ADVIENTO - Una idea diferente en navidad

Una idea diferente en navidad

Era el mes de diciembre y la profesora les había pedido a los alumnos que preparan un dibujo de navidad los cuales serían presentados a un concurso.

Todos los niños se pusieron manos a la obra. Realizaron dibujos del pesebre, del nacimiento del niño Jesús y de Papá Noel con diferentes colores e incomparables formas.

Y cuando llegó el día de dar a conocer el nombre de ganador, premiaron al niño Andy. Pero Carla no estaba de acuerdo con el fallo del jurado. Le parecía injusto y poco creíble porque ella y sus amigas decían que su dibujo era el más bonito y el mejor decorado.

En la tarde, cuando la madre fue a buscarla a la escuela la vio con cara de enojada y le preguntó el motivo. Entonces Carla le contó todo lo sucedido y añadió que el dibujo de Andy daba asco. La madre guardó silencio por unos minutos y luego preguntó:

_ ¿Qué dibujó Andy?

_ Dibujó dos gusanitos dentro de una manzana celebrando la navidad_ contestó Carla.

La madre sorprendida y con una sonrisa en los labios la miró a los ojos y le dijo:

_ Andy ha ganado porque el jurado ha valorado su creatividad. Escucha, quiero que nunca olvides esto: La creatividad es mucho más importante que la rutina.

Al escuchar esto, Carla tomó la mano a su madre y se marchó feliz pensando en darle la enhorabuena a su amigo Andy.

Autora: María Abreu

A TIME TO BE SILENT AND A TIME TO SPEAK

A mantra is a chant repeated (whispered, if the circumstances do not allow words to be spoken aloud) to relax and let go of stress.
To get a hold of impatience, my besetting sin, I use a verse from the Bible's Old Testament as a mantra.
The verse I chant is Ecclesiastes 3:7:
"(There is) A time to keep silence, and a time to speak".
I usually chant it in Swedish or German, though (It works best with Luther's translation: "Schweigen hat seine Zeit, und reden hat seine Zeit").
The author of the Ecclesiastes, identified by most scholars with Solomon, was right. Though most people, including the writer of this blog, are not so fond of the time to keep silence when it comes to waiting.
Waiting in silence and without any distractions on one's own is something that the reader is very likely to dislike as much as I do.
Another "time to keep silence" is when a totalitarian government bans self-expression, freethought, and/or freedom of speech. Think Ferdinand II, Oliver Cromwell, Benito Mussolini and other Fascist dictators, Josif Stalin and other Communist dictators. After years of violent repression, all of them finally failed.
It comes as no surprise that great international shifts into self-expression values and deviance tolerance (Hellenism, Enlightenment, Sexual Revolution) always succeed the defeat of the crises caused by such totalitarianisms, that appear in the pages of history of ideas as Losers with capital letters.
Several Bible critics have also given their thoughts on this verse:
Clarke:

"Wisdom restrains

The tongue, when words are vain: but now,

'Tis time to speak, and silence would be criminal."

Sometimes, "words are vain", No more details.

Gill:

 "A time to keep silence, and a time to speak ; when it is an evil time, a time of calamity in a nation, it is not a time to be loquacious and talkative, especially in a vain and ludicrous way, ; or when a particular friend or relation is in distress, as in the case of Job and his friends,  or when in the presence of wicked men, who make a jest of everything serious and religious, ; and so when under afflictive dispensations of Providence, it is a time to be still and mute, and not open the mouth in a murmuring and complaining way, . And, on the other hand, there is a time to speak, either publicly; or privately [···].
That's right. Persecution. The blues (either when oneself or an acquaintance has the blues). Those are convenient scenarios to be silent.
Keil and Delitsch:
"To keep silence has its time, and to speak has its time." Severe strokes of adversity turn the mind in quietness back upon itself; and the demeanour most befitting such adversity is silent resignation.
The blues, again. When you feel like that, nothing appears pleasant.