O King of the Friday;
an ancient Irish Rune Prayer
for Friday evening:
O King of the Friday
whose limbs were stretched on the cross,
O Lord who did suffer the bruises,
the wounds, the loss,
we stretch ourselves
beneath the shield of thy might,
some fruit from the tree of thy passion
fall on us this night!
A meditation poem for Good Friday night:
The Tipping Point.
The tipping point
is now reached
at last.
The ancient scales
of justice,
long fixed,
creak stiffly and tilt
mercywards,
weighed anew,
re-balanced
by wooden thorns
and three iron nails,
stirred
by that last shattering cry
of consummation,
more of a breath
than a shout
by then,
delivered into winds
suddenly woven
from calvary's calm;
as though inspired by
His exhalation to wake
all who weep,
or sleep,
or wander,
now drawn to new ways,
all while rocks crack
beneath
the sacred strain
of holding Him who
holds them in themselves,
and a once sure crowd
feels the fear of sudden clarity too late,
too late.
What of His fled followers?
Did they feel it too?
The sad shuddering
of the earth's molten heart
boiling and breaking
in grief,
those who hid themselves
like Adam from an
all seeing eye
of love,
like children who,
thinking to
conceal their faces,
close their own eyes.
Yes, these,
who would soon return,
almost all,
and be gathered
again
around
she who was
His parting gift,
who had first gifted Him
with all He human had.
She the solid earth healing
his broken fisherman foundation
until solidity returns
thrice assured.
Now He seems to return
to rest
upon her lap,
but Soul journeys still
in realms long lost to us
He routs rage
and restores
right.
His light harrows Hell
where revealed now
as Word,
and Lord,
and King,
He claims His dowry,
the seeming dead
of all the ages,
freeing and raising
before being risen
Himself,
while His body,
salved,
shrouded,
and entombed
waits for wedding kiss
of resurrection
dawn.
(stained glass of the Passion from Ards Friary)
The Seven Sayings:
These are the seven sayings
that made the world aright,
breathed upon the wind
by the Lord of light,
as from his wooden throne
they conquer broken hearts,
and spoke by Him alone
then healing sundered parts.
The first it was forgiveness
offered to us all,
who would pierce the God-man
with a bloody awl.
The second was a promise
offered to a thief,
who then gainéd heaven
by his new belief.
The third it was in parting
His mother to behold,
to all of us then given
as queen to love and hold.
The fourth it was a great cry
from His broken heart,
yearning for His Father
while torn by sin apart.
The fifth it was a thirsting
for the souls of all,
dying for their living
healing then their fall.
The sixth it was a whisper
that thundered in the sky
bringing to completion
His quest to live and die.
The seventh was a yielding
of His final breath,
rendering now His spirit,
Life now touching death.
These are the seven sayings
that made the world aright
breathed upon the wind
by the Lord of light
as from his wooden throne
they conquer broken hearts,
are spoke by Him alone
then healing sundered parts.
On this blessed Friday
may we make our way
to the skull topped hill
there to see and pray,
to gaze upon the God-man,
to hear these words of grace,
to adore the saviour
who then took our place,
and by these sacred sayings,
these blessed words of power,
unmade the serpent's wounding
in that fateful hour.
So glory let us give Him
and always let us praise
who by His seven sayings
did our sins erase,
and ever let us speak them
aloud for all to hear
for by their very sounding
His mercy draweth near.
Art by Salvador Dali based on the vision of St. John of the Cross.
A meditation poem for Holy Monday of the Lord’s Anointing
Perfume
They were a people aware of smell as we are not.
Thinking ourselves safe in our sanitised
and oh so hygienic ways we lose so much.
They lived breathing the breath of Mother Earth,
exhaled in a myriad of mists, miasmas and myrrhs;
the Fisherfolk and their slimy shining scales
the Shepherds and their greasy fleeces,
Merchants fogged by clouds of spices,
and Lepers with their cracked and bleeding skins;
above them all, perhaps, the incense fumed robes of Priests
hiding the metal edge of blood poured out upon the altar stone;
so they lived and died with their own fragrance
woven into the warp and woof of cloth and skin and lives,
to say nothing of the sun’s sweat upon the brow and back
of middle eastern days.
How it must have exploded then, this perfume,
as with the cracking of the sealed white urn
the ointment poured out, slow as sunrise,
felt not just upon His feet but in the air,
the precious nard,
that held within itself the living breath
of flowers and herbs
announcing their ancient edenic essence,
pouring its power into nose and throat and lungs,
silencing the room with this sacrament of scent,
at once so sacred and so animal,
singing its old song to both soul and sense alike.
Stored long and held precious
by the Woman for so many days,
a gift perhaps, taken down
only to be put back until the appointed time;
not yet, not yet, she might have said,
waiting for the heart’s movement as only women wait.
Until today, when He visits once again this blessed Bethany,
this place of peace and miracle of friendship,
watered with His laughter and His tears,
for sisters two and reborn brother all.
Perhaps she sees in Him the weary dusting of the road,
perhaps a presentiment of the future way appears,
no matter what spurs the gift,
it is given freely as grace is given,
becoming a deeper grace in that very giving,
now an omen, to point the way toward the path of pain,
a knight’s anointing for the combat coming
for Him who is already thrice anointed,
priest, prophet, king,
yet named anew for death by perfumed oil’s cool touch,
as with her tears and hair she wipes His feet in welcome
liturgy of love that breaks the bounds of law
and silences all but one,
whose sense and soul are long since dulled
to all but self, causing the Word Himself
to speak and make it known that Love
itself permits this scenting scene as prophecy
and extravagance, earth’s last gift for Him
who in its scent song tastes all the notes
and knows again the touch
of crib remembered cooling myrrh,
and its long foretelling tomb,
for which the time has now at last, arrived.
His feet anointed for the journey He must take
so all may at last attain their home,
He will become
the perfumed ointment for our healing,
the fragrant offering,
the incense burned and offered up.
(Picture by Daniel F Gerhertz)
Meditation for the Fifth Friday of Lent:
Why the Cross?
Why of all the possible modes of execution was the Cross chosen?
The ancient fathers of the Church list a number of reasons. Here are a few of them:
Crucifixion was reserved for the worst criminals and was considered the worst punishment... In absolute humiity Christ takes on the worst of what Humanity can offer so as to raise us up to the best...
Sin and death entered the world through what hung from a tree... so it was conquered and banished by He who hung from the tree of the Cross.
Christ is nailed between heaven and earth. His arms open wide in the embrace of inifinite Divine Love. He restores the ancient communion between heaven and earth forever in His own death.
The Vertical axis of the Cross represents the Eternal Now of God piercing for ever the horizontal axis of time, thus in the incarnation of Christ and through His passion and death, we have access to the eternal loving NOW of God forever...
At the centre of this piercing we have the pierced heart of Christ from which flows the streams of Sacramental Grace that we call the Church...
This is the Atonement, literally the "At-One-Ment", that Christ accomplished through His death on the Cross...the rebalancing and healing of the ancient wound of sin that separated Humanity from God and threw the whole cosmos out of balance...now healed by Christ through the Cross it becomes our way home again. As St. Augustine says, "He descended so that we could ascend with Him."
Wherever you are today pause a moment and simply consider the Cross.
Pax +
