Easter 7 C - May 29, 2022

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Ephrem Arcement

Easter 7 C - May 29, 2022

Acts 16:16-34

Revelation 22:12-14,16-17,20-21

John 17:20-26

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If I said that Christianity was all about power, how would you respond? I myself would feel the urge to object. Isn’t power precisely what corrupts Christian life? Wouldn’t humility, perhaps, serve to better define Christianity? To quote one very prominent ecclesiastic, “Let us turn our backs on power.” Yet, the more I actually contemplate Christian faith, religion in general, and life itself, the more I’m convinced that to turn our backs on power would be to betray life and to forfeit our relationship with God. Our lives would simply implode!

God is power! Power of a specific kind but power nonetheless…explosive, extravagant, creative power. Open up your Bible to nearly any page and you will read about a God creating the heavens and the earth, turning rivers into blood and parting seas, providing manna from heaven and water from a rock. You will read about miracles of healing and miracles of divine intervention. Or what about the Incarnation, Resurrection, and Ascension of our Lord? What are these events without power? Or the Easter story we hear today about the Apostles casting out a spirit of divination from a slave girl or the power of prayer and worship to open prison doors and break shackles? And then there is the power of God on showcase in the book of Revelation where the Risen Lord is about to come from heaven to save the saints and destroy evil once for all.

And yet the pages of the Bible are also filled with another kind of power…the power to tempt and lead astray, the power of a lie to wreak devastating consequences, the power of shame and guilt, the power to plunder and kill, the power of sickness and death.

No wonder some of our favorite stories are those about the clashing of powers…the power of good versus the power of evil. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is, in fact, the good news that God is more powerful than Satan, that life is more powerful than death. So, it is hard to deny that at the heart of life and faith is this reality of power. It is the force of life. It is the DNA of the beating human heart. The inestimable gift of God that we have received in Christ is that in Christ we encounter power completely and totally sanctified and pure, never turned in on itself, always overflowing for good. In Christ, power is purely and simply love at every turn. Never control, never manipulation. He reveals it in his healing the sick and liberating those bound by the devil; in his acts of reconciling and bringing into community those who are marginalized; in his heroic ability to endure the injustices of a world who misunderstands and rejects him and in his courage of denying himself his own right to live.

As we approach the liturgical end of celebrating the saving events of Christ in his Paschal Mystery, it is an opportune time for us to reflect on the meaning of it all and widen the scope of our vision. What was the purpose of Christ's life but to unleash upon the world a power to transform it and make it what it was always intended to be? In Christ we encounter a God who has not been deaf to those who have cried out shackled in the power of evil and One who has indeed heard and decisively answered. The answer was like nothing anyone expected but far more than anyone could have hoped. We have been given a power that liberates and transforms. Its name is Love, the only force to conquer evil and turn hearts of stone into hearts of flesh allowing them to act in the very same power of Christ himself…healing, reconciling, and bringing life to those who are dead.

Today we hear our Lord pray that we all may be one, even completely one, just as he and the Father are one…and that we may dwell in God and God may dwell in us. This grand, mystical vision boggles the mind and humbles the heart. Yet, this is precisely God’s gift to us and our destiny. The point of the Christian life is to learn how to harness this power for divine intimacy and live in its fullness. And Christ didn’t pray that we would come to experience this oneness once we get to heaven. No, he prayed that we would come to experience this oneness even now, in this life…a oneness with God that empowers us to live at one with each other.

And, most importantly, as we widen the scope, we see that at the very heart of the Paschal journey stands a bloody cross…the sanctifying, transforming instrument that takes power turned in on itself and transforms it into something divine…the power to bear the hatred of this world and to bury it in the sacrifice of one’s life.

Meekness has been defined as power under control. It comes from the Greek which referred to a wild stallion who undergoes months of training to bring its unruly strength into submission so that it can be directed to use that strength in ways that would be most effective in battle. For me, this kind of meekness is the glory of Christian power and has become the goal of my own Christian life.

When I see the gross divisions in our world, between nations, between races, even between churches…when I see violence perpetrated against fellow human beings or against the natural world in which we live…when I see how one human being can control and manipulate a nation and unleash devastating terror on thousands…and when I think of the Christian response that can finally save us from such powerful forces of evil…I think of Christ, the meek and humble Lamb of God who unleashed on the world a greater power still and am compelled to live more fully into what has already been given, the victory already won.

And so we pray…Lord of Life, who has created all that is by your powerful, life-giving Word, pour out upon us once again the power of your Spirit as we anticipate the celebration of your divine Love lavishly given at Pentecost. Take our broken, stony hearts and imbue them with life, recreating them in your divine image. Heal us, renew us, and inspire us to always act in the conquering power of your mercy and forgiveness and so reveal to a world fractured to breaking point the way to reconciliation and peace…for you are the Light that has cast out the darkness, the Lamb that has taken away the sin of the world. Come, Lord Jesus! Holy Spirit, come! Amen.

Ascension day C - May 26, 2022

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Randy Greve, OHC

Ascension day C - May 26, 2022

Acts 1:1-11

Ephesians 1:15-23

Luke 24:44-53

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In the reading from the Acts of the Apostles, just before the moment of Ascension, the disciples ask, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” As we celebrate the glorious and joyful Ascension of our Lord, alongside our wonder is the nervousness the imagery of such an event creates in us. The disciples seem to be nervous as well. The question they ask is less about who are you, Jesus, than “what’s the plan?” “Are you going to fix the problems of the world now?” Anxiety usually moves us toward grasping ideas and getting things done before abiding in presence. Pragmatic action is no substitute for abiding presence. Doing things for Jesus is not the same as being with Jesus - we need both.

If we decide to hyper-literalize, then we have to ask: What did the disciples see? Where did Jesus go? Is this history or metaphor? We humans are pragmatic, rational, creatures. We want to understand, accomplish, control. How do we know we should not be out feeding the hungry and comforting the lonely rather than gathering in this chapel? What is more Christ-like - caring for the needy or contemplating the meaning of ancient texts? The announcement of the miraculous invites us to wrestle with possibilities beyond our powers to understand. The story claims there is a bigger world around us that we do not see, a larger reality that we cannot perceive. The life of Christ is communicated to us into the layers of conditioning, experience, and imagination we develop over decades, so that before we ask what the story means, we must ask who are we who are hearing the account of the Ascension.

Do we uncritically accept the story? Do we dismiss such events as coming from a pre-scientific, superstitious world and therefore meaningless for us today? I am hearing an increase in reports from clergy and faithful laypersons who note an enlarging chasm between Christian doctrine and our current social challenges. The church is full of hypocrites or out of touch or a thing of the past. The refrain is, “Let’s not waste time with divisive theological opinions, it’s time to work together to create a better world here and now.” If we know what is right, perhaps we no longer need to worship Jesus, but just do what he wants us to do.

Many social commentators have described our cultural moment as an apocalypse, an unveiling, of our buried sins, of the work that is still left undone in our collective vision of equality and freedom. Such times are full of opportunity for honest reflection or denial and blame. Our deep illusion is that we believe the press of our own arrogance, can do it ourselves; gather the tools, the answers, apply them, and end whatever evil or crisis before us. I have heard the word “fix” many times in the last few weeks. Perhaps because I have become more sensitized to the cultural conversation in the light of this season and this feast. How do we fix violence, climate change, and other social crises is asked every time I listen to the news. Some party, politician, or group can do it and should do it. Our imaginations are primed by the stories we have absorbed. We can do anything. We remember nothing.

The miraculous, the mystical, the unseen, the realities that are beyond our minds are essential elements that make the world meaningful and make our humanity infused with power and hope. They are not meant to be comfortable, or even comforting, if comforting means quick and easy solutions to complex evils. While we may want answers and fixes, what we get is hope, promise, power, and presence. And we are asked to believe that those are better, more solid and lasting gifts than our limited minds can create on our own. The classic theology of the Ascension is that Jesus, whose presence was localized while on earth, passes his presence into us through the Holy Spirit, into the Holy Eucharist, and into the promise of the new heaven and new earth, the final and ultimate consummation of the kingdom of God. The Ascension is an act of love toward us wherein Christ desires and enacts his loving embrace wide enough to encompass the whole cosmos. The divine glory of the whole cosmos enters into the particular in bread and wine and comes to dwell within us. The love that inhabits the universe seeks to be touched and tasted by our bodies.

These mysteries, these realities, invite us to a renewed theological orientation, a poetic imagination that can help us discern the times as more than a series of problems to be fixed, but as an invitation to be people of patient inquiry, humble cooperation, bold proclamations of God’s truth. We are stewards and witnesses of the kingdom that is already and not yet, breaking into our world even when its progress seems exceedingly slow. Our work is partnering with Christ in the slow, deep work of conversion that takes as long as it takes for it to be real, knowing that the final consummation comes when the new heaven and new earth descend from Christ. The Ascension is part of the theology of the person of Christ. Theology is the first word on a subject that serves to propel us into mystery, not the last word of a definition that defines that mystery.

The life of Christ speaks to our identity, our longing, our communal moment as the central reality of our existence. A poetic imagination reminds us that life is liturgy, the earth is the sanctuary. Corporate worship may be a respite from the news and trials of everyday life and a re-focus on the presence of God, but worship must never become an escape into an alternative world wholly separated from the rest of life, cut off from the other six days and 23 hours of our week. Theology that stays safely shelved in church pews is a betrayal of our faith in Jesus. Shelved theology is worse than none at all. In miracles, in the invisible, in the hope of a future promise we can barely imagine, we are confronted with the genuinely new, the limits of our power, the folly of our capabilities to fix it. That is why Jesus comes to us, shares his power and presence with us. Our mortal finitude, our awareness of our need, is the prerequisite of sharing in the glory of our humanity.

Jesus dismisses the disciples' question about whether he was about to restore the kingdom to Israel - it is none of your business, he says. He admonishes them not to take God’s role, but to remain obedient to their vocation as stewards of power and witnesses of God’s visitation in Christ.

Therefore will keep gathering, keep being nervous, keep waiting and watching and witnessing. “Surely the Lord is in this place - and I did not know it! How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” Amen.

Easter 6 C - May 22, 2022

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Luc Thuku, OHC

Easter 6 C - May 22, 2022

Acts 16:9-15

Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5

John 14:23-29

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We have gathered again on this morning of the Sixth Sunday of Easter to celebrate the Resurrection and be fed in Word and Sacrament. From the Gospel passage we heard this morning, we are placed in the Holy Week events and this may seem strange during the Eastertide season. However in the gospel acording to John, these are the chapters where we hear from Jesus himself what living into the resurrection reality truly means. We will come back to this in a moment. First let us explore the main theme from today’s readings which seems to be mission which stems from discipleship or discipleship that leads to mission. In today's passage from the Acts of the Apostles, Paul receives a vision from God. A few verses before this passage begins, Paul and his companions Silas and Timothy seemed at a loss for where to go preach next. They had moved around in the region encountering barriers that strangely seemed to have been set up by God. The Spirit had prevented them or rather had forbidden them from going into Asia or into Bythinia and they were restricted to Troas by God’s refusal to let them go North, South or West. Though the verses that preceed our passage today are ommited as part of it in the lectionary, they are important in that they teach us, the church, that God is in charge of the mission. They also clearly show that the church at times searches for God’s calling in mistaken directions and futile attempts and that the will of God communicated by the Spirit often happens through frustrating and difficult discernment. As already stated, today's passage begins with Paul receiving a vision and the vision is not as clear as we would imagine and therefore needed to be interpreted by the community of faith and owned up by the same community before it could be acted upon. In verse 10, we hear the community taking ownership of the vision… “we concluded what it meant and what to do about it”. We learn a crucial lesson here this morning that although God communicates with individuals, the mission He gives is not necessarily for that particular individual but for the entire Community and not just as a theme for discussions and meetings, but for immediate action. The mission that we recieve is not personal, it is not even for the Church but it is God’s. However, the Church is called to discern God’s mission at every turn and that is our call this morning… Where is the Spirit calling us, is the Spirit calling us to those whom we might think are outside the circle of our responsibility? What visions call us as a Religious Community or as an Order beyond the boundaries we have set for ourselves, into ministry where and that we had not considered before? Are we so comfortable in West Park, Toronto and a certain part of the Republic of South Africa that our eyes have been closed to visions of, and our ears have become deaf to, God inviting us to new frontiers? After the community discerns where God is calling them, Paul and his mission team head directly to Philippi which was a Roman colony, a miniature Rome, a place that was supposed to show what the empire is all about and can offer. Paul heads there and plants a church so that it acts as a community that says No to the ways of imperial power and offer a different way of life, a different story, a different promise. This is still the mission entrusted to the Church today; to be, and to offer, in the face of different and of familiar systems of power and oppression, a different way of life and of being. Unfortunately the Church of today has become so comfortable in her dealings with the systems of power in place and has become compromised and contaminated to the extent of providing theology to back up some of the most oppressive and violent regimes, ideologies and policies that have characterized life in our world today and in the past! If you want to see the extent to which our society has become rotten, look no further than most of the churches! Paul’s vision had involved a Macedonian man but the first to welcome the good-news in Philippi was a woman (and non Jew) named Lydia. This woman was from Thyatira where Paul had just come from and the lesson here is that we should not have any simple expectations about God’s mission. What we need is an open mind and an open attitude to acept what God continues to reveal. This is because God reveals self afresh daily but if we become stuck or fixated on the original vision or mission or even in our successes or failures, we most likely will miss the point and end up sabotaging what we claim to be working to build. Lydia’s faith became active immediately and she and her entire household got baptized. She therefore becomes the first person in Europe to become Christian! She then opens her home to the disciples and by so doing, social and cultural barriers begin to crumble as this Roman outpost begins to be changed by God’s grace. Lydia prevailed upon Paul and his companions to stay with her just as the Emmaus disciples prevailed on Jesus to stay with them for the night. When lives are transformed and opened up by faithful discipleship, the fellowship of the risen Lord continues to extend in the world. This brings us back to today’s Gospel passage. We hear Jesus talking to his disciples about his imminent departure in what is popularly known as the farewell discourse. He speaks to them about the mission he is entrusting to them, that of love! He makes it clear that his followers will love him by serving others. Most of us most of the time think we can make a distinction between loving Jesus and keeping his word and erroneously imagine that we can do one and omit the other. Jesus however does not recognize or envision that distinction. In verse 23, he states a fact as a condition .. “those who love me will keep my word”(John 14:23)… Love for Jesus is love in action! Now, for us to live that kind of love we need the constant presence of God in our midst. Jesus speaks of that presence in a special way when he talks about himself and the father in relation to those who love him… “we will come and make our home with them”. This statement is in no way a reward for good behavior. It is a statement of where God likes to spend time. The book of Revelations 21 tells us that the home of God is among mortals God will dwell with us as our God. We will be God’s people and God himself will be with us! Jesus also reminds the disciples that the Holy Spirit will teach them everything and remind them all He has said to them.(John 14:25) He also assures them of His peace a peace that is different from the peace the world gives. Those of us who have the mission to love Jesus will therefore be known in our work and in our being by these characteristics, that is, The father and Son will make a home with us, in the work of the Spirit to call to mind everything that Jesus taught us, and in the ongoing experience of peace, a peace that comes from Him and not from the world! Whenever peace is mentioned, it does not necessarily imply that there will not be hardships. As Jesus is making this promise of peace, he himself is on his way to the Cross. He also knew what troubles his disciples would suffer. His promise of peace is therefore remarkable. It is one thing to offer reassuarance when things are well; it is another to do so when suffering looms. Yet, Jesus admonishes his disciples not to let their hearts be troubled or be afraid. It is one of the paradoxes of Christianity that the greatest peace can exist amisdt the greatest suffering. Matyrs testify to this. Trials and temptations, hardships and opposition, disappointments and discouragement are all part of the package that is discipleship. True discipleship however is evident in the ability to say with Paul… “If God is for us, who can be against us”, (Romans 8:31). The peace that Paul experiences and spoke about in his hardships filled life is the peace in the midst of suffering. He spoke many times of this peace and it is the same peace we are offered today. It comes from having one’s heart set on what trully matters; God and His love in our hearts. Let us therefore pray that God’s indwelling presence comes to us afresh so that we can be able to be love in action as we strive to make Him known and loved through word and action. Jesus offers us peace and love by offering himself. Let us therefore receive him into our hearts and lives. Only then can we find true peace! AMEN

Easter 5 C - May 15, 2022

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Bernard Delcourt, OHC

Easter 5 C - May 15, 2022

Acts 11:1-18

Revelation 21:1-6

John 13:31-35

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Our three readings today give us a sweeping view of God’s plan for us all. Mutual inclusion in God’s all-embracing love. It starts with God loving us warts and all. We respond to God in love. We deliberately become instruments of God’s love. It evolves to our including everyone in God and in our God-inspired love. Simple? No matter, for the love of Jesus, let’s do it anyway. ***** In Acts, Peter learns to be as inclusive as the Holy Spirit. He says: The Spirit told me to go with them and not to make a distinction between them and us. And he adds: And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them just as it had upon us at the beginning This passage of Acts expands the message of many of Jesus’ parables. The Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son come to mind. In order to love our neighbor as God enjoins us to, we have to include everyone, not only the members of our club. And this love enfleshes the love of God for all of creation. God does not love selectively some parts of the creation. God loves all of it and redeems all of it. No exclusion. We don’t get to choose whom God loves. As Christians we commit to love those God loves. Everyone. ***** In our reading from Revelation, we hear: See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; God does not dwell solely with Israel whom he chose to carry God’s message. God dwells face-to-face, elbow to elbow with all of God’s people. Mourning and crying and pain will no longer apply to anyone, no matter their origin, their identity or their righteousness. Yes, God’s mercy will embrace all of us. No one is excluded, no matter how unrighteous they may seem to us or even to themselves. Not even the people we feel entitled to ignore, exclude or despise in our current lives are beyond God’s mercy. ***** Br. Randy once told us of a priest friend of his that came up with a very good illustration of hell. His friend said hell is what happens when folk get to the pearly gates, look in to see who is there, and say, “Oh, I’m sorry, we’re not in communion with them.” Are we willing to enjoy the full inclusiveness of God’s love? Or would we rather be deprived of God’s presence than to share God’s love with people we turn up our nose at. ***** And in the gospel according to John, Jesus says: I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. Remember, this comes after Jesus washed the apostles feet at the last supper. And after Judas departed having received from Jesus’ hand the piece of bread he dipped in the dish. What is new in the commandment is how Jesus’ life, death and resurrection models for us what love is and who is included in that love. A commandment to love had appeared before in the history of Israel. In Leviticus 19:18 it says: You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord. Can you hear the differences? The scope and intent of what was in seed in Leviticus has blossomed in Jesus’ commandment to those who want to follow Him. This is from the man who said: “Love your enemies.” That is quite a leap from loving a member of my tribe whom I would prefer to bear a grudge against. Jesus loved Judas even as he knew he was betraying him. ***** God’s love enfolds us, no matter what we are and what we do. God’s love enfolds everyone and everything. We are invited to be inspired and take our cue from God’s love. That is a daunting task, but it is the task we have set ourselves in choosing to follow Jesus. He says: By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. So this week, I invite you to deliberately identify one or more persons whom you ignore, despise or neglect. Do not be fooled that there are no such persons in your life. It’s just that it’s more comfortable for us to be in denial about that. Can you train your heart’s eye to see that person as a beloved child of God? Can you feel God’s love for that person? And can you yourself treat that person in a way that will make them feel acknowledged, liked or cared for? Can you ask God to help you make the leap into loving that child of God? And by the way, thank you very much for loving all the people you like and care about in your life. Let’s keep it up and widen our scope! Amen.

Easter 4 C - May 8, 2022

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Aidan Owen, OHC

Easter 4 C - May 8, 2022

Acts 9:36-43

Revelation 7:9-17

John 10:22-30

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In the name of the One God, who is Lover, Beloved, and Love Overflowing.

This fourth Sunday of Easter is known as Good Shepherd Sunday. Even though, in our three-year lectionary, it’s only in Year B, which we had last year, that Jesus actually says “I am the good shepherd,” the gospel lectionary for this Sunday always centers on the image of Jesus as the shepherd of the sheep. He knows his sheep; he calls them each by name; he lays down his life for them; and they—that is, we—follow that voice, leading us ever onward to our home in God. I’ve always found the moniker “Good Shepherd” both puzzling and attractive. What does Jesus mean by calling himself the good shepherd? Remember, in Matthew he denies the adjective “good,” and reminds his followers that no one is good but God. Biblical scholars also remind us that his contemporaries might have seen Jesus as the foolish shepherd who leaves his entire flock to search for the one missing sheep—an act that would actually endanger the 99 left behind in the hopes of gaining one insignificant little ewe.

And what is this voice that we know, and that calls us each by name? How do we hear it? I heard a sermon on Good Shepherd Sunday several years ago that pointed out that the word we translate into English as “good” carries in both Greek and Hebrew a double meaning. It means “good” as we understand it—meaning both desirable and morally sound. And it also means “beautiful,” as in pleasing, attractive, excellent. Taken in these layers, the image refracts Jesus' image like a prism refracts light. Not only is Jesus good but he is also beautiful, lovely, attractive, captivating.

Now, it’s dangerous to talk about beauty in our contemporary context, obsessed as we so often are with the so-called beautiful, young things. So often we mix up beauty with glamor. Glamor distracts us. It’s always shiny, new, and seemingly flawless. Think of the gym-toned bodies the advertisers promise us if we’ll only buy this or eat that. Glamor is always rotten at the core, no matter how lovely it seems on the surface, because it is really ugliness papered over with a symmetry and order that speaks to our desire to fly away from these impoverished human bodies. Beauty, by contrast, conveys us to ourselves. John Galsworthy writes of beauty that, “Where Beauty was, nothing ever ran quite straight, which, no doubt, was why so many people looked on it as immoral.” (from The Forsyte Saga) Beauty often covers itself with seeming ugliness, disorder, or disarray, because it elevates the ordinary, the human, the flawed and draws out the line of holiness crouched therein. The most beautiful face I ever saw was that of a very old woman at a museum. Her face was so wrinkled it folded in on itself in crags and valleys. Her skin was dappled with brown, like a forest with the light poring through. Her nose was a bit hooked, and her lips thin and drawn. But as I gazed on her, a deep knowing emerged from within, a knowing that drew me more fully into myself. I became more whole in the moment of my gazing. Such is the power of beauty to convey us to ourselves. True beauty reveals itself to those who have the patience to wait and to watch. It requires something of us. And rather than inviting us to betray ourselves, as does glamor, beauty repays us with a deepening sense of the holy within and around us.

Perhaps you know the poem called “The Bright Field” by the Welsh poet and Anglican priest R.S. Thomas:

I have seen the sun break through to illuminate a small field for a while, and gone my way and forgotten it. But that was the pearl of great price, the one field that had treasure in it. I realise now that I must give all that I have to possess it. Life is not hurrying on to a receding future, nor hankering after an imagined past. It is the turning aside like Moses to the miracle of the lit bush, to a brightness that seemed as transitory as your youth once, but is the eternity that awaits you. Perhaps, as so often happens, the wisdom of language precedes us. Maybe “goodness” and “beauty” are not two different meanings of one word. Maybe they’re shades of one another. Maybe Jesus’ goodness is his beauty, lying hidden in the field we pass on our morning walk. Perhaps his voice is the glint of the sunshine, whispering to us to slow down, to pay attention, to allow the radiance of our life to emerge around and within us. Perhaps the shepherd who leaves the 99, foolish though he may be, understands that wholeness is worth the risk, that wholeness is worth everything, because that is where love lies. If true beauty emerges in and through the contrast of the ordinary, human flotsam with the radiance of divinity, then of course Jesus—fully human and fully divine—is the icon of a beauty that is moral, good, and attractive to both body and soul. And in reconciling the human and the divine—or, rather, in showing that there is no contradiction between them, that, like light and darkness, the human and the divine illuminate and boundary one another—Jesus shows us the way to deeper wholeness and reconciliation in God. We need this vision of a reconciling beauty now more than ever. Dostoevsky famously wrote in The Idiot that “beauty will save the world.” And how, we might wonder? Well, look around. War, yes. Plague, yes. Devastation, yes. But also the crabapples in their peerless bounty, and the love of our families and friends, and these fragile precious eyes we have. The light of Jesus’ resurrection does not banish totally and completely the darkness that fills our world. But it does provide us with the contrast to see that world more fully, to know its beauty and in that knowledge to be known as God’s hands and God’s feet and God’s beating, broken heart in this world. In her book Hope in the Dark Rebecca Solnit writes that “someday all this may be ruins over which pelicans will fly, but for now it is a place where history is still unfolding. Today is also the day of creation.” (Hope in the Dark, p. 114) I would add that not only is today the day of creation. But it is also good, and it is beautiful. We may not be able to end the atrocities in Ukraine, or stop the resurgence of fascism throughout the world, or mend the broken hearts of those struck down by addiction and despair, but if we ourselves are more whole, then the world is, too. If we love more, then the world is that much more loving. If we can turn away from violence and death within us, then world is that much more alive.

Each time we hear the voice of our good and beautiful shepherd calling us by name and choose to turn homeward, Christ is risen within and around us, and Easter dawns once more. Alleluia! Christ is risen!