About us

Advent is a sacred time in the traditional Christian calendar, a time to prepare for the coming of the Living God at Christmas. 'Preparation' in today's context usually means shopping and gift-wrapping and organising parties - a hectic lifestyle that has nothing to do with the Christian festival marking the birth of the Prince of Peace. Awake the Dawn is a place apart from the stress and worry and consumerism. It is a search for God's face.

The five principal bloggers are all young women with disabilities. (Between us we have autism, dyspraxia, dyslexia, a neurological condition that causes chronic pain, and a colourful variety of mental health difficulties.) One of us is a single mother. Two and a half of us are Catholics. (Two people are in the process of converting, and as they're only a quarter of the way there they count as a half-Catholic when added together.) One of us is a Quaker. Another was raised in a fundamentalist Christian household and somebody else used to live as a Muslim. One person is a former atheist. We all have very different ideas, interests, and outlooks on life, and in reflection of that we have each chosen a different theme to write about for Awake the Dawn.

May God bless you as you wait for the sunrise with us.

Danni
Danni accidentally became a Christian when she was eighteen. She went to a carol service for the sake of the music and walked out feeling a strange urge to go back, which she now realises was a strategic move on the part of Jesus. By Easter she knew that she believed in Him. Danni has struggled with mental health difficulties for most of her life, and at the moment she is living in sheltered accommodation while her three-year-old daughter Samantha is cared for by foster parents. For a while it looked very likely that Sammie would be put up for adoption, and Sammie is the only family that Danni has. Mostly because of this, Danni has a deep love for Mary, the mother of Jesus, who knew what it was like to lose a child. Unsurprisingly, Danni is going to write about Mary for Awake the Dawn. (She is not feeling that well today, which is why this short bio has been written on her behalf by Stella Maris.)


Dominus Illuminatio Mea
D is a nineteen-year-old student of Classics and Spanish at Oxford University, who is taking a year out because of her health. She is the (legitimate!) daughter of a Catholic priest, which is always a good line of introduction at parties. Despite being medically diagnosed as barren, her mother conceived after praying and drinking water from the healing well at Walsingham. D is the eldest of six children, one of whom cherishes ambitions to become either 'the pope or an old man in the park with a stick'. She will be writing about the three wise men who travelled from Persia to worship the newborn Jesus.


Pagmie
Hello. I am Miranda, but my posts will be appearing under the name of my Google blog. I am F/16/UK, or just, 16 year old girl living in the UK. I got asked to write for Awake the Dawn as I am a Quaker, and hence have a different view, and I jumped at the chance. I have a long and complex history that I don't plan to go into, but I am prepared to say that I am a relatively radical Quaker. My four posts will be on obedience and respect, women's rights, the Jewish festival of Purim, and finally a Quaker view on these things - all based around the Book of Esther. I chose this book as it concentrates on hope and waiting, like Advent itself.


Pebles
Hello. How are you? I am 22 years old. I like patterns and maths and pigeons and trains and lots of things. I have dyspraxia, dyslexia, and autism. My favourite saints are St Bernadette, St Therese of Lisieux, St Maximilian Kolbe, St Francis of Assisi and St Miriam. I was baptized in the sea. It was late at night and the water was cold. I liked the water being cold. I remember the water and all the patterns that it made and the stars and I remember closing my eyes so that all of the brilliant things around me would not distract me. I wanted to think of God. I remember pressure on my shoulders and back and being pushed under the water. I remember how the water felt all around me and I remember coming back up out of it. I remember smiling like when something very brilliant happens like when my niece Summer was born. I remember that I felt the way you feel when you take a heavy bag off your back, but it was in my chest where it felt like the bag had been taken from. I am a Catholic Christian. I am going to write about searching for God.


Stella Maris
"Make straight in the desert a highway for our God." This verse from the Bible has inspired me to write about preparing for the divine coming, starting with conversion of the heart and moving on to questions of social justice, especially poverty and peace. I grew up in Saudi Arabia and have travelled widely in the Middle East, visiting Bahrain, Israel-Palestine, Egypt, and Jordan. (Next stop: Yemen.) My immersion in that melting-pot of languages, cultures, and religions flavours practically everything that I write - and I write a lot, ranging from books on my disabilities to nativity plays involving hippie kibbutzniks. (Do not ask.) I hope to become a nun once I have finished with university, assuming that I can find a convent willing to accommodate my two thousand books. (Yes, I really do have that number, and no, a vow of holy poverty should not stand in the way of me and my bookshelves.)


Guest Bloggers
From time to time a special guest blogger may step in. The proposed guest list features a Jew, an Evangelical Christian, and - more exotic still - an American. Stay tuned.