and brothers. You are transforming the world.

[LYRICS]

All you kids get out the back door
I've never seen her this mad before
She took all her favorite things down from the window
And broke 'em all over her clean floor

It's Saturday at the mansion
The oldest boy walks with a slouch
The young ones are wild in back of the house
And she gave up and went back to sleep on the couch

Something as simple as boys and girls
Gets tossed all around and lost in the world
Something as hard as a prayer on your back
Wait a long time for an answer

When I was little I'd stare at her picture
And talk to the Mother of God
I swear sometimes I'd see her lips move
Like she was trying to say something to me

When I was eighteen I moved to Florida
Like everyone sick of the cold does
And I waited on old people waiting to die
OhI waited on them
until I was
 

Something as simple as boys and girls
Gets tossed all around and lost in the world
Something as hard as a prayer on your back
Wait a long time for an answer

So I'm wearing my footsteps into this floor
One day I won't live here anymore
Someone will wonder who lived here before
And went on their way

I live too many miles from the ocean
And I'm getting older and odd
I get up every morning with my cup of coffee
And I talk to the Mother of God

Something as simple as boys and girls
Gets tossed all around and lost in the world
Something as hard as a prayer on your back
Can wait a long time for an answer
Can wait a long time for an answer

Maybe it's alright
Maybe we won't fight anymore
Maybe love is waiting at the end of every road
I don't know
I don't know
But maybe
maybe it's
alright

Making Pies

Austinite Patty Griffin with one of her gorgeous songs about the courage of ordinary women.

Woman is the glorious, victorious, the mother of the heart of the world.

[LYRICS]

It's not far
I can walk
Down the block
To TableTalk
Close my eyes
Make the pies all day

Plastic cap
On my hair
I used to mind
Now I don't care
I used to mind
Now I don't care
Cause I'm gray

Did I show you this picture of my nephew
Taken at his big birthday surprise
At my sister's house last Sunday
This is Monday and I'm making pies
I'm making pies
Making pies
Pies

Thursday nights
I go and type
Down at the church
For Father Mike
It gets me out
And he ain't hard to like
At all

Jesus stares at me
In my chair
With his big blue eyes
And his honey brown hair
And he's looking at me
From way up there
On the wall

Did I show you this picture of my sweetheart
Taken of us before the war
Of the Greek and his Italian girl
One Sunday at the shore 

We tied our ribbons to the fire escape
They were taken by the birds
Who flew home to the country
As the bombs rained on the world

5am
Here I am
Walking the block
To TableTalk
You could cry or die
Or just make pies all day
I'm making pies
Making pies
Making pies
Making pies

getting ready for The Greatest Gift

Single just released from Sufjan's upcoming EP The Greatest Gift: outtakes, remixes, and extras from his Carrie & Lowell album.

Preorder it here: http://smarturl.it/greatest-gift Lyrics: As if you know the story of Wallowa Lake: Leviathan first hid in the deep where her children sleep She kept them hidden from the plague But have you heard the story of my mother's fate?

Saturn & Mercury

Who else writes a song about cannibalism, addiction, self-hatred, holy Communion, shame, rejection, and love for enemies - under the guise of being about a planet in our solar system? Nobody.

and this little gem from the same album.