Wednesday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time

On June 8, 2021June 9, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, Faith, Hope, ordinary time, Poetry, Prayer, Psalms5 Comments

June 9, 2021

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 25 which is our Alleluia Verse.

Psalm 25, in total, is a psalm of lament. But today’s single phrase is a golden thread in an otherwise somber weave. It is a simple act of faith and dependence on God. It is the yielding of one’s life into God’s unfolding promise.

Praying with this psalm today, I am nostalgic. On June 9th, 58 years ago, I graduated from high school.

I guess for some, high school graduation isn’t a remarkable or memorable event. But for me, and the two other young women in this photo, it was a time of earth-shaking choices and profound commitments. It was a moment in our personal stories that would shape our lives forever – we had decided to become Sisters of Mercy.

Every life has one – or likely a few – such moments. They are the hinges on which our life story revolves. Praying gratefully with them helps us to recognize God’s enduring Presence in our lives and to rejuvenate our faith.

When you get as old as I am, the accumulation of gratitude is overwhelming and the trust in God’s continued abiding is assuring.

Robert Frost seems to have been having such a prayer when he wrote his beloved poem. Maybe it will help your prayer today or at some other date of holy reminiscence in your life.

Poetry: The Road Not Taken – Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Music: The Magnificat Medley – John Michael Talbot

I chose this song today for two reasons.

It is the verse in our Responsorial Psalm:

Holy is the Lord our God.
Psalm 99:7

2. The Magnificat was such a moment in Mary’s life.

Tuesday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time

On June 7, 2021June 7, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Discipleship, Faith, Forgiveness, Hope, Jesus, Love, Mercy, ordinary time, Poetry, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

June 8, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 119, a repeated favorite on the blog – you might like to re-visit any of the 13 entries:

Past reflections on Psalm 119

Today, let’s pray with 119 in the light of Paul’s words to the Corinthians:

For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, …
was not “yes” and “no,” but always “YES”.
God’s promises … find their “Yes” in him.
2 Corinthians 1:19-20

Here’s what those slightly cryptic but profoundly meaningful phrases mean to me.

No doubt, sometime in your life you have heard someone powerful say “No” to you. Or perhaps life itself has said it with some insurmountable limitations.

It is in those moments that we truly understand what “Yes” means because it has eluded us!

That meaning takes various forms depending on our circumstances. “Yes” can mean freedom, love, mercy, forgiveness, renewal, possibility, hope, fulfillment.

And “Yes” is always a beginning … a mystery that longs to be unfurled, unpeeled – like this beautiful red onion ( that I bought yesterday for a salad that turned into a reflection!)

Psalm 119 “unpeels” the layers of our relationship with God. Here’s how I hear it in my prayer:

O Lovely God,
You are wonderful.
You are my Light.
You amaze me
by the “Yes” of your Love.
You fire my spirit
to love You in return.

Lavish Mercy, turn to me
because I love You.
Steady me in my shadows.
Draw my “yes”
into the Light
of your beautiful Face.
based on Psalm 119:129-135

Poem: love is a place – e.e.cummings

love is a place
& through this place of
love move
(with brightness of peace)
all places

yes is a world
& in this world of
yes live
(skillfully curled)
all worlds

Music: The Beauty We Love

Memorial of Saint Philip Neri, Priest

On May 25, 2021May 25, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, Discipleship, Faith, Hope, Jesus, ordinary time, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

May 26, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 79, one of the “Sad Songs of Zion”. While many of the Psalms are celebratory in nature, offering praise and thanksgiving, about a third of the Psalter is lament.

These mournful songs remind us that life is indeed full of both joys and sorrows. Faith calls us to live through these modulations within the presence of God.

The psalmist of 79 cries out from imprisonment and deathly fear, but is not without hope for a better future:

Let the prisoners’ sighing come before you;
   with your great power free those doomed to death.
Then we, your people and the sheep of your pasture,
   will give thanks to you forever;
   through all generations we will declare your praise.
Psalm 79: 11-13

This is the kind of resilient prayer we can learn from the Psalms. At times, we find ourselves “imprisoned” – locked away from what we most want in our lives – love, peace, security, health, freedom. To deny such suffering only buries us deeper in it.

As we see in our Gospel today, Jesus calls us to face our truth and to seek God’s Presence within it. Doing so will allow us, as it did the disciples, to move beyond self-centered expectation to God-centered courageous hope.

Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee,
came to Jesus and said to him,
‘Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”
He replied, ‘What do you wish me to do for you?”
They answered him,
“Grant that in your glory
we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.”
Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking.
Can you drink the chalice that I drink
or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”
They said to him, ‘We can.”
Jesus said to them, “The chalice that I drink, you will drink,
and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized;
but to sit at my right or at my left is not mine to give
but is for those for whom it has been prepared.”

As we look at our world, and perhaps our own lives, we see much suffering. How can God come to us from the midst of such pain? Psalm 79 tells us to keep inviting God and to be vigilant and attentive for God’s appearance. Just as in our Gospel, it will not look as we had expected it to look.

Remember us
Show us
Help us
Deliver us
Free us
Then we will give thanks and praise your Name
The Basic Prayer of Psalm 79

Poetry: A Blessing by Elizabeth Eiland Figueroa

May the God of Surprises delight you, 
inviting you to accept gifts not yet imagined.
May the God of Transformation call you, 
opening you to continual renewal.
May the God of Justice confront you, 
daring you to see the world through God’s eyes.
May the God of Abundance affirm you, 
nudging you towards deeper trust.
May the God of Embrace hold you, 
encircling you in the hearth of God’s home.
May the God of Hopefulness bless you, 
encouraging you with the fruits of faith.
May the God of Welcoming invite you, 
drawing you nearer to the fullness of God’s expression in you.
May God Who is Present be with you, 
awakening you to God in all things, all people, and all moments.
May God be with you.
Amen.

Music: The Joys and Sorrows of Life – Johannes Bornlöff

Wednesday of the Seventh Week of Easter

On May 18, 2021May 20, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Faith, Hope, peace, Poetry, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

May 19, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 68, some different verses for this second day:

Show forth, O God, your power,
   the power, O God, with which you took our part;
For your temple in Jerusalem
   let the kings bring you gifts.
You kingdoms of the earth, sing to God,
   chant praise to the Lord
   who rides on the heights of the ancient heavens.
Behold, God’s voice resounds, the voice of power:
   “Confess the power of God!”

Psalm 68 is a prayer that gives full voice to Israel’s gratitude for being God’s chosen people. And in that way, it is a challenging psalm to pray with today as modern Israel and Palestine descend into all out war which disproportionately affects the poor, elderly, women and children.

The contradiction of our psalm, placed against this war scenario, is deeply unsettling. Does God really want the nation of Israel to dominate a geography to the annihilation of other peoples?

What I remind myself of this morning is this: biblical Israel is not the same as the political state of Israel. After WWII, the political state was initiated as part of a partition plan in which both Palestine and Israel would be independent states. The plan didn’t work out, creating multiple ensuing conflicts. The current one is just the latest edition.

Biblical Israel, on the other hand, is not a physical territory but instead a relationship – the foundational heritage of all Abrahamic faiths. For Christians it is a heritage that led to our faith in Jesus Christ, the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham. Although once rooted in a geography, that faith is now rooted in a universal love which reverences life for all people, particularly the poor, the orphaned, and the disenfranchised.

As I pray Psalm 68 today, I pray it with a woman named Arlette in my mind and heart. My friend Eileen McGovern introduced me to her friend, who wishes not to be named, with the following story. As we pray today, let this woman and all who suffer in war be with us.

I write for a friend who is voiceless. She lives in Bethlehem, Palestine.
I met her during a pilgrimage in October 2019, and we became friends. We have kept in touch and have grown to know and to respect one another. She is teaching me Arabic phrases. I am not a good student so we both laugh at my efforts. Or, we used to until the recent outbreak of violence.
She was born in 1948 when Palestine was a French protectorate. French is her first language, one of four. Yet she is voiceless. Who will hear her?
As a young school girl she pledged allegiance to the French flag and sang La Marseillaise when her home was a French protectorate. When Transjordan was created, as a teenager she sang the Jordanian anthem as she struggled to learn Arabic. At age 40 she became a Palestinian with the creation of the Israeli and Palestine states. She still lives in the West Bank. She has not moved, but politics again have upended her life.
She loves children. Before the Covid-19 pandemic she volunteered at a school for deaf children. At Christmas she runs a charity to give poor Christian children a gift card and food so that their families can celebrate the feast with the traditional chicken dinner, a luxury they cannot afford. During the previous intifada she used to gather Palestinian children into her home and give them chocolates and tell them stories so they would not throw stones at Israeli soldiers.
She is a woman of peace who has seen too much war. She is haunted by the memory of looking out her window to see a man standing outside her house disappear in a phosphorescent flash. This morning she told me of watching TV and seeing men desperately digging, some with their bare hands, in the rubble of a Palestinian home where the cries of an infant girl could be heard. The men did not have heavy equipment so I do not know if they were able to save her.
Now she asks: “Who am I? The Israelis do not want us here. They want me to leave the home of my birth, but I am a devout Christian who loves this land, a sacred land, the Holy Land, the land of Jesus’ birth. I do not want to leave, and where would I go? Who wants Palestinians? No one wants us. I want only to live in peace and to see people of all faiths be able to come to Jerusalem without fear. I live in fear, especially for my son who can be taken from me at any time by Israeli police. I pray, but I am afraid to hope again.”

Music: Desert – Rasha Nahas is a Palestinian artist. Below is her song “Desert” which I find both profound and disturbing. It can be interpreted as a personification poem describing the experience of the Palestinian people in the story of a single individual.

Here is a link to learn more about Rasha from America magazine:

An article about Rasha Nahas from America Magazine

Please just take it all away
I am nobody I could name
My self
I float upon
Pearls some songs
They’ve been buried for years
My self
I’m a desert torn
I was born on the mountain by the sea
The west rapes east
My west disease
I’m a little beast
Hiding up the street
In a little room
With a little bed
On the dusty floor
Lies human flesh
Time melts out my eyes
As my heart is bleeding quarter tones
and I sail on this song
The dead sea
used to be alive
She had a woman and a child
And she couldn’t live at home she said
She wandered lost
and she wandered west
to the place where the bible spoke of gods
All their temples and their floods
They hung her on a cross
She is a language no one dares to talk
Sweet bleeding palms and the breeze of death
They buried her
She’s a roaring breath
Time melts out her eyes
As her heart is bleeding
Quarter tones and she sails on this song
Sweet bleeding palms
And the cheering men
They buried me
I am a roaring breath

Saturday of the Fourth Week of Easter

On April 30, 2021April 30, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Eastertide, Faith, Gospel, Hope, Poetry, PsalmsLeave a comment

May 1, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 98, an invitation to believe and rejoice in God’s Presence in our lives.

O Lord, You have made known the victory,
You have openly showed your righteousness
in the sight of the nations
Psalm 98: 2-3

In our first reading, as many Jews reject the invitation to Christian faith, the Apostles turn to the Gentiles with their evangelization:

The Gentiles were delighted when they heard this
and glorified the word of the Lord.
All who were destined for eternal life came to believe,
and the word of the Lord continued to spread
through the whole region.
Acts 13: 48-49

But our Gospel passage reminds us that the exercise of faith demands an openness to God’s presence. Poor Philip seems to be missing the fact that Jesus – God – is right there with him!

Philip’s statement, “Show us the Father and it will be enough for us” translates like this for me: prove everything and then we can believe. I smile at Philip’s simplicity but then realize I am not that different from him. I often ask for proof of God’s Presence in my circumstances completely forgetting the fact that God is already and always there!

When thinking about faith, these two complementary passages both challenge and sustain me. I pray with them often:

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for,
the evidence of things not seen.
Hebrews 11:1

But hope that is seen is not hope.
Who hopes for what they already have?
But if we hope for what we do not yet have,
we wait for it patiently.
Romans 8:24-25

This kind of Resurrection faith and hope allow us to receive and rejoice in the Good News the Apostles preach in Acts today, and to proclaim it as encouraged in our Psalm:

Sing a new song to the Lord, who has done marvellous things,
whose mighty hand and holy arm have won the victory.
O Lord, You remember your mercy and faithfulness toward us,
and all the ends of the earth have seen your victory, O God.
Shout with joy to the Lord, all you lands;
lift up your voice, rejoice and sing.
Psalm 98: 1-4

Poetry: Flickering Mind – Denise Levertov

Lord, not you
it is I who am absent.
At first
belief was a joy I kept in secret,
stealing alone
into sacred places:
a quick glance, and away -- and back,
circling.

I have long since uttered your name
but now
I elude your presence.
I stop
to think about you, and my mind
at once
like a minnow darts away,
darts
into the shadows, into gleams that fret
unceasing over
the river's purling and passing.

Not for one second
will my self hold still, but wanders
anywhere,
everywhere it can turn.  Not you,
it is I am absent.

You are the stream, the fish, the light,
the pulsing shadow.
You the unchanging presence, in whom all
moves and changes.

How can I focus my flickering, perceive
at the fountain's heart
the sapphire I know is there?

Music: Prayer- From Moses in Egypt, an oratorio by Giaocchino Rossini

In the opera, Moses in Egypt, Moses leads the community in a prayer of hope before the crossing of the Red Sea.

I couldn’t find a suitable English translation, but the original Italian is below. As with many gorgeous operatic arias, I am just as happy not to translate. The music itself speaks and often the actual words pale in comparison. Hear what “speaks” particularly to you in this lovely music.

Dal tuo stellato soglio,
Signor, ti volgi a noi!
Pietà de’ figli tuoi!
Del popol tuo pietà!
Pietà de’ figli tuoi!
Del popol tuo pietà!
Se pronti al tuo potere
Sono elementi, e sfere,
Tu amico scampo addita
Al dubbio, errante piè!
Pietoso Dio! ne aìta’:
Noi non viviam, che in Te!
In questo cor dolente
deh, scendi, o Dio clemente,
e farmaco soave
tu sia di pace almen!
Il nostro cor che pena
deh! tu confronta almen!

Psalm 23: Darkness to Light

On March 21, 2021March 21, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, Faith, Hope, Jesus, Lent, Mercy, PsalmsLeave a comment

Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent

Monday, March 22, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with our revered Psalm 23. This powerful prayer of confidence and hope fits well with today’s readings.

In the passage from Daniel, the innocent Susanna never wavers in her trust:

O eternal God, you know what is hidden
and are aware of all things before they come to be:
you know that they have testified falsely against me.
Here I am about to die,
though I have done none of the things
with which these wicked men have charged me.”
The Lord heard her prayer.
Daniel 13: 42-44

In our Gospel, the woman – though not innocent – stills finds refuge in Jesus’s mercy.

So he was left alone with the woman before him.
Then Jesus straightened up and said to her,
“Woman, where are they?
Has no one condemned you?”
She replied, “No one, sir.”
Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you.
Go, and from now on do not sin any more.”
John 8: 9-11

Like these two women, we may find ourselves in a dark valley at times. Whether we are innocent or guilty in arriving there, God abides with us in mercy.

The key is to acknowledge our situation and to reach out to that Mercy. In that way, even though we encounter difficulty, as said in Psalm 23, we live in Light and not in shadow:

Only goodness and kindness follow me
all the days of my life;
And I shall dwell in the house of the LORD
for years to come.
Psalm 23: 5-6

Poetry: Light by Rabindranath Tagore

Light, my light, the world-filling light,
the eye-kissing light, heart-sweetening light!
Ah, the light dances, my darling, at the center of my life;
the light strikes, my darling, the chords of my love;
the sky opens, the wind runs wild, laughter passes over the earth.
The butterflies spread their sails on the sea of light.
Lilies and jasmines surge up on the crest of the waves of light.
The light is shattered into gold on every cloud, my darling,
and it scatters gems in profusion.
Mirth spreads from leaf to leaf, my darling,
and gladness without measure.
The heaven’s river has drowned its banks
and the flood of joy is abroad.

Laetare Sunday — Remember Joy!

On March 13, 2021March 13, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Courage, Faith, Hope, Lent2 Comments

Today’s Readings

In preparing for today’s reflection, I decided to look back a year ago to Laetare Sunday 2020. We were just beginning a very troubling and painful journey. We had no idea the depths to which it would take us. I hadn’t even learned to call our enemy “Covid”, as you will see.
Yet as I read the past reflection in the light of where we are today, I was filled with awe, gratitude, sadness and remembrance.
I thought it might be good to offer the selection as a re-read for today as we stand on the brink of hope, Daylight Savings Time and a Spring that, for twelve terrible months, we couldn’t count on seeing.
As we begin to help one another heal, hope, and fully live again, let’s continue to pray for another. Thank you all for being part of the Lavish Mercy community whose prayer helped carry us all through these times.

May God bless you all — and good health, good heart, good Spirit to every one of you.

Laetare! Rejoice! Lent has run half its distance to Easter.

I know it may be a bit difficult to rejoice in this Corona time, but think of this:
Spring has stepped over the horizon! The long winter watch is over. But before we shake off its black velvet wraps for good, it might be well to think about what winter has taught us. It may strengthen us for this unusually challenging spring!

The stretch of time between November and April is all about waiting. Bulbs wait under the frozen earth. Bears hibernate in the cold mountains. Birds migrate, their old nests empty until the spring. All creation seems to enter a time of patience and unrealized expectation. But it is not a time of desolation. It is a time of hope for things yet unseen. Perhaps we can make our Corona time that kind of hopeful time.

We human beings also experience “winter” – not simply the seasonal one – but “winters of the spirit”. We all go through times when our nests have been emptied; times when all the beautiful flowering aspects of our lives seem dormant; times when our vigor and strength seem to hide in the cave of depression or sadness. These “winters” take many forms. We may find ourselves sick of a job we had always loved. We may find a long, committed relationship wavering. We may find the burdens of age or economics overwhelming us. We may be the unwilling bearers of responsibilities we had not bargained for.

But if we listen, under the deep silence of waning winter, the wind rustles. It carries the hint of a new season. It carries the hope of the renewing cycle of our lives. In that silence, we may be able to hear our own heartbeat more clearly. We may come to a clearer understanding of what is most important in our lives. In the stillness, we may be forced to know and understand ourselves in a deeper way.

In this time of global angst and uncertainty, I think of a powerful image from the works of St. Teresa of Avila. St. Teresa imagines God as a warm healer leaning over our frozen world, setting free the beauty of our spirits. This is what she says:

And God is always there, if you feel wounded.
He kneels over this earth like a divine medic,
and His love thaws the holy in us.
Teresa of Avila

Every time you touch another person’s life, — in these times, from at least six feet away — you have the chance to change winter into spring. You have a chance to be like God.

Call someone who may feel very alone. Be “Laetare” for them! Pray for someone suffering illness or loss. Send healing hopes to those you may not even know in distant places of our shared earth. Light, Easter rising and renewed life will come. Let us trust God and hold one another up as we wait.

Music: Laetare Jerusalem – Discantus

Laetáre Jerúsalem:
et convéntum fácite
ómnes qui dilígitis éam:
gaudéte cum laetítia,
qui in tristítia fuístis:
ut exsultétis, et satiémini
abubéribus consolatiónis véstrae.

Ps.: Laetátus sum in his quae dícta sunt míhi:
in dómum Dómini íbimus.

Glória Pátri, et Fílio,
et Spirítui Sáncto.
Sicut erat in princípio,
et nunc, et semper,
et in saécula saeculórum. Amen.

Rejoice, O Jerusalem:
and come together all you that love her:
rejoice with joy you that have been in sorrow:
that you may exult,
and be filled from the breasts of your consolation

Ps.: I rejoiced at the things that were said to me:
we shall go into the house of the Lord.

Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit;
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Psalm 147: Count Your Blessings

On March 9, 2021March 9, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Creation, Faith, Hope, Lent, Poetry, Prayer, Psalms2 Comments

Wednesday of the Third Week of Lent

March 10, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 147, a poem filled with reasons to love and praise God. Today’s selected verses mention just a few of those reasons.

The blessings of security and family:

Worship the Lord, O Jerusalem; praise your God, O Zion,
who has strengthened the bars of your gates,
who has blessed your children within you.
Psalm 147: 12-13

The blessings of diverse Creation:

The Lord sends out a command to the earth,
and this word runs very swiftly.
The Lord gives snow like wool
and scatters hoarfrost like ashes
Psalm 147: 15-16

The blessings of faith and religious heritage:

The Lord declares the word to Jacob,
statutes and judgements to Israel.
The Lord has not done so to any other nation;
to them these judgements have not been revealed.
Psalm 147: 19-20

Sometimes we spend a lot of energy praying over the things we think we need rather than recognizing all that we have.

This morning as I prayed, a personal thanksgiving psalm unfolded in my heart:

Hundreds of snow geese followed their yearly flight path right over my home, honking a symphony of hope.
The sun rose warm, tugging a clear promise of spring up over the horizon.
The Psalms lay open in my lap, a rich gift of the ages to my sometimes thin prayer.
My beloved communities slowly awakened and blossomed around me – my Mercy sisters, the toddlers in the daycare below me, the daily hum of the Motherhouse across the path outside my window, the buses carrying children to our Mercy schools
My family texting from their faraway homes.
I imagined myself as a small part of the magnificent communities described by beloved Pope Francis in Laudato Sí and Fratelli Tutti.
I felt those communities slowly beginning to recover from this past year’s devastation.
I prayed my sense of blessing into those still so deeply broken by global suffering, begging for their healing.

Gratitude for my blessings overwhelmed me, as it did our psalmist in #147:

Hallelujah!
How good to sing praise to our God;
how pleasant to give fitting praise.
Psalm 147:1

Poem: God Moves in a Mysterious Way – William Cowper

God moves in a mysterious way,
    His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
    And rides upon the storm.

Deep in unfathomable mines
    Of never failing skill;
He treasures up his bright designs,
    And works His sovereign will.

Ye fearful saints fresh courage take,
    The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
    In blessings on your head.

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
    But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence,
    He hides a smiling face.

His purposes will ripen fast,
    Unfolding ev'ry hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
    But sweet will be the flow'r.

Blind unbelief is sure to err,
    And scan his work in vain;
God is his own interpreter,
    And he will make it plain.

Music: The Snow Goose – John Ritchie

Speaking of geese this morning, one of my all time favorite stories is “The Snow Goose” by Paul Gallico. I hope many of you have read it. It’s beautiful. I found a website that talks all about it, even with a Richard Harris movie included! For those who might be interested in a literary excursion 😀:

Musty Books: “The Snow Goose” by Paul Gallico (1941)

Psalm 105: Tell the Story

On March 4, 2021March 4, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, Hope, Jesus, Love, Poetry, PsalmsLeave a comment

Friday of the Second Week of Lent

March 5, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 105. Together with our other readings, the psalm allows us to participate in Israel’s great family storytelling.

Give thanks to the LORD, invoke God’s name;
make known among the peoples God’s deeds!
Sing praise to the Lord, play music;
proclaim all the Lord’s wondrous deeds!
Psalm 105: 1-2

Psalm 105 is one of two historical psalms. (The other is Psalm 78.) Its verses summarize an amazing catalogue of God’s faithfulness to Israel and invites the listeners to grateful praise and unfettered hope.

Today’s particular passage is chosen because it recounts the same incidents as our first reading – the story of Joseph. And Joseph’s story prefigures Jesus’s own story which he offers in parable form in today’s Gospel.

When the LORD called down a famine on the land
and ruined the crop that sustained them,
He sent a man before them,
Joseph, sold as a slave.
Psalm 105: 16-17

For us, the telling and re-telling
of relationship stories
is an important human rubric,
practiced at
crowded Thanksgiving tables,
at relaxed summer reunions,
and at our inevitable bereavements.

Eventually, with enough retellings, a story becomes part of our family or friendship canon. Thence forward, it gains new dimension. Just like the canon of the Mass, whose formula becomes beautifully rote to us, the story now may be endlessly repeated without being exhausted. In its retelling, it always reveals something new and confirms something old.

Seek out the LORD and the Lord’s might;
constantly seek God’s face.
Recall the wondrous deeds God has done
for you and your beloved ones
Psalm 105: 4-5

In fact, such a story becomes a kind of sacrament, carrying within it the mysterious and unwordable blessings of what it means to live, love, die, and believe.

Each human story is, in some form, a re-enactment of Christ’s life, death, and Resurrection. The faith, courage, humor, pathos, genius and serendipity of our lives carry the graces to make us holy, to make us Love as Jesus was Love.

When we gratefully retell the history of those graces – as Psalm 105 does today – we practice a powerful ritual of faith. By such liturgy, we are invited to the same grateful praise and unfettered hope as we meet in Psalm 105.

The LORD, is our God
whose judgments reach through all the earth.
Who remembers forever the covenant,
the word commanded for a thousand generations.
Psalm 105: 8-9

Poetry: The Storyteller – Mike Jones

I’m a teller of tales, a spinner of yarns,
A weaver of dreams and a liar.
I’ll teach you some stories to tell to your friends,
While sitting at home by the fire.
You may not believe everything that I say
But there’s one thing I’ll tell you that’s true
For my stories were given as presents to me
And now they are my gifts to you.

My stories are as old as the mountains and rivers
That flow through the land they were born in
They were told in the homes of peasants in rags
And kings with fine clothes adorning.
There’s no need for silver or gold in great store
For a tale becomes richer with telling
And as long as each listener has a pair of good ears
It matters not where they are dwelling.

A story well told can lift up your hearts
And help you forget all your sorrows
It can give you the strength and the courage to stand
And face all your troubles tomorrow.
For there’s wisdom and wit, beauty and charm
There’s laughter and sometimes there’s tears
But when the story is over and the spell it is broken
You’ll find that there’s nothing to fear

My stories were learned in my grandparent’s home
Where their grandparents also had heard them
They were given as payment by travelling folk
For a warm place to lay down their burdens
My stories are ageless, they never grow old
With each telling they are born anew
And when my story is ended, I’ll still be alive
In the tales that I’ve given to you.

Music: The Story I’ll Tell – Morgan Harper Nichols

Psalm 130: The Depths

On February 25, 2021February 25, 2021 By Renee Yann, RSMIn Faith, Hope, Lent, Mercy, Poetry, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

Friday of the First Week of Lent

February 26, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 130, the De Profundis. This is a transformative prayer whose power we may not fully realize.

Have you ever been disappointed with God? Have you ever let God know it in your prayer?

Psalm 130 is the psalmist’s complaint to God that things are as bad as they can get and God doesn’t appear to care. It is a plea – even a demand- for God to pay attention and do something. (See my poem, sent a little later, called “These Things”.)

Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD;
LORD, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive
to my voice in supplication.

But Psalm 130 is not just a private complaint. As well as being a penitential psalm, 130 is marked as a “Psalm of Ascent”. This means that it was sung by the community as they went to the Temple to worship.

Psalm 130 carries the tone of a national or global lament. It has the feeling of a deeply bruised people bearing a desperate hope mixed with some bewilderment. It is a feeling we all recognize.

Yesterday in my neighborhood, we had our first hint of spring weather. On a short walk, I met a few people whose winter-weary eyes, above their masks, held a spark of resurrection hope.

With distribution of COVID vaccines, hope for deliverance from the pandemic surfaces like a tentative bud. We are starting the slow ascent from the depths we have all shared. We are on our way to the temple of thanksgiving and praise.

But Psalm 130 reminds that, on that ascent, fully voicing our lament is imperative for true healing. In reference to the pandemic, and to any other devastation we face in life, we must be honest with God about our fear, confusion, sadness, hopelessness, and shaken faith … about our disappointment in God, our splintered expectations which need healing.

If you, O LORD, mark iniquities,
LORD, who can stand?

It is only by asking God how these things – whatever they might be – could be allowed to happen to us, or to any of God’s beloved, that we will open ourselves to the Divine answer – a mystery too deep for words.

I trust you, LORD;
   my soul trusts in your word.
My soul waits for you
   more than sentinels wait for the dawn.
   Let me wait for the LORD.

Such prayer heals, leading us to a deeper, truer relationship with God.

For with the LORD is kindness
and plenteous redemption;
And the Lord will redeem Israel
from all their suffering and sin.

Poetry: Spring – Mary Oliver

Somewhere
a black bear
has just risen from sleep
and is staring

down the mountain.
All night
in the brisk and shallow restlessness
of early spring

I think of her,
her four black fists
flicking the gravel,
her tongue

like a red fire
touching the grass,
the cold water.
There is only one question:

how to love this world.
I think of her 
rising
like a black and leafy ledge

to sharpen her claws against 
the silence
of the trees.
Whatever else

my life is
with its poems
and its music
and its cities,

it is also this dazzling darkness
coming 
down the mountain,
breathing and tasting;

all day I think of her –
her white teeth,
her wordlessness, 
her perfect love.

Music: Pié Jesu – Michael Hoppé

For us, the telling and re-telling of relationship stories is an important human rubric, practiced at crowded Thanksgiving tables, at relaxed summer reunions, and at our inevitable bereavements.

For us, the telling and re-telling
of relationship stories
is an important human rubric,
practiced at
crowded Thanksgiving tables,
at relaxed summer reunions,
and at our inevitable bereavements.