St. Francis of the Elements: A Meditation

St. Francis of the Elements: 

A Meditation.

Brother Air:

Francis,
you were a feather born upon the breath of God; dancing with the unseen and manifesting the invisible in your skyborn steps, inviting all to see again the Divine dance into which they are blessed born...
Francis,
you were an Autumnal leaf gilded by grace's sunshine and shower; now unafraid to let go of anything that would keep you from the freedom of flight and happy to journey to the dissolution of all in offering...
Francis,
you were a snowflake; unique and Heaven sent, you kissed the earth lightly and woke us to her own beauty and wisdom, long lost in our lies...
Francis,
you were a lightening strike; shattering a clear sky and bringing the Divine storm that renews and creates, bringing beginning and drawing a new Spring from stuffy stalled hearts...

Brother Fire:

Francis,
you were a spark; struck by Grace from the Flint of heart's hardness, yearning for the dry straw of sin to be kindled in kindness consuming...
Francis,
you were a hearth on a Winter's night; leeching the indifference from our cold ecclesial bones, welcoming all to sit in storied circle and be one in warmth...
Francis,
you were a forest fire; consuming all in the conflagration of your consecrated love, incandescent within the light of Grace flaming through your burning bones...

Sister Water:

Francis,
you were the dew of dawn; appearing to announce a new morning of magic when beasts and birds become brothers and sisters and our tongues are loosed at last in Eden's song...
Francis,
you were a sweet spring; burbling with joy that knows no end, offering to all a deep draught of the Divine, the only answer to soul's thirst...
Francis,
you were a mountain stream; singing your silver song upon a pilgrim path, refreshing worn feet and charming the divine dance from stony hearts...
Francis,
you were an ocean's drop; borne upon the tide of love you yielded to the pull of prayer and lost yourself in the sacred sea of His resurrection gaze and became yourself in unbecoming all you were not...

Sister Mother Earth:

Francis,
you were a grain of dust upon the road; herald and holy, you dwelt in truth's humility, barefoot upon the brown earth, fading at distance into the truth of her embrace...
Francis,
you were a stone; becoming stillness you yielded yourself and were chisel formed into a foundation, while still a friar free to rest upon the rock of faith...
Francis,
you were a healing herb; condensing in yourself the medicine of first divine in-breathing when all that is, is named as good, for reminding us of redemption's remedy you gave root and leaf and flower and fruit for all...
Francis,
you were bird and beast; all found their friend in you and revealed their inner teaching of praise at your prayer; wondering to hear in you the voice long lost from creature's canticle sung by all that is, as you drew even tears from those who by Adam's naming had felt their brother-sisterhood of being lost to them until your call...

Francis,
you are beyond all elemental being now, plunged sainted and seraphic into Love's fire of origin and union and ending, all in one eternal communion of praise, where God is all in all and all are one. Pouring out upon those who are brave enough to follow your bloody footprints upon the Gospeled path an ever flowing fountain of peace and joy and brother beckoning us ever onward, ever upward, from earth's embrace, to sing with wind and fire and water our way into the Divine Dance of Being!

Homily for the Easter Vigil 2018

Homily for the Easter Vigil 2018

The Angel said, “You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified: He has risen, He is not here. See here is the place where they laid Him. But you must go and tell His disciples and Peter: He is going before you to Galilee; it is there you will see Him, just as He told you.” Mk. 16:8

We have arrived at the place of fulfilment.

We have arrived at the place where all our longing, all our desiring falls away.

We have arrived at the moment of Resurrection, not just of Christ, but through Him and with Him and in Him, a resurrection of all that is.

Long lost in self, long lost in despair, long lost in death we had felt the coldness of a life that seems to have no meaning, no essence, no hope…

we had felt the darkness of a wintered night without and even more so within…

we know what the long night of sin has done to us…

it has worn us down…

it has shamed us…

it has taken from us all that we hoped for…

as sin always does…

since the garden we have known its false promises and since the garden we have thought them real, only to stumble and fall again and again…

And yet for thousands of years we have hoped for deliverance, for freedom, for restoration…

We have been promised such in the proclamations of prophet and in the whispers of patriarchs, in the songs of the holy women and in the innocence of children we have seen another way, we have been recalled to righteousness, we have been invited again and again into covenant…

and we have heard that it is possible that the God who is Love never abandons His creation. Never abandons His people, never abandons you, never abandons me…

And He has promised…

he has declared that not only will He be Emmanuel, the God with Us, but He will be Jesus, the One who saves us from our sins. How? By facing down our darkness. He who is light will descend into the darkness of our sin. God from God, Light from Light, true God from True God; the everlasting Word of the Father will descend, will empty Himself and descend into the very bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh… this is how much He loves us…

He will become us and in becoming us He will face our darkness, consume our sin, heal our wounds…

He will be our sacrifice, the only sacrifice acceptable to the Father for in His humanity He will descend to heal us and in His divinity He will raise us up to our eternal home in the very heart of the communion of Love that we call God…

Yes He will descend and in descending touch the darkness, touch the despair, touch the sin, touch the misery of our selfishness and for just a moment, for just a seeming moment seem to be consumed. He will touch death, death on a cross. He will touch your death, all that is dead in you, all that is dead in me…

just for a moment…

they touch…

they embrace…

they kiss…

and from the darkened Golgotha sky the source of life and light breathes out his Spirit over the chaos we have caused…

And then…

and then He conquers!

Darkness is overcome by Light

Death is overcome by Life

Despair is overcome by Hope

Love… Love…Love

conquers all!

He is Risen!

Alleluia!

He is Risen!

This is the heart of existence, the heart of the story of creation, this is what it is all about and always was and will be about…

He descends and in that universal moment of Resurrection I am raised too, you are raised too, and crackling along the great faultline of history forwards and backwards into the world of the dead and the world of those yet to come all feel that great earthquake of power as death is conquered, the gates of hell are broken and the lamb reveals himself as the Lion of Judah

and He goes before us…

listen to the words of the Angel…

He goes before us…

We will see Him there just as He told us…

He goes before us…

the One who was foretold through the ages…

the One who emptied Himself of Divine Glory so as to become one with us…

goes before us…

The One who suffered and died and rose again goes before us…

He goes before me…

He goes before you…

Do you know what that means?

It is the great Easter secret…

from now on there is never a moment in your life or in my life, never a joy, a suffering, a place, or a time where He is not already there, waiting for you to arrive and be present to Him so that He may pour out love and light and power upon you… The resurrection is not just a moment in history it is happening now…

in this moment and in every moment we will ever face!

Our choice tonight and in each moment is to liberate His power in us, to allow Him to be the God He is who waits until we allow Him in… until we become present to Him…

Otherwise we miss it… we can be like the disciples who hear the word of hope and power and dismiss it… it can’t be we think! I had my plans and they failed… I had my hopes and they failed… I know who I am and I am a failure…

So I will dismiss the easter message tonight and descend back into my worry, my pain, my story of how things should be, could have been, would have been…

No not tonight! I beg you not tonight!

Leave the tomb of the past behind… walk out into the garden of the new morning of God’s Love.

He has died to show you how much you are loved. Your God has died for you!

He has risen to show you how much you are loved. Your God has risen for you!

He has gone ahead of you to prepare a place for you. Your God goes ahead of you!

No more fear of the future then!

No more regret for the past then!

As the Lamb He has cancelled your past

As the Lion He fights for your future…

So we on this holiest of nights begin again with the God of beginning

We say to Him again Lord that I may see! Lord that I may follow! Here I am Lord in all my mess, my pain, my glorious brokenness! Here I am for you! Let me begin again this day, this very moment. Not my will but yours…

What have we to fear?

We have it from the Angel’s mouth…

He has risen…

He is not here in the place of the tomb…

He is going before you…

It is there you will see Him…

Just as He told you…

And let us pray: Lord I will follow you into the easter light of the life you have prepared for me…

Hearing Confessions: Hearing Grace

Over the last three days I have had the privilege of hearing around 12 hours of Confessions... musing on the grace of this wonderful sacrament led me back to this reflection from last year...

Once again I am struck by the extraordinary nature of this Divine gift...
Old and young, they came....
Old ladies and men seeking more chat than Sacrament....
Young people needing counsel as well as Confession...
The long lost who at last have found their way home, only to discover that they had never actually left the house of Divine Love, nor could they...
The broken relationship...
The stressed out Mum or Dad...
The one making life decisions and unsure what is real and what is illusion...
The random walker in the woods who on passing the church receives a nudge from their Guardian Angel and thinks why not?

No one but God will ever know the dance of grace that takes place in and through the Sacrament of Reconciliation... those who come arrive for all kinds of reasons... and often we discover the real reasons together as hearts open, tears fall, and grace rushes into the gap between who we are at our lowest and who we may be at our best... And then the final extraordinary glimpse of the vision that Divine Love has for us when absolution is given, freedom received, heart is salved and wounds are healed and we realise that we never needed to carry these burdens at all... All that was asked of us was to let them drop one by one into the transforming furnace of Divine Love blazing eternally in His Sacred Heart... And this is a miracle beyond miracles that takes place in Confessionals and in sanctuaries every day, yes, but also in shops and on the street and in parks and at festivals and funerals and weddings and in pubs and on pavements and in prisons and beside hospital beds and in the strident voices of the young and in the whispered voice of the dying... when someone looks at you with that look and says, "Would you mind hearing my Confession?"

But if I could ask one thing of you... Please pray for us who are called to this ministry of Divine Encounter for we see and hear it all and carry within us not only knowledge of our own sins and darkness (which is tough enough for any person) but also the direct knowledge of the gaping wound at the heart of all humanity, and while, thank God, it is not our job to heal it, or judge it, it is our sacred duty to be the instrument through which He pours His healing and unconditional love into it...while we seek always that healing for ourselves too...
The best description of the Sacrament I ever heard was from an old friar who described it as "two sinners having a conversation in the presence of God, and remember where God is present everyone leaves healed."
Call it what you will: The Sacrament of Reconciliation, of Confession, of Penance, of Soul Beauty... maybe in these days He is calling you to such an encounter too... Lay down your burdens... and realise you never had to carry them at all.



Pic is of Pope Francis making his Confession in Rome

The Twelve Are Alive In Me

The Twelve Are Alive In Me

There are days

when it feels

as though all the twelve

live in this poor disciple’s heart.

For, depending on the moment’s mystery

each has his place and his preaching

is heard in my soul.

Peter is present

A rock and foundation stone

thrice cleft by betrayal

and cleansed by tears at

cockcrow

but fitting fully now nonetheless,

this rough fisherman of grace,

overawed at Love that does not depart

in the presence of sin

or even self satisfied importance,

but teaches patiently

through the impetuosity

of one who would

build tents to contain heaven

on a hill,

and swing a leg over the side

to begin the water walk of wonder

until storm tossed seas

recall a quavering heart to the lesson of humility

and later call “Quo Vadis?”

to One whose way he will follow to

an upside down end.

O yes.

Peter is present in me.

Andrew beckons too,

the announcer of the Lord.

First called and first to call others

“Come!”

he cries in me, “I have found Him!”

And this is the life of Andrew in me

finding and losing and finding again;

only to lose again so that I may call others to

the finding in their turn,

and in that struggle to perhaps

at the last, find all that I have longed for

and sought in every teacher;

the One from whom the knowledge comes,

the One who is the Wisdom of the Ages

the Lamb walking wild towards His

Paschal place while saying all the while

“Come and See…”

“Come and See…”

O yes. Andrew is present in me.

The Sons of Thunder have their place in me,

brothers both and twice blessed

James and John; lions of the Lord,

tamed slowly into Apostles of

Mercy and Love;

they shine the light

on all unreconciled in me,

all that is yet to yield

to the gentleness of grace,

transforming fire into fire,

light into light, they smoulder within

until finally alight, the mystic flame

burns away my blindness

and gives the eagle’s eye,

the pilgrim’s staff

to see and walk the way

beyond the way

of this world

Matthew dwells here too.

Tax Collector, Publican,

who yet holds the priestly name

too in his heart, even in his broken days.

Forgiven his compromise

with the world and called clean

from the heart of horror

by One who sudden stands unbidden

in the midst of the unclean place

to cleanse and call.

His story told me to hope

that I too could be called

not once only but daily

from the hard taxation

of sin’s slavery

and its distractions to become

a living Gospel

of His grace

evangelising all

in exultation

over mercy found, not once only,

but many times,

where even the tale of my betrayals

becomes a blessed gate to grace

for all who hear.

O yes. Matthew is present in me.

Philip and Bartholomew

Brothers of the road

and companions

on the way

are found in me.

Spirit led preachers and questioners too

seeking wisdom’s light and imparting

wisdom’s blessings all in the power of

the Word.

In their pain they preached

and fulfilled their longing

to see with their own eyes

and touch with their own hands.

They teach the lesson of being open to Angels

met upon the road in all the disguises

of grace, stepping lightly and not long upon the earth

they dance across deserts and invite me

to flow freely in faith

O yes. Philip and Bartholomew are present in me.

Thomas too is here,

sometimes still appearing as

Didymus the Doubter;

needing the touch of truth,

the gaping wound that proves Love’s

Labour birthing blessedness in blindness.

Yet also, and more often

he in me affirms faith and its freedom

describing divinity in mystery

and Lordship in light

touching presence, yes

by becoming the very vessel

in which is seen and heard

the One who is the face

of the Father.

O yes. Thomas is present in me.

Three come forward now

Each with their own share

Of me, in me, with me,

Simon, James and Jude

Of the first two named

I owe the allegiance of the east,

for into the sun rise they walked

their way of faith together

once healed of the heaviness

of seeming loss and ruin on Calvary’s Cross.

In its sign they bought with their blood too

the blessing of a harvest

still to be reaped, not just in distant lands

but in this my soul that lies too often in darkness

and yearns for resurrection dawn.

Of the third what can I say

but that his gift is hope, perhaps

the greatest grace of all save love,

but can love be kindled

save at hope’s hearth?

He too lived his hope unto the gates of Heaven

where hope fades into faith’s fulfilment

and where I pray each day these noble three

may yet bring me and all I love safely home.

O yes. Simon and James and Jude are present in me.

And yes…

There is a Judas place

in which I am the betrayer,

whose faith is so frail

it cannot imagine a mercy

wide enough for me

and hurtles instead headlong

through temptation’s tumult

to bestow a kiss,

by which the silver coin of self

turns to doubt’s dust

in an unknowing dawn, a mere second away from resurrection

May I be saved from it by this sacred knowing that

O yes. Judas is present in me.

But there is too a blessedness in me,

though not of me,

that kindles faith and hope and love

even in the face of my own weary weakness,

and calls me yet, as they were called

from out the ordinary occupation of the day to know

that these Apostles, all alive in me,

are spokes of one great wheel of love,

that turns the stars and drives the sun across the sky

and pours upon us the uncreated light by which we see the light!

Known to those twelve first as Rabbi, then as Christ, and finally as Lord,

He lights my way, loves me and all that is

into the blessing of being

and asks me now, as then he asked, and he now asks you,

“Will you not come and see?”

O yes. He is present in me.

Moon Memories

Moon Memories:

Once,

The moon followed

me home,

I know,

because I watched her

out the back window of the car.

Occasionally slipping

behind trees or buildings

like a secret agent,

she kept up with us

effortlessly,

as I strained against

the straps of my seat

to meet her gaze.

I felt her interest

and her smile,

happy to have made

a new friend.

Once,

not afraid of the night,

but of the day

that would follow,

I was invited

by my Mother

to gaze on the Moon

outside our house,

and greet her as

Our Lady’s lamp

protecting all,

guiding all home,

wisdom

passed down

from her Father,

whom I had never met,

but always felt

I knew.

He loved the Moon

she said.

There is hereditary

of the heart,

as well as of the blood,

it seems.

To this day

I miss her calls

that would begin always

with,

Have you seen the Moon

tonight?

For I cannot look up

at the Moon

without looking

within

too.

Once,

I spent the night

in a wood made pure

silver

by her presence,

and felt the life in every thing

stir and sing

and dance

in a wild celebration

that is hidden from

the day.

I sat stone still

and watched

Foxes play

about me

and a Badger

pass by like an ancient sage

busy on his own quest,

and I believed

in magic again

by her light.

Once,

I remember her

appearing during the

long drawn out days

of dry schooling,

and seeing her

still serenity

so far above

the awfulness

of that age

made me breathe out

a breath

I did not even know

I had been holding

on to for years.

She felt like a friend

checking in.

We greeted each other

then,

as we do to this day,

each noticing the other

in the blessed acceptance

of being.

Once,

Sick and fevered I rose

gasping in the middle

of a winter’s night

and pulled back the curtain

to find her shining

over snow so newly fallen

that not a flake

had been disturbed

but glowed in her gaze

cascading in curves

over a street I knew

but saw again

for the first time

now softened

by snowlight’s reflection

of her blessed touch.

I looked and looked

at this gracious gift

of enchantment’s echo

until I felt I was being

looked at in turn

and blessed too.

In the morning,

I woke

well.

Once,

I walked the pier

between my parents

on the night before

I left to follow

the path.

We watched her rise

together,

in silence

and listened to a mandolin

playing in the distance.

We did not have to speak,

the Moon sang for us,

soul songs only we could hear.

Always remember this night,

they said later.

As if I could

do anything

else?

Once,

Feeling bereft and lost

I caught sight of her

rising over a strange city

(Though I remember her,

and the feelings,

but not the city it was.)

and I did not feel lost

anymore

How could you be lost

when you are always

under her graced gaze?.

How could you be alone

when everyone you know

and love is beneath her blessing

too?

I asked myself.

Once,

I saw her,

loom so large

as to almost

be alarming,

bedecked in harvest

gold and heavy seeming,

she lit the land beneath

so beautifully

that the cattle on the hills

cried out to her,

and the birds began their chorus

for a dawn

that was yet hours away.

I danced in her light

that night,

beneath the trees,

a slow sandaled

shuffle of monkish sort,

and bowed deeply

as she passed.

How could you not?

When all around

and within

was

psalming

celebration

of her compline

completeness.

Once,

I watched her rise

sickle sharp

over Assisi.

As though making manifest

the unseen divine smile

hanging in the air

over this holy place

where joy was married

to peace in the song

of brother-sisterhood.

I smiled back and felt

the saint smile too

behind it all

and wondered what

his long silent nights

of prayer

must have been like

measured only by her dance

across the sky

slowly revealing her face

to him,

as grace comes gently

to fill us

only as we empty

and so seem

to disappear

into divine darkness

just like

her.

Candlemas Feb 2^nd 2018

Storm Fallen Cedar

Storm Fallen Cedar

It was the storm

that took her

at the last;

while we nestled

deeper in our beds,

unsleeping,

but grateful all the same

for the simple joy

of shelter.

In the smallest hours

Heaven opened

overhead

and poured upon us

an onslaught of

wild wind,

with rain so cold

it was almost snow

in its sharpness.

Just before the dawn

it peaked in power,

finally enough,

as it

whipped

like a scourge

against her long aged, grey,

elephantine skin

and, though her sisters

held their vigil nearby,

she gently gave way,

and fell,

prostrate upon the earth

from which she came,

embraced by the sacred soil

of our little

graveyard.

Was she tired

of her long watch upon the hill?

Holding her gaze

over the forest, the family

and now the friars,

for three hundred

of our human years

(Whatever kind of reckoning

Trees make of time

I do not know,

and they do not tell

in our tongue at least.)

So much had passed

beneath her branches

famines, feasts, families

and finally, friars, all played

their part

measuring her time,

each in their own way.

That morning,

emerging into light,

we heard the news

in shock;

the ripple of her passing

echoing

in awe and prayer both,

a sadness felt in brother, bird, and beast

for those still enough to hear.

Today,

I made my pilgrimage

to pay my respects

as she lies in state,

our sacred sister,

eldress of this land.

Finding her broken body

dissolving already,

her ancient green soul

flown.

Her long hidden heartwood

now exposed,

still raw and soft yet,

open to the breeze,

that touched her broken branches

with the sacred sprinkling

of the rain.

So often before

I had blessed her,

and given her my brother’s bow

in passing by,

and so been blessed in turn

by her simple stately

being.

My hands, resting upon her trunk,

felt the difference

today.

No pulse,

no inner warmth,

no great deep

breathing in her

root,

trunk,

branch,

bark.

It brought sadness too,

but also the joy of knowing

that in every death

something withdraws,

is freed,

leaves.

For all that live

sing their own soul song

arising from Divine love,

and in someway,

at the end will

return their essence

as gift borrowed for a while,

until the new creation

allows resurrection seed

to finally fully bloom

in all beings.

I was not the first

to grieve her though,

For all around the tracks

and trails of those she sheltered showed;

the fleet of foot, feathered, furred

they too had felt her passing,

and it seemed had held their funeral rites

ever before us.

And then,

I looked up from my troubled thoughts

and found my gaze held

by a Stag who watched,

wary and wonderful and wild,

from the forest’s edge.

Both of us, in our own way,

guardians of this land.

Both of us mourning

the passing of our eldress,

each in our own way.

Both of us simply there

in the brotherhood of all being.

And I think, in that moment

we were blessed,

and blessed each other too,

in our common grief and trust

that all that live upon this earth will die,

and all that dies will live again in Love.

Then, bowing gently, we withdrew

to forest and to friary each,

aware of other 

and of something

beyond other, 

I, for my part, call grace,

(Whatever kind of reckoning

Deer make of grace

I do not know,

and they do not tell

in our tongue at least.),

grace that had led us both

to be there

at that time, together,

in mourning,

for our storm fallen sister,

the great and ancient being

we simply call

Tree.