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Primitive religion is not believed, it is danced!

Arthur Darby Nock

Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
And only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries.

Elizabeth Browning



Wednesday, December 19, 2018

The Song of Compassion


“Compassion constitutes a radical form of criticism, for it announces that the hurt is to be taken seriously, that the hurt is not to be accepted as normal and natural but is an abnormal and unacceptable condition for humanness.”
 Walter Brueggemann
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Perhaps it may be, a Yeats says,
Writing in the turmoil of 1919
Standing in the midst of the muddy and bloody horror of World War I
The looming specter of the Russian Revolution,
and the political turmoil in his own native Ireland.

Perhaps things are spinning aparty
As the world spins
“turning an turning in the widening gyre”

Perhaps indeed
“things fall apart, the centre cannot hold”  (Yeats, Second Coming)

We live in anxious times,
With the rupture of traditional family and societal structures (that’ not all bad)
the loss of collective religious faith,
and erosion of a collective sense of purpose

Perhaps, in the time of Trump,
when we sense that the old rules no longer apply
and there’s nothing to replace them
and all we have left are lies, and hate, greed and brutality

it is true
that “some rough beast… slouches to Bethlehem to be born”

and we are left, watching its ponderous progress
as hate flourishes
and racism explodes
as fear dominates
a cruelty increases

We are left watching as inequity and injustice grow

This is a time of looming darkness
This ADVENT
This time of waiting

And yet, we feel the call to resist the growing darkness
The imagery of Advent, the light shining in the darkness
Flickering, but hopefully
Ever growing

“But how!” we cry

And we stand perplex and vulnerable

O Sacred Children
We are not helpless

We have the power of the universe at our command
We have that which can transform

We have love
Not love as a vague romantic notion
But love as sacrifice and expenditure

And love is released first through compassion
It is sparked as we see and feel, the pain of others
As we participate in hunger, and fear
Rejection and exclusion

And then our souls offended, say “enough, no more”
“Compassion constitutes a radical form of criticism,
for it announces that the hurt is to be taken seriously,
that the hurt is not to be accepted as normal and natural
but is an abnormal and unacceptable condition for humanness.” (Walter Brueggemann)

How do we celebrate Advent?
How do we seek to prepare for the arrival
Not of the rough beast
But of the child

We shall sing the Sacred song of Hope
The song of compassion
In this strange land (Psalm 137)

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