The Knitting Theologian

I found this in Magnificat today and wanted to share it.

A stable-lamp is lighted
Whose glow shall wake the sky;
The stars shall bend their voices,
And every stone shall cry.
And every stone shall cry,
And straw like gold shall shine;
A barn shall harbor heaven,
A stall become a shrine.

This child through David’s city
Shall ride in triumph by;
The palm shall strew its branches,
And every stone shall cry.
And every stone shall cry,
Though heavy, dull, and dumb,
And lie within the roadway
To pave his kingdom come.

Yet he shall be forsaken,
And yielded up to die;
The sky shall groan and darken,
And every stone shall cry.
And every stone shall cry
For stony hearts of men:
God’s blood upon the spearhead,
God’s love refused again.

But now, as at the ending,
The low is lifted high;
The stars shall bend their voices,
And every stone shall cry.
And every stone shall cry
In praises of the child
By whose descent among us
The worlds are reconciled.

Richard Wilbur, quoted in Magnificat, vol. 10, no. 11, Christmas 2008, pp. 51-52.

I love the way he repeats the line “and every stone shall cry,” particularly the way he uses it both as an ending and as a beginning. The phrase itself is from Scripture, Luke 19:39-40:

Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples.” He said in reply, “I tell you, if they keep silent, the stones will cry out!”

The context of this quotation is when Jesus was entering Jerusalem in triumph, riding on a colt, with people spreading their cloaks before him and waving palm branches, when Jesus’ disciples began to praise God “aloud with joy for all the mighty deeds they had seen.”

I think it’s important to remember the birth of Jesus in context with the rest of his life. Christmas is a time of great joy and promise, but foreshadowed within the blessed humility of his birth is the ignominious and yet also blessed humility of his death.

How grateful I am for the gift of faith this morning, as I look out upon yet more snow falling.

Just a quick update to say hello and thank you to Dave in New York City, who welcomed me on his blog yesterday. Dave posted the source of a lovely Rumi poem in response to a comment I made asking for it. I found Dave via Michelle who works for Loyola Press and found (I don’t know how) my post on Fr. Paul Coutinho’s book, How Big is Your God.

The lines I like best in the Rumi poem are

Be melting snow.
Wash yourself of yourself.

They resonate with me because of my struggles to awaken, to open to God’s will, to recognize the barriers that keep me from trusting totally in God’s love. I do want so much to wash myself of myself, to empty myself, to make room for God.

Back to a snowy day in the Pacific Northwest, with more snow on the way.

I love this last week of Advent, with all the stories about Jesus’s family tree, Joseph’s struggle with the news that Mary was pregnant, and, today, the story about Zechariah and Elizabeth’s most wanted child, John the Baptist. I love all these stories but I don’t always know where to go with them in prayer. I’ll ask Jesus, “so, what do you want me to pay attention to?”

Today, one of the reflection points in the Sacred Space book mentioned the idea that I, too, was a wanted child. This turned out to be where the Holy Spirit wanted to take me.

I had never really thought about it before, being a wanted child. Given my lifelong struggle with the belief that nobody could possibly really want me, I suppose it’s not a surprise. For today, Jesus reminded me first of all that of course my parents wanted me. And then He took me further and reminded me that God wanted me.

Have you ever thought about that? The idea that God, who formed you and loves you with a deep and wide and utterly compassionate love, wanted you, specifically, you, to be born? Not only that, but to be born at a particular time and a particular place, to particular parents, and with a particular set of attributes?

I never had, until this morning. What a gift.

Quick post. The title refers to a book by Paul Coutinho, S.J., (about) which my friend Fr. Jack told me I absolutely had to read. So I broke my self-imposed fast from Amazon.com and bought it.

It is a small book. The subtitle is “The Freedom to Experience the Divine.” The first time I opened the book, a few weeks ago, a paragraph in the introduction, which is by Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, brought me up short:

We tend to be well-armored against authentic God experience, because it always leads us into the unfamiliar, that new terrain where we are not in control and God is. St. Augustine said, “Si comprehenderis, non est Deus”: “If you can understand it, it is not God.” I guess that is why God usually has to break in or break us down to break through to us.

I certainly feel broken down these days. Not insurmountably, mind; just cracked open, vulnerable, waiting for the next thing. And somewhere in the back of my mind, a small voice keeps reminding me that I asked for this when I started praying for openness.

Here’s a link to a video of Fr. Coutinho talking about the idea of a big God.

If you are reading this book, or if you start reading it, let me know. Let’s talk about it.