Sacred Heart

Thus says the LORD:
When Israel was a child I loved him,
out of Egypt I called my son.
Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk,
who took them in my arms;
I drew them with human cords,
with bands of love;
I fostered them like one
who raises an infant to his cheeks;
Yet, though I stooped to feed my child,
they did not know that I was their healer.
—Hosea 11:1, 3-4

As if the first were not enough—
God's boundlessness in Mary's womb—
a second miracle was done:
Th'eternal made itself a room.

The ever endless love of God 
within a heart of flesh and blood,
the Logos entered human bonds,
the loves that draw us heavenward.

The infant on his mother's breast,
her eyes upon him filled with love,
a father's tender first caress:
Himself the wellspring drank thereof.

The friendship of his brothers, then,
the service he so oft received,
he turned in love to serving them:
He washed them and he bid them eat.

Now in his sacred heart reside
the many human loves he knew
within the ceasless ocean tides
of love divine and ever new.

As flowing out and flowing in
God's loves and our loves intertwine
within the heart that beats in him.
He walks these seas to reach our side.

Christ and the sacred heart, c. 1200 AD, East wall inside porch, St Mary the Virgin, Eryholme By Profsdmartin1 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=113970803

Visitation

The fountain where salvation springs
that death could not destroy:
From you, the flood shall topple kings
and mighty ones despoil.
The poor shall taste the feast he brings:
the grain, the wine, the oil,
but in your heart yet keep these things
and pour them out in joy.

Because of you, then, blest are we
on whom those waters spilled:
Christ Jesus shall the hungry feed
and empty he shall fill.
Now blest are those who have not seen
but who believe him still,
and blest are you who have believed
the Word would be fulfilled.

For now the desert runs with streams
transforming us within,
and we can rest in Christ our peace,
his pastures cool and dim.
So pray for us, that we might see
God-with-us, bone and skin,
and pray, O Mother—let it be!—
that we shall be like him!

Manuscript Illumination with the Visitation in an Initial D, from a Choir Book. Art forgery attributed to “the Spanish Forger” – https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/467415, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59007587

Thistles

Cast out from our parents' garden,
poured our sweat into the soil:
Thorns and thistles for a harvest,
little for so great a toil.
Yet, O Lord, will you accept it
when we bring our sacrifice?
Will you, can you, take and bless it
if we have no greater tithe?

What you spoke at our beginning
when you took the formless world,
molded, shaped it, set it spinning,
called its dusks and dawnings good,
does that word still echo for us
though our shaping comes to naught?
Does that goodness still enfold us
if our harvest goes to rot?

Messy, naked, hungry, empty
we come from our mothers' wombs;
we will go forth in the same way
to the silence of our tombs.
Only you can fill these hands, Lord,
with the gifts you'd have us bring.
Take our nakedness and failure:
Let it be our offering.

Planta de cardo en flor, en una vereda de Montevideo By Fadesga – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=144819271

The Rising Word

The Word that spoke the light
gave up his final breath
into the waiting hands of God,
but, oh, the light still shines.
The Word now speaks again,
its mighty echoes rolling on.

Before the stars shone down,
before the mountains rose,
he was, before the world began,
and after stars burn out,
when mountains are no more,
he is, beyond our human span.

But human he became,
a moment and a pulse:
Eternity would live and die.
A fingerprint, a name,
to feel earth's downward pull,
and yet, beyond all hope, to rise.

The author of all life
rewrites the book of death
upon the pages of our hearts.
All glory be to Christ,
world without end, amen,
who pulls us into endless song.

Christ Pantocrator By Unknown author – Unknown source, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5820582

Eclipse: Annunciation 2024

We cannot bear the burning light;

we do not love the dark:

The sun, dimmed for our naked sight,

becomes a ring-crowned spark.



See how the night enfolds the noon,

death overshadows us:

Life hides itself behind the moon;

Christ hides himself in dust.



Oh, but the wonder of that sight!

Oh, but the terror, too—

Shadows dissolve into the night

while the sun stands at noon!



In the beginning was the Word

telling the light to be—

time was, another voice is heard:

Let it be done to me.



Lift up your heads and do not fear;

look with unshaded eye:

See how your hope is ever near.

Soon the light dawns on high!



True God from God and light from light

is swaddled in the dark.

Oh, blessèd is the cov'ring night!

Blessèd the crowning spark!

1904 By Joseph Norman Lockyer – Internet Archive identifier: LockyerAstronomia, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=85851566

Fragile Threads

Job spoke, saying:
Is not man’s life on earth a drudgery?
Are not his days those of hirelings?
He is a slave who longs for the shade,
a hireling who waits for his wages.
So I have been assigned months of misery,
and troubled nights have been allotted to me.
If in bed I say, “When shall I arise?”
then the night drags on;
I am filled with restlessness until the dawn.
My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle;
they come to an end without hope.
Remember that my life is like the wind;
I shall not see happiness again.
Job 7:1-4, 6-7

Swifter than a weaver's shuttle,

briefer than a watch at night,

drudgery and toil and trouble,

sleepless as we wait for light:

So we spend our whole life's journey,

restless nights and wasted days,

yet as lightning comes your mercy,

showing wonders by its blaze.



Christ, you see the brokenhearted:

Tenderly you bind their wounds.

Call us as you call the stars out,

glowing embers in our gloom.

You rebuild what lies within us;

you, the highest, look down low.

As you came to dwell with sinners,

so you turn our tears to hope.



We are fragile threads, but blessèd.

All roads lead us to our tombs,

yet you came to share our weakness,

thread yourself upon the loom.

You have borne our ills within you,

our infirmities your own,

so we'll share the life you've given

endlessly before your throne.

Job and His Friends by Ilya Repin (1869) – http://lj.rossia.org/users/john_petrov/854534.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2538610

Hungered

The Lord, from heaven's vistas,

has cast his eye down low—

uncrossable the distance

except by God alone—



to look upon the lowly

and gather all their tears

to water something holy,

a harvest for the years.



For he who sees the evil

devour his own as bread

has come to spare his people.

He sows himself instead.



A seed within the furrow,

a star within the night,

he shall be bread tomorrow,

the nurture of our life.



The wicked shall devour him

as they consume the poor,

and they will fall down pow'rless,

and death shall be no more.



And all who've ever hungered

at last shall eat their fill,

for Christ grows up among us,

and all shall be made well.

Christ Pantocrator By Unknown author – Unknown source, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5820582

Mary, Mother of God

Includes a detail from Nicholas Love’s Mirror of the Blessed Life of Jesus Christ (as recounted in Grace Hamman’s Jesus Through Medieval Eyes): that Mary took off her kerchief and used it to swaddle the infant Christ.

You took your veil to swaddle him—

no shame before your God

but, Eden-like in Bethlehem,

held him against your heart.



So we, against the winter wind

prideless, defenseless stand.

Oh, wrap us up as you did him

who rested in your hands.



The night is long and bitter cold;

we wait to see his face,

Mary, who did the savior hold,

teach us to feel his grace.



In any warmth that wraps us 'round,

in any comfort's touch,

we hope his mercy may abound

who needed you so much.



And if we cannot feel his love,

then pray we can feel yours,

that earthly love maybe enough

to show us heaven's doors.



Mary, we are your children now,

as helpless as was Christ.

Come swaddle us as in that hour

you cradled paradise.

Madonna Advocata (Hagiosoritissa) aus dem 7. Jahrhundert By Asia – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=61627017

Present

When the days were completed for their purification
according to the law of Moses,
they took him up to Jerusalem
to present him to the Lord.
Luke 2:22

It was no mighty deed or work

but simply that he was,

the highest God come down to earth

to share our life with us:



Redeemed by two small turtledoves,

as any other boy,

yet prophets looked on him with love

and spoke of him with joy.



And suddenly, God was not far:

Christ to the temple came.

Not distant as the burning stars,

but near as candle flame.



Not shrouded e'er in fire and smoke,

but swaddled, cradled, near,

his blanket edge untucked and soaked

by an old man's happy tears.



So is creation born again,

so are all things made new,

by a wonder born in Bethlehem

whom prophets longed to view.



So every child bears God's own light

that shines in all there is.

For Christ has come to share our life

that we may share in his.

Prophecies of Simeon. Klosterneuburger Evangelienwerk, fol. 17v. By Unknown author – http://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/de/sbs/0008/17v, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=42913070

Needy

Man’s maker was made man, that He, Ruler of the stars, might nurse at His mother’s breast; that the Bread might hunger, the Fountain thirst, the Light sleep, the Way be tired on its journey; that the Truth might be accused of false witness, the Teacher be beaten with whips, the Foundation be suspended on wood; that Strength might grow weak; that the Healer might be wounded; that Life might die.
St. Augustine of Hippo

God's only Son begotten,

through whom all things were made,

the light that shines in darkness,

is blind by lantern-flame.



The Word in the beginning,

on Mary's breast he lies,

knows only warmth and milk now,

and wordlessly he cries.



Then come you now to Bethl'em;

make firm your feeble steps:

The love of God unending

is drawing his first breaths.



Come running with the shepherds,

as swift as angel hosts,

for heaven's throne stands empty:

A manger overflows.



And he who fills us hungers;

the living water thirsts.

God's Providence among us

is needy at his birth.



And she who bore him whispers—

the Word hangs on her voice.

This midnight, God is with us.

Come to him and rejoice!

“The Manger”, photograph by Gertrude Käsebier – Camera Notes, Vol 4 No 1, July 1900, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5151764