The Church puts a finger to her lips




 There it is…that light in the darkness coming into us! I awoke this morning and though it is not Easter dawn, it is a sign of hope that indeed the tears of Good Friday are being transformed into a dawning love.


I/we often move quickly from Good Friday to Easter Sunday! We aren’t quite sure what to “do”?! We aren’t quite sure “how” to wait for a Mystery.

Martin Smith helps me when he says that when we get to Holy Saturday there are simply no words. “The church puts a finger to her lips…To be silent in awe is different, though, from being mute out of ignorance.” To paraphrase: our imaginations have been taken to their breaking-point in following Jesus to the utmost limit of his solidarity with us.


So lest I be disingenuous and go on and on with words, let me take my breaking imagination to a “breaking in” of love and light which comes to a fullness in the resurrection. Let me watch, gaze and listen…to mystery.


I will gaze at the dawn and its aftermath; I will gaze at the vastness of the water and wonder about this foretaste of immeasurability and eternity; I will listen to Arvo Part’s stabat mater as something of divine clarity pierces my soul. May I then be a little closer to the wonder of it all.

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