{"href":"https://api.simplecast.com/oembed?url=https%3A%2F%2Fucanews.simplecast.com%2Fepisodes%2Fobservations09122021-vw9msO8T","width":444,"version":"1.0","type":"rich","title":"Observations: A year’s worth of Advent","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_url":"https://image.simplecastcdn.com/images/0ae8ec02-bd32-43af-9c08-63be6f3c504a/751b0e3c-9c70-46ec-8ca3-cb50e4a2ba30/observations-artwork-divya.jpg","thumbnail_height":300,"provider_url":"https://simplecast.com","provider_name":"Simplecast","html":"<iframe src=\"https://player.simplecast.com/a71bb740-5e8f-4727-a50b-ed5c7f1c7e2f\" height=\"200\" width=\"100%\" title=\"Observations: A year’s worth of Advent\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"></iframe>","height":200,"description":"The Church year begins and ends with disaster stories. They are a style of biblical literature called apocalypse that has now become a genre of popular entertainment. We are fascinated by apocalyptic stories because in many ways, they are our own stories. But there is more to apocalyptic than disaster. It is an important part of the Bible and faith because it tells us something about God’s presence with us. Father William Grimm, who lives in Japan,  shares some thoughts on this."}