On the Third Day of Christmas

my true love gave to me

      THREE French hens
       two turtledoves and a partridge in a pear tree

According to what I read, this gift represents the three cardinal virtues.  Kind of a word play there - that hens represent cardinals....  sorry, my random brain can't stop making connections :-)

I couldn't find out much of significance about French hens.. but they must be special.... since the song is of 1700s English tradition.  I would think that a hen that made it from France to England would be special indeed.. probably a type different from the ordinary hens.  And, as a hen, the potential for producing more of this special breed would exist..

BUT.. the cardinal virtues....  Faith, Hope, and Love.

Faith... believing in that we cannot see or prove.  

Hope.... that spark of FAITH that things can always get better

Love... that YOU that ties everything together and makes life worth living

Dear God,

Please help me be like a child.  Help me see life the way YOU do - not the way I do...

 Please help me childlike..... help me have FAITH even though life continually reminds me that I should be logical... realistic... cynical....

 Please help me be childlike.....  help me have HOPE even though life continually reminds me that some situations appear hopeless, that it is HARD to wake up every day and go on when I can't see any way out...

Please help me be childlike... to LOVE even though life continually reminds me that I am unusual, different, unloveable.  

God, I understand life is not easy - I do not wish to be childISH.. self-centered and wanting to have fun all the time.  But I do want to BELIEVE like a child... to have HOPE like a child.. and to LOVE like a child... these 3 things... without too many questions...  Yes, I will have questions - and you know this because you made me just the way I am.  But to be able to have these 3 virtues - like a child - will give me the glimpse of heaven that will help me live the life you intended for me.

So I ask your help

Amen.