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praying at the new year

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-eight years and a million words

Nichinan, 2020.01.02

Today we went to a shrine to pray, as it's a new year. This involves trading in the old prayer doo-dads that the family picked up at a shrine at the outset of 2019. These, made of pine and lightly decorated with prayer characters, are then ritually burned while we ritually buy new tokens.

After that, Mari's father's sister arrived with her husband and daughters and their husbands and children. They were praying at a family-specific shrine that was built inside Mari's parents' place.

The household shrine is on the left in this pic.

rand()m quote

Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.

—Frank Wilhoit