A Prayer

Easter looms large in my vision. Tomorrow is Holy Thursday.

Lord, I wonder why you have given me what you have? And I both fear and hope that it is because of this season. But if it is, I will be sad at having lost this intimacy with you. But if it is not, I will, shamefully, feel the relief of someone no longer looking over my shoulder. But really, I want you to guide me so closely. I want to obey you in your directions which have such clarity. It is my fear of where you are leading that makes me hesitant. But I should not fear my destination, because if you are taking me there, you will be with me. More fearful would be to remain here in a pleasance without you than to go into trial with you. And so I suppose I must go with you. You who speaks through me must be with me and carry me forward as a rushing stream and help me to trust in you to guard me and prepare me as needed. And if you are for me, who can be against me? So tomorrow I will begin the walk to Calvary with you. And once it is finished, and once you are risen indeed, let me take up my cross with you and follow you. Be my Simon that I might follow you to Calvary.

Palm Sunday and Holy Week

Today was Palm Sunday. One year ago, this was The Countdown. On this day, a year ago, I began the one week countdown to acceptance into full communion with the Catholic church and Confirmation. As was said in church, this evening, this entire week is in essence one liturgy: we enter on Palm Sunday, we experience the first reading on Holy Thursday, we keep vigil with prayers as though psalms, we experience the second reading on Good Friday, then on Easter Sunday we celebrate the consecration of the Host and are sent forth.

[The next day]

It was interesting. I have felt a certain desolation of the soul in the past while growing. Yesterday it reached a certain clarity: it was a desolation tied to the journey which we follow. Palm Sunday is one of the most ironic days of the year, to me. And in a most painful way. Here we are waving our palms and celebrating the triumphant entrance of Jesus into the holy city, and in a few days we will torture and kill him. These palms are the nails of guilt, piercing the flesh. How appropriate that we should fold them into crosses which redeem their nature which drives our hopeless guilt and shame into our hearts. Instead, in this new form, their message is reformed to one naming our guilt and speaking forgiveness.