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Signs of the Times  •  25 December 2018 •  No. 180
Abbreviated edition

Processional. The annual Christmas entrance into Bethlehem from the Latin Patriarch church. (3:11 video. Thanks, Loren.)

Above. Painting by Dan Trabue.

It’s Christmas night, and I’m sitting in a hotel room in Oklahoma City. Alone. My sole surviving aunt died yesterday, which required some hustling: last-minute travel arrangements and a passel of calls; planning a funeral (and finding a location); gathering up a large folder of legal documents in preparation for doing my executor duty; making arrangements to have her meager furnishings moved.

Even for a woman living one rung above destitution, there are an amazing number of documents involved. If the authorities tracked human rights with the same vigilance as property rights, the Kingdom would be near.

Mary Ruth is the last of the seven siblings on my Dad’s side. And this is the third funeral I’ve done in Oklahoma this year.

This one is the hardest though, since only one of my aunt’s three kids want to be here. They’ve had a hard road.

Christmas has a way of bringing family dysfunction into sharp relief. The tinsel and bauble and gift wrapping residue cover only so much strain.

It occurs to me, though, that the original Christmas Day was not a cheery one for the faith’s First Family. Nor is the Here-Comes-Sanny-Claus experience of the average family in the US normative for much of the world.

Remembering Joseph

A friend in Italy recently posted on Facebook a remarkable 15th century icon of the Nativity (see below). It would be uncommon, even in 21st century terms, because of its gender-bending depiction of the Holy Family.

Mary is shown reading Torah; Joseph is on the ground cuddling baby Jesus.

It makes me wonder if the artist (traditional iconographers did their work anonymously) was influenced by the Beguines , semi-monastic communities (initially in the Low Countries of Europe) of single women, beginning in the 12th century, who served the poor and marginalized, yet took no formal religious vows. Initially recognized by church authorities, their growing presence outside of male authorities, along with their theological creativity, led to repression.

Right: “Nativity, the Virgin reading,” 15th century icon, printed in “Besancon Book of Hours,” French School, in The Fitzwilliam Museum.

I have long been especially curious about Joseph. Mary is obviously at the center of the story of Jesus’ birth. It’s true that she “submits” to the entreaty of the angel; but her submission is the stuff of revolt against the entrenched social order. Her surrender is an active collaboration; and, to every Herod—then and now—a national security threat.

Joseph, on the other hand, has a minor part in the story, and his presence on the stage is fleeting.

His reaction to Mary’s surprise pregnancy is magnanimous. The text says that he refused to publicly shame Mary for this cockamamie story of divine procreation. And then, planning to “dismiss her quietly” (Matthew 1:19), he reverses course and follows the angel’s dreamtime instruction to wed Mary. Then, after another dream, he guides Mary and baby Jesus through the desert as refugees from Herod’s rage, taking shelter in Egypt. After yet another dream, he brings the family back to Palestine, this time to Nazareth, north of Rome’s closely guarded grip.

After that, except for an indirect suggestion of his presence with Mary for Jesus’ post-natal “purification” ritual (Luke 2:22), he disappears from history. Though not, since then, in the imagination of shipwrecked sailors and abandoned children, for whom he is a patron saint.

Below is a poem inspired by his thin but intriguing storyline.

§  §  §

Joseph
Obscured brother
consigned to the margins
of Incarnation narrative.
Carpentry-calloused hands
now shield the shame
of sagging face, drooping, disgraced.
Chiseled lines prematurely sculpting
age in youthful countenance.
Thoughts of Mary smudge the heart
as tears smear the face.
Mary. Beloved. Betrothed. Betrayed?
Mary. With child. Whose? How, and why?
Joseph, companion in confusion
over God’s intention.
No multi-colored coat for you as for
your scoundrel namesake of old.
But who dares answer, much less complain?

Joseph
Made redundant by the very breath of God.
What became of you?
Obedient to heaven’s outrageous instructions
amid Caesar’s assessment.
Unable to provide more than squalid accommodation
in your beloved’s night of travail.
Enduring embarrassed encounters
with wild-eyed shepherds and
strangely-clothed pilgrims
from obscure and distant lands,
each with incredulous stories of starry encounters.
Then hurtling toward Egypt—a land still haunted
by chained voices of ancestral slaves
—only steps ahead of Herod’s rage, the
Ramah-voice of Rachel weeping in the wind.

Joseph
Did compliance with heaven’s intrigue
cause your undoing?
Was it more than your pride could endure?
Or did Rome nail you to one of its trees,
anonymously, sharing the sentence
of countless other Palestinian fathers,
left hanging in imperial ambition
years before the similar fate
of Mary’s fetal promise?
Did you map that road
for him as he did for us?

Joseph
Loving Mary more than posterity itself.
A future eclipsed by divine drama,
a fate unrecorded, left to the imagination
of bath-robed youngsters in seasonal pageants.
But not forgotten in the heart of God
or, even to this day, in the prayers
of shipwrecked sailors
and abandoned children.

St. Joseph
Consort of Mary,
accomplice of God.
Chaperon the prayers of all
who disappear from history.
Supporting cast in the
larger story of redemption,
leaving no trace other than the faint
moisture of tears on some beloved’s face.
Vouchsafe the memory of such shadowed faces,
anonymous names, ’til their inscription in
the Lamb’s Book of Life.
—Ken Sehested

Confessing our faith. 200 religious leaders gather at the US-Meixco border, confronted by Border Patrol officers. (2:37 video. Thanks Shelley.)

Already a patron saint of Mexico, Canada and Belgium, in 1870, Joseph was declared patron of the universal church by Pope Pius IX, and in 1955 Pope Pius XII established May 1 as the "Feast of St. Joseph the Worker" to counter the Communists' May Day.

Hymn of praise. “Es ist ein Ros' entsprungen” (“Lo, How a Rose ‘er Blooming”) sung by The Gesualdo Six in the Ely Cathedral, England.  (Thanks Dick.)

In the news. “On December 6-7th, 2018, more than 300 people met in Bethlehem, consisting of Palestinian Christian church and organization leaders, Kairos Palestine leaders, people of faith, representatives of the Palestinian civil society, and around 100 international Christians representing the global Kairos for Justice movement and different church bodies.” —read the conference statement, “Hope Where There Is No Hope”

State of our disunion. Among the victims of President Trump’s border wall hallucination is the National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas, where on any given day you can observe some 60 species of butterflies, the most diverse in the country.
        Recently “the US supreme court issued a ruling allowing the Trump administration to waive 28 federal laws, including the Endangered Species Act and the Clean Air Act, and begin construction on 33 new miles of border wall in the heart of the valley—and right through the butterfly center.” —Samuel Gilbert, Guardian

Just for fun. Kids find animal playmates at the zoo. (3:04 video. Thanks Jeanie.)

200th anniversary of the first singing of “Silent Night.” “The song was first performed on Christmas Eve 1818 at St Nicholas parish church in Oberndorf, a village in the Austrian Empire on the Salzach river in present-day Austria. A young priest, Father Joseph Mohr, had come to Oberndorf the year before. He had written the lyrics of the song "Stille Nacht" in 1816 at Mariapfarr, the hometown of his father in the Salzburg Lungau region, where Joseph had worked as a co-adjutor. The melody was composed by Franz Xaver Gruber, schoolmaster and organist in the nearby village of Arnsdorf.” —“Silent Night,” Wikipedia

Recessional. Country music royalty Kelly Clarkson, Trisha Yearwood and Reba McEntire team up to perform “Silent Night.”

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©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org. Language not otherwise indicated above is that of the editor, as are those portions cited as “kls.” Don’t let the “copyright” notice keep you from circulating material you find here (and elsewhere in this site). Reprint permission is hereby granted in advance for noncommercial purposes.

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Go tell John

A litany for worship inspired by Matthew 11:1-6

by Ken Sehested

The disciples of John came to Jesus saying, “Dude, what’s up with this? John’s in prison, and you’re out here lollygagging in the boondocks! John wants to know when the revolution is getting underway. Are you the Man-in-Charge or not?!”

Jesus said to them, “Go tell John what you see and hear.”

Go tell John, and Mary, too: The blind are being hired as wilderness travel guides. And the lame have signed up for ballroom dancing classes. Go tell John.

Go tell John what you see and hear.

Go tell John, and Mary, too: The lepers strut their stuff on Parisian fashion runways. And the deaf are harmonizing in Carnegie Hall. Go tell John.

Go tell John what you see and hear.

Go tell John, and Mary, too: The dead have kicked off  coffin lids and put obituary writers out of business. The poor have food in the pantry and gas in the car. Go tell John.

Go tell John what you see and hear. Comfort Elizabeth in the grief to come. And blessed are all who see God at work in these things!

Chanting: “St. John, release the sins of our lips in order that your servants may be able to relate your wonderful deeds with full resound.” (English translation, first verse, of “Ut queant laxis, ”performed by Schola Sanctae Sunnivae)

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©ken sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org. Inspired by Matthew 11:1-6.

The renewing significance of Mary’s Magnificat

Introduction to "Signs of the Times," 9 December 2016, #99

by Ken Sehested

       At first glance, through modernity’s eyes, Mary’s encounter with the angel’s natal announcement—and her annunciating response—appears to be a form of self-subjugation.

       Is Luke’s story a case of a colonized mind? Did she actively concede to her own binding and bonding? Should we insist on a more assertive, individuated figure to front the Christmas story?

       I, for one, think not.

       Does the manger’s straw have a ghost of a chance against sharpened steel? Can there be any lingering question about the dominance of shock and awe’s rule?

       I, for one, think so.

       In fact—and I’m going out on a limb here—I think the proper lesson feminism recovers is that grasping leads to gasping. That power with is ultimately the only sustaining kind; power over, only leading to death.

       Only yielding—to the Commonwealth—leads to healing. Only those with “wombs of welcome”  can heal the earth.

       Indeed, our deepest social need involves restoring a spiritual vision powerful enough to dispel the deception that we are on our own, that might makes right, that independence (freedom) involves no interdependence.

       In some Native American traditions, one of the harshest criticisms one can make about another is to say, “You behave as if you have no relatives.” In the midst of this bewildering and frightful electoral season (politics is so much more than elections and legislation) we need the reviving power of a common vision that we belong not just to each other but to our environment as well. Among the many ways to speak of the Blessed One is that God is the Presence that both entices us to remember our relatedness and inflicts us when we forget.

       Every indicative (what we say about God) contains, at least implicitly, an imperative (what we do with each other). Any theology that does anything but this is but a parlor game (though, often, a vicious one).

       To highlight Mary’s subversive song of faith in Luke 1, the major theme of this issue of “Signs of the Times” records many small acts of resistance and rebuilding in public life, miniature parables of what is possible on the major stage. And to support Luke’s tale we’ve enlisted another text (outside Advent’s lectionary guidance), from Matthew 11:28, where Jesus urged, “Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest”—rest being anything but passivity. Here, Jesus was only saying what his Mama taught him, that only relational living is sturdy enough to withstand the rage of history's idolatrous storms.

        To put it another way, Jesus’ offer of comfort is not the enabling of an addiction but the harnessing of hope—not the passive withdrawal from history’s disputed drama but empowering sustenance in its midst. We can live without anything but this.

       There is an amazing array of songs that utilize the “Come Unto Me” refrain, some using the same lyrics and melody, some different, in virtually every imaginable genre. All of this issue’s musical recommendations come from that collection.

       In no way was Mary “meek and mild,” as Christmas hymnody would have us believe. What we urgently need to remember is that all the characteristics Gospel writers assigned to Jesus—savior, prince of peace, incarnate god, ruler of the world—were titles ascribed to Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus.

       The struggle over legitimate claim to that throne continues still.

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©ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

“Undo the folded lie”

Notes on the reckless folly of our season

by Ken Sehested

“I believe the light that shines on you will shine on you forever . . .
though I can’t guarantee there’s nothing scary hiding under your bed.”
—Paul Simon, lyrics in “Father and Daughter”

This Advent I feel more like the dumbfounded cleric Zechariah, of Luke’s nativity drama, than any other character. I have little more to say to supplement the abundance of commentary on this season’s reckless folly. Here are but a few footnotes.

1. Presidential candidate Donald Trump is a buffoon—a dangerous one, to be sure, but no less a caricature. It would be a mistake, though, to thus characterize those who find his screech appealing. They are a symptom of incendiary political forces—of disaffiliation and cynicism—which tear at our social fabric. Trump incarnates what the Apostle Paul referred to as “principalities and powers,” transpersonal realities which wreak havoc in our body politic and beyond. Such forces cannot be squelched. They cannot be drained or addressed before they are mapped and root causes attended.

2. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, ISIS’ Muslim caliphate contender, is a beast—a deadly, dangerous one, but no less a caricature. It would be a mistake, though, to thus characterize those who find his screech appealing. They are a symptom of incendiary political forces—of disaffiliation and cynicism—which tear at our social fabric. Al-Baghdadi incarnates what the Apostle Paul referred to as “principalities and powers,” transpersonal realities which wreak havoc in the Middle East’s body politic and beyond. Such forces cannot be squelched. They cannot be drained or addressed before they are mapped and root causes attended.

3. The photo of three-year-old Aylan Kurdi’s body, which galvanized global attention to what is now our globe’s largest forced-displacement in history (55 million as of the end of 2014, according to the UN Refugee Agency), represents a parallel nativity scene for the Christian season of Advent. His posture on that Turkish beach, surreally like that of a child peacefully asleep, is the appropriate lens through which we should read the baby Jesus story. The terrifying backdrop of Palestinian misery—of Mary’s travail, Joseph’s confusion, the shepherds’ shivering and the Magis’ dangerous pilgrimage amid Imperial Rome’s occupation and Herod’s rage—have largely been purged from our decorative props.

4. The first Advent was a time of terror. Which is why minor-keyed music is Advent’s signature choral fare. Such music is for people capable of singing in spite of, rather than because of, facts on the ground. Then as now, the future was up for grabs, stakes were high and messianic claims multiplied. In our day, Trump and al-Baghdadi have two of the louder trumpets. Santa Claus, with his apparently bottomless bag of goodies—Dow Jones bounty for the righteous, Hellfire missiles for everyone else—rules December’s festivals as well as its funeral processions.

5. Then as now, there is little-or-no room in the inn for displaced Semites like the Syrians and others from kindred conditions in other conflicted regions. Reports of hijab-snatching assaults on Muslim women (as young as a sixth-grader on a school playground) now come from across this nation and around the Christian-flavored world. The reason for the season has devolved to tribal loyalties, racial-ethnic assessments and fearmongering done in the name of national god-pretending mascots and public polling trends.

6. When the saving work of Christ is stripped of the servant practice of Jesus, God becomes yet one more carnival barker selling snake oil and striptease; yet one more bullying deity in a neighborhood already crowded with calloused buffoons and beastial saviors.

7. Not even devoted warriors believe we can “kill our way to victory,” as Admiral Michael Mullen, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in testimony to Congress in 2008. That sentiment was repeated this past February by State Department Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf, saying “we cannot kill our way out of this war [against ISIS].”

Truth is, we are making enemies faster than we can kill them. What we need to mobilize are poets and lyricists and storytellers, to tell a different narrative. “The shortest distance between a human being and Truth,” as Anthony de Mello wrote, “is a story.” Our destiny is shaped less by wars won and lost than by stories loved and lived. As that revered missionary hymn says, “We’ve a story to tell to the nations,” one that “will shatter the spear and sword.”

Maybe we should elevate one of the church’s ordinary-day hymns—“This Is My Song (O God of all the nations)”—to Advent status.

“My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean / and sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine; / but other lands have sunlight too, and clover / and skies are everywhere as blue as mine.”*

Maybe we could learn that cherishing one’s nation—one’s people, tribe, land and tradition—does not require denigrating others.

Maybe the tragic image of Aylan Kurdi’s surf-lain body will reinvigorate the story of baby Jesus, reminding us that Herod-hearted massacres are still the way of a world in need of a different story. The most effective complaint against the sway of buffoonery and beastly rule is costly devotion to the things that make for peace.

“Nothing can save us that is possible,” the poet W.H. Auden wrote amid the darkest days of World War II. “We who are about to die demand a miracle.” But his lines were not a call to passivity in the face of calamity. “All I have is a voice / to undo the folded lie.”** Turns out, that’s all we need, for the universe has a corresponding Word that, when joined to ours, has wonder working power.

Advent’s waiting is not listless. With training, death’s threat need not unnerve us. Fear not, though folded lies await.

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*Read Ken Sehested’s new lyrics to “This Is My Song” /litanies-prayers/2015/12/10/this-is-my-song-o-god-of-all-the-nations.1789433
**The first Auden verse is from “For the Time Being: A Christmas Oratorio,” written in 1942. The second is from “September 1, 1939.”

©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

Peace, like war, is waged

A litany for worship by Walker Knight

by Walker Knight

Peace plans its strategy and encircles the enemy.

Peace, like war, is waged.

Peace marshals its forces and storms the gates.

Peace, like war, is waged.

Peace gathers its weapons and pierces the defense.

Peace, like war, is waged.

But Christ has turned it all around:

the weapons of peace are love, joy, goodness, longsuffering;

the arms of peace are justice, truth, patience, prayer;

the strategy of peace brings safety, welfare, happiness;

the forces of peace are the sons and daughters of God.                                            

Adapted from a longer poem

Jeremiad rising from a Santa Clarita schoolyard rampage

by Ken Sehested

Another school shooting. Sirens wail. First responders race.

Video shows the now-common recessional, with rifled law enforcement escorting a parade of students from school grounds. So oft repeated it’s now a kind of ritual liturgy.

Then a repeat of the predictable press conference, where scads of local elite get their turns in repeating the mantras. Sheriff, police chief, mayor, FBI agent, school superintendent, hospital administration, all chiming in: awful, tragedy, distress, heartbreak, failure, regret, unimaginable.

Cross out “unimaginable.”

Cable news channels muster their contacts list to orchestrate commentary from a parade of anyone with a title and a video link. Not even presidential impeachment hearings generate more product placement viewership.

From the makeshift podium the press conference moderator begins. “Here’s what we know. . . .  Here’s what we don’t know. . . . We’re doing lots of things.” Lots of things. Lots. Of things. And still more things.

“We’re a strong community. We need to hold each others’ hand. Say our prayers. Say ‘never again.’” (The actual words of this afternoon’s moderator.) Again and again and again.

But never ever comes.

Such vivid, heart-felt perorations of remorse and mourning and lamentation and contrition.

But no repentance. No amends.

Only vacuous remorse. Sentimental mourning. Ethereal lamentation. Vaporous contrition. The gun lobby won’t allow actual penitence. The senate majority leader won’t allow gun safety bills to be considered. Political “realism” triumphs.

One actual Fox News commentator is on record saying, after an earlier, even worse slaughter, “This is the price of freedom.”

Too high a price, this “freedom”—there’s that word, of hallowed memories and hard fought struggle, the altar in our national cathedrals of patriotism, now officiating as pimp to politicians who know where the money comes from.

You gotta’ know who butters your bread, we profess, in light of Mammon’s dominion.

If the Supreme Court says (“Citizens United v. FEC”) campaign finance freedom can be bought by the highest bidder, who are we to blush?

Lo, and “they did not know how to blush" (Jeremiah 6:15).

Not unlike the stones’ authorized cry, the schoolyard itself demands to know: “Oh, who will bless, / Bless and redeem the blood-stained, tear-drenched ground / So once again the healing sun will blaze, / The small birds sing, the flowers be found, / And lion and lamb in loving joy may graze?”*

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*excerpt from Madeleine L’Engle’s “The Other Side of the Sun”

©ken sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

On the origins of Veterans Day

by Ken Sehested

Veterans Day doesn’t lend itself to commercial attention like its twin, Memorial Day, probably because it’s squeezed between two other cash-registering holidays, Halloween and Thanksgiving, and it does not coincide with a car-cultural observance like the Indy 500 auto race.

But it is a federal holiday, what was originally called Armistice (or Remembrance) Day, marking the cessation of World War I hostilities on the 11th month of the 11th day at the 11th hour in 1918.

The “remembrance” is stirred by the poem, “In Flanders Field,” written by Canadian John McCrae, a Lieutenant Colonel during the war, from the point of view of the dead, early in that conflict before the war’s romanticism turned to disillusionment.

§  §  §

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place. . . .

§  §  §

Here are four things people of faith should reflect on in this season.

1. The law of unintended consequences is never more apparent than in violent conflict.

World War I, begun in July 1914 between Austria-Hungary and Serbia, quickly spread to numerous other countries due to an interlocking series of alliances. The howls of purported dishonored national glory were provoked by precisely the kind of nationalist assertions favored by the current occupant of the White House’s West Wing.

It was all supposed to be over by Christmas. Instead, it escalated quickly. Given the imperial reach and extractive interests of numerous belligerent nations, soldiers from 28 different countries participated. Nations as far away from Europe as South Africa and Japan participated. And all of this started when a fervent Serbian nationalist assassinated the presumptive heir (and his wife) to the Austro-Hungarian throne.

It was unprecedented carnage. The first day alone of the Battle of the Somme resulted in over 70,000 casualties. By war's end on 11 November 1918, the final tally of vengeance for one assassination had claimed the lives of nearly 40 million combatants and civilians, many times over wounded. Add to that, eight million horses, mules, and donkeys were killed.

Furthermore, the war precipitated the Ottoman Empire’s Armenian genocide, which took the lives of another 1.5 million; and it was a significant factor in “the greatest medical holocaust in history,” the 1918 influenza outbreak, which took the lives of somewhere between 50-100 million people worldwide.

§  §  §

. . . .and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

§  §  §

2. The Great War was the globe’s first industrialized war. The exuberance of humankind’s burst of scientific discovery in the late 19th century dramatically increased the capacity for mechanized killing. Machine guns, submarines, airplanes, and tanks were “force multipliers” (to use current military jargon).

To say nothing of the development chemical weapons—which, though not the most reliable killing apparatus, was far and away the most terrifying. Each of the major powers—France, Britain and Germany—used chemical weapons, though Germany’s use was the most significant. The US developed an even more effective chemical weapon, and sent a specialized chemical warfare unit to Europe; but the war’s end precluded their deployment.

3. In 1954, in the heat of the Cold War’s hysteria, when “God” became the mascot of the “free” world over against the “godless” communists, Armistice (or “Remembrance”) Day was repurposed as “Veterans Day.” In so doing, the work of mourning and incantations resolving never-again were displaced by the celebration of martial prowess.

“Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans’ Day is not,” declared novelist Kurt Vonnegut, a World War II veteran and prisoner of war. “So I will throw Veterans’ Day over my shoulder. Armistice Day I will keep. I don’t want to throw away any sacred things.”

§  §  §

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

§  §  §

4. Writers as far back as the Napoleonic Wars noted the sudden appearance of the red poppy on battlefields, but it was McCrae’s grief-inspired poem that highlighted the association.

That bit of verse led to the tradition, especially in the United Kingdom and several of its commonwealth allies, but also in the U.S., of wearing artificial flowers resembling red poppies as a symbol of mournful remembrance of the war’s incalculable suffering, along with the resolve to never again commit such atrocities. (The Allies advertised the fight as “The war to end all wars.”)

What we now know is that in soils like that of Flanders, a thin crust of alkaline is released when the ground is disturbed, as happens with bombardment and grave digging. The soil becomes acidic, choking most growth. But poppies thrive in such war-spoiled botanical conditions.

The red poppy is not a floral triumph. Rather, it is the ground’s tear, resulting from the soil’s hemorrhage. It is a judgment lodged against the despoiling of earth’s fertility—and against all mortal “faith” requiring the blood of sacralizing violence as the price of “redemption.”

§  §  §

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
  If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

§  §  §

We are left to wonder if McCrae, when urging those who came after to “Take up our quarrel with the foe,” had any inkling of how rapidly foes would multiply.

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©ken sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

Quotes about saints

A collection

by Ken Sehested

§ "Don't call me a saint. I don't want to be dismissed that easily.” —Dorothy Day

 § “The world is waiting for new saints, ecstatic men and women who are so deeply rooted in the love of God that they are free to imagine a new international order. . . . Most people despair that [it] is possible. They cling to old ways and prefer the security of their misery to the insecurity of their joy. But the few who dare to sing a new song of peace are the new St. Francises of our time, offering a glimpse of a new order that is being born out of the ruin of the old.” —Henri Nouwen

§ “[T]he difference between being at peace and being complacent is one of the most basic lessons saints can teach us.” — Charles Mathewes

§ “A saint is simply a human being whose soul has . . . grown up to its full stature, by full and generous response to its environment, God.” —Evelyn Underhill

 § “When I give people food, they call me a saint. When I ask why there is no food, they call me a communist.” —Dom Helder Camara, former archbishop of Recife, Brazil

§ “In his holy flirtation with the world, God occasionally drops a pocket handkerchief. These handkerchiefs are called saints." —Frederick Buechner

§  “And thus I clothe my naked villainy With old odd ends, stol'n forth of holy writ And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.” —William Shakespeare

§ “I am a violent man learning to be nonviolent.” —Cesar Chavez, a “folk saint” in the pantheon of Mexican Americans, whose birthday, 31 March, is a federal commemorative holiday in the US

§ “Christ moves among the pots and pans.” —Saint Teresa of Ávila, 16th century Spanish mystic, Carmelite nun

§ “Let us plant dates even though those who plant them will never eat them. We must live by the love of what we will never see. This is the secret discipline. It is a refusal to let the creative act be dissolved away in immediate sense experience, and a stubborn commitment to the future of our grandchildren. Such disciplined love is what has given prophets, revolutionaries, and saints the courage to die for the future they envisaged. They make their own bodies the seed of their highest hope.” —Brazilian theologian Rubem Alves

§ “I am not a saint, unless you think of a saint as a sinner who keeps on trying.” ―Nelson Mandela

§ “In truth, all human beings are called to be saints, but that just means called to be fully human, to be perfect—that is, whole, mature, fulfilled. The saints are simply those men and women who relish the event of life as a gift and who realize that the only way to honor such a gift is to give it away.” —William Stringfellow

§ “From somber, serious, sullen saints, save us O Lord.” —Saint Teresa of Ávila

§ “The key question that every school of spirituality must answer is how to reconcile presence to the world with presence to God, or however you prefer to formulate it. How are we to overcome the duality and interrelate the two presences? This question runs through the history of spirituality.” —J.C. Guy, writing about St. Ignatius of Loyola

§ “Every saint has a bee in his halo.” ―Elbert Hubbard

§ “Maybe more than anything else, to be a saint is to know joy. Not happiness that comes and goes with the moments that occasion it, but joy that is always there like an underground spring no matter how dark and terrible the night. To be a saint is to be a little out of one's mind, which is a very good thing to be a little out of from time to time. It is to live a life that is always giving itself away and yet is always full.” —Frederick Buechner

 § “In a church where holy people were supposed to be perfect, austere, and forbidding, she prayed to be delivered from sour saints. An admirer once remarked on her voracious appetite: ‘For such a holy woman, you sure pack it in.’
        “‘Listen,’ Teresa shot back, ‘when I pray, I pray; when I eat, I eat!’” —St. Teresa of Ávila, quoted by Mary Luti

§ “There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future.” —St. Augustine

§ “The whole case for Christianity is that [one] who is dependent upon the luxuries of life is corrupt, spiritually corrupt, politically corrupt, financially corrupt. There is one thing that Christ and all the Christian saints have said with a sort of savage monotony. They have said simply that to be rich is to be in peculiar danger of moral wreck.” —G.K. Chesterton

§ “Keep me reasonably sweet; I do not want to be a Saint—some of them are so hard to live with—but a sour old person is one of the crowning works of the devil. Give me the ability to see good things in unexpected places, and talents in unexpected people. And, give me, O Lord, the grace to tell them so.” —17th century “Nun’s Prayer,” St. Albans Abbey

§ “Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take, / The clouds ye so much dread / Are big with mercy, and shall break / In blessings on your head.” —William Cowper, 18th century English poet and hymnodist

§ “Big churches, little saints.” —author unknown

§ Short story. “I arrived for a cut at the very end of their workday and witnessed them provide a warm and very human circle of care for the only other client. This was a woman past my age who had called in a panic when her long wavy hair started coming out in handfuls as a result of her cancer treatment regimen.

        “Now this was not my first time here, and in the past I've heard these women pass on some vicious gossip and fling barbed zingers at one another with glee. There was none of that this evening. Neither was there saccharine sentiments nor empty platitudes.

         “Instead, they lovingly washed her hair and efficiently shaved off what remained, completely following the woman's lead in conversation topics, which ranged from family doings to treatment experiences and side effects to the best way to fashionize her new look. Perhaps she would wear black lipstick and go Goth or maybe wear only one of her large hoop earrings for more of a pirate statement. They cut some stretchy black silky material into a headscarf and tied it into some beautiful stylish knots.

         “And they held steady when she teared up as she faced her self in the mirror without her hair.

         “It was beautiful. They were beautiful. She was beautiful.” —Amy Smith

§ “I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints—the sinners are much more fun.” —Billy Joel

§ “It is great wisdom to know how to be silent and to look at neither the remarks, nor the deeds, nor the lives of others.” —Saint John of the Cross

§ “You may never enter a lion’s den, or travel through a war zone, or hear a prison door close behind your act of conscience. Mostly, you don’t get to custom-design the witness you bear, the woe you endure, or the promises you make to mend the world as it crosses your path.
      “By and large, you weigh the choices that come your way without the fanfare of stardom’s spotlight, your picture in the paper, or even angels whispering in your ear. Saintly work is more common than you think." —Ken Sehested

§ “There is no sinner like a young saint.” ―Aphra Behn

§ “Every town in the country has people like these folks [who do extraordinary things in ordinary ways].  Nobody gives them prizes, writes articles about them, but they demonstrate in their lives the truth of what Karl Rahner once noted about saints: saints, the German theologian once said, show us that in this particular fashion one can be an authentic Christian.” —Lawrence Cunningham

§ “Truly! Truly! By God! Be as sure of it as you are that God lives: at the least good deed done here in this world, the least bit of good will, the least good desire, all the saints in heaven and on earth rejoice, and together with the angels their joy is such that all the joy in this world can’t be compared. For truly, God laughs and plays.” —Meister Eckhart

§ “But the dark night of the soul / Will come round again / And that ability to meet it / once more / Will make saints of us all.” —Abigail Hastings, “Hallowed Week”

§ “Sanctify yourself and you will sanctify society.” ―Francis Of Assisi

 § “I should like a great lake of finest ale for all the people. / I should like a table of the choicest foods for the family of heaven. / Let the ale be made from the fruits of faith, and the food be for giving love.” —St. Brigit of Kildare (Ireland)

§ “He that falls into sin is a man; that grieves at it, is a saint; that boasteth of it, is a devil.” —Thomas Fuller

§ “Something in [the saints] so loves the world that they give themselves to the laws of gravity and chance. Far from flying with the angels, they trace with the fidelity of a seismograph needle the state of the solid bloody landscape. Their houses are dangerous and finite, but they are at home in the world. They can love the shape of human beings, the fine and twisted shapes of the heart. It is good to have among us such people, such balancing monsters of love.” —Leonard Cohen

§ “Saintliness is also a temptation.” —Jean Anouilh

§ “A saint addicted to excessive self-abnegation is a dangerous associate; he may infect you with poverty, and a stiffening of those joints which are needed for advancement—in a word, with more renunciation than you care for—and so you flee the contagion.” —Victor Hugo

§ “It is easier to make a saint out of a libertine than out of a prig.” —George Santayana

§ “Now that [Martin Luther King Jr.] is safely dead let us praise him, build monuments to his glory, sing hosannas to his name. Dead men make such convenient heroes. They cannot rise to challenge the images we would fashion from their lives. And besides, it is easier to build monuments than to make a better world. So now that he is safely dead we with eased consciences will teach our children that he was a great man . . . knowing that the cause for which he lived is still a cause and the dream for which he died is still a dream, a dead man's dream.” —Carl Wendell Hines Jr.

§ “You venerate the saints, and you take pleasure in touching their relics. But you disregard their greatest legacy, the example of a blameless life. . . . No devotion is more acceptable and proper to the saints than striving to imitate their virtues.” —Erasmus

§ “So the great Church of Christ came into being by ignoring the life of Christ. . . . The Fathers of the Church were good men, often saintly men, sometimes men who cared enough for Christ to die for him, but they did not trust him. They could not trust the safety of his church to his way of doing things. So they set out to make the church safe in their own way. Creeds and theologies protected it from individual vagaries; riches and power protected it against outside attacks. The church was safe. But one thing its ardent builders and defenders failed to see. Nothing that lives can be safe. Life means danger. The more the church was hedged about with confessions of faith and defended by the mighty of the earth, the feebler its life grew.”—Edith Hamilton

§ “And the gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ, until all of us come to . . . the full stature of Christ.” —Ephesians 4:11-13

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©ken sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

 

Hallowed Week

A call to worship for All Hallows' Eve and All Saints Day

by Abigail Hastings

We come again to a time when mortals
            play out the battle of good and evil.
Before the goodness of the saints is delivered to us,
We must face the dark night
Don our courage
Wear it like a shield and
Say BOO! to the darkness
            before it engulfs us.

We make play of our fears
We cover our faces, disguise our bodies
We peer out into that world of shadows and light
And we think, for a time, we can prevail.

But the dark night of the soul
Will come round again
And that ability to meet it
            once more
Will make saints of us all.

For the questions, for the doubt,
            for the despair and longing,
For the joy that comes in the morning,
We turn to God
            for a place to be—
A respite and safe haven
A gathering of souls.

This is such a place
Here we are given the time
To know and be known
To enter in worship and communion
To puzzle out the tricks
            and celebrate the treats.

You are invited to this time of worship.

©Abigail Hastings @ prayerandpolitiks.org

 

News, views, notes, and quotes

Signs of the Times  •  16 October 2019 •  No. 202

Processional. “The Lord’s Prayer” in Kurdish.

Above: Lolan Valley, Khwakurk Mountains, Kurdistan

Special issue
WHO ARE THE KURDS?
(and why it matters, given Trump’s most recent international misadventure)

The Kurds are members of a large, predominantly Muslim ethnic group. They have their own cultural and linguistic traditions, and most speak one of two major dialects of the Kurdish language, which is closely related to Persian. They represent one of the largest people-groups who do not constitute a nation-state.

        Between 10 and 12 million Kurds live in Turkey, where they comprise about 20% of the population. Between 5 and 6 million live in Iran, accounting for close to 10% of the population. Kurds in Iraq number more than 4 million, and comprise about 23% of the population.

        After World War I, Western powers promised Kurds their own homeland in the agreement known as the Treaty of Sèvres. But a later agreement instead divided them among Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran. They make up the fourth-largest ethnic group in the Middle East. —for more info see Siobhán O'Grady, Washington Post  and “Who are the Kurds?” BBC

Invocation. “I don’t know about the levels and layers of heaven, / but I do know about tenderness / about curves of a baby’s bottom / about the touch of a loved one / about wrinkles / about dirt / about sunshine. . . . / This is a God / who is not just the God of the majesty and the mighty, / but a God of the broken down, / the poor, / the refugee. / This is a God is less the Prime Mover / and more the Most Moved Mover.” —Omid Safi, from “A Theology of Cracked Spaces”

For more summary information on the Kurdish people, see “Kurdish People Fast Facts,” CNN.

The Syrian civil war is multilayered and complicated. This short BBC video (5:45) provides the basic scorecard.

Call to worship. “The Hurrian Hymn,” oldest known music (c. 1400 BCE), found in Syria. Performed on the lyre by Michael Levy.

Hymn of praise. “Tala' al-Badru Alayna” (The Moon Has Shone His Light To Us),” Canadian children’s choir singing the oldest known Islamic song, which was sung by Prophet Muhammad's companions to welcome him as he sought refuge in Medina

The US’ major ally in Syria is the Kurdish-dominated “People’s Protection Units” (YPG), which is the primary component of the Democratic Federation of North Syria’s “Syrian Democratice Forces.

Left: The Flag of Kurdistan was created by Xoybûn during the Ararat rebellion against Turkey in 1928, where it was hoisted by thousands of Kurdish rebels. When the Republic of Kurdistan was proclaimed in 1947 [a short-lived self-governing state in what is now Iran], Mustafa Barzani hoisted the flag in Mahabad, and the flag was adopted as the official flag of Kurdistan.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces are essentially the US’ mercenary force and have in the last five year lost approximately 11,000 of its soldiers fighting ISIS with US backing.

The Kurds among the YPG are cousins (often literally) of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) within Turkey which has been engaged in a 25-year insurrection against the Turkish government . Both the US and Turkey (but not the United Nations) consider the PKK a terrorist organization.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan considers both the YPG and the PKK as terrorist organizations.

One unit within the YPG is made up of Syriac-Assyrian Christians.

There are a significant number of women soldiers among the YPG army.

Confession. “Ever since Exodus 20:2—‘I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt’—the sanctity of God and sanctuary for refugees are forever linked.” —Ken Sehested

Hymn of supplication. “Song of the Syrian Refugees,” Abu & Mohamad

¶ Turkey, which “jails more journalists than any other nation,” is ruled by Erdoğan’s right-wing Justice and Development Party, which has become more repressive after the 2016 attempted coup by segments of the Turkish military.

Among the complications in US-Turkey relations is the fact that the US has an estimated 50 nuclear bombs stored at Turkey’s Air Base, from which the US Airforce’s 39th Wing operates. Removing them would signal a major diplomatic breach with Turkey, a NATO ally. —Stephen Losey, Air Force Times

¶ A century ago, the Syrian Christian community (among the oldest in the world) made up 30% of the country’s population. Historically, much of the Syrian Christian community has supported the rule of the Assad family—which has provided a measure of religious freedom—out of fear of be supplanted by a conservative Islamist government. —see “Syria’s beleaguered Christians,” BBC

Words of assurance. ”You’re Not Alone, Syria.” —featuring Abdullah Rolle, Faisal Salah, Omar Esa, Khaleel Muhammad, Hassen Rasool, Muslim Belal, Abdul Wahab, Umar Salaams and Masikah

The Kurds “are the Medes in the Bible. They are the descendants of Madai, one of the sixteen grandsons of Noah (see Genesis 10:2).” —Wade Burleson, “”

In 2015 Steve Bannon, conservative journalist and political operative, asked Donald Trump that if he was elected president of the US, did he consider Turkey a dependable ally. Trump said, “I have a little conflict of interest because I have a major, major building in Istanbul. It’s called Trump Towers.” —MSNBC video (1:00)

Left: “The Pietà of Syria.” “Delawer Omar, a Syrian Kurd exiled in Switzerland, paints to show the world what the Syrians in general and the Kurds in particular have suffered at the hands of the Bashar Assad. Among his startling and haunting paintings are those of a father cradling his dead son.  He was inspired to paint his ‘The Pietà of Syria’ after seeing a poignant photograph of a Syrian father carrying his dead son following the bombing of the city of Homs.”

Hymn of intercession. “Abun d'beschmayo” (The Lord's Prayer” in Aramaic), Sarah Ego.

Climate change and the Syrian civil war. “A severe drought, worsened by a warming climate, drove Syrian farmers to abandon their crops and flock to cities, helping trigger a civil war that has killed hundreds of thousands of people, according to a new study.” —Craig Welch, National Geographic

¶ Trump, who has spoken often about getting out of the “endless” wars in the Middle East, announced he would pull troops out of Syria just three weeks after his decision to send 2,000 additional US troops, along with missile defense systems and two squadrons of fighter jets, to Saudi Arabia. —Tim Pierce, Washington Examiner

By the numbers. The Syrian civil war has created more than 11 million refugees. In 2018 the US took in a total of 11, or 0.0001%, of that total. —NPR

        Who’s taking in Syrian refugees? Lebanon–1.5 million (one-out-of-four residents of Lebanon’s population are Syrian refugees); Jordan–1.4 million; Turkey–1.9 million; Israel, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia–0; Italy–110,000; Australia–4,400. . . . —for additional info, see “Immigration Canada”

Preach it. “The true test of faith is how we treat those who can do nothing for us in return.” —Dillon Burroughs

Few Westerners know that Syria’s sole political party is the al-Ba’ath Arab Socialist Party, founded in Damascus in 1947 to promote Arab nationalism and socialist economies under secular constitutions. (Saddam Hussein’s party was also Ba’athist.) Following the Soviet Union’s collapse, Syria’s leaders slowly developed open markets policy but—especially under current Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s rule—without social welfare provisions, which led to dramatic increases in poverty, unemployment, and income disparity. —“The Ba’ath Party in Syria”

The US’ Kurdish allies have just established a strategic partnership with Syria’s government; and Russian troops are now moving into territory in northern Syria where US troops have been withdrawn. —Kareem Fahim, Sarah Dadouch & Will Englund, Washington Post

Can’t makes this sh*t up. “The former head of the leading boot making company of the U.S. military was recently sentenced to federal prison for fraud after a scheme in which he imported Chinese-made boots labeled with ‘USA’ to pass off as American-made.” —, Military Times (Thanks Connie.)

Call to the table. “There are two questions that we have to ask ourselves: The first is 'Where am I going?' And the second is ‘Who will go with me?' If you ever get these questions in the wrong order, you are in trouble.” ―Howard Thurman (Thanks Mike.)

The state of our disunion.

        • Samsung’s latest phone, the Galaxy Fold,  sells for a cool $2,000. If you make minimum wage, it will cost you nearly 16 months of earnings to buy one.

        • “When billionaire Jeff Bezos cut health benefits on September 13 for [1,900] part-time workers at his Whole Foods grocery stores, the richest man in the world saved the equivalent of what he makes . . . somewhere between 2-6 hours.” —, Common Dreams

Confessing our faith. “The idols of the nations are silver and gold.” “Psalm 135: Arabic Orthodox Chant,” from St. George Church, Aleppo, Syria.

Uncommon corporate courage. After the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, Dick’s Sporting Goods CEO ordered at the AR-15 semi-automatic rifles be removed from his stories nationwide. After the 2018 shooting at Majory Stoneman Doughlas High School in Floriday, he instituted a new store policy restricting gun sales to anyone under 21. He estimates the company lost about a quarter of a billion dollars. But he says he would do it all over again if need be. —For more see “Dick’s Sporting Goods CEO Says He Destroyed $5 Million Worth of Rifles to Take Them Off the Street,” Time.  You can also hear a compelling 14-minute interview with Stack by Marketplace’s Kai Ryssdal

Best one-liner. “And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.” —author unknown (though frequently attributed to philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche)

For the beauty of the earth.  “2624-Year-Old Cypress Tree Discovered in North Carolina Swamp." As Live Science reports, scientists date the tree (below) to be 2624 years old, making it one the oldest living non-clonal trees on Earth,” predating the Great Wall of China and the Roman Empire. —Michele Debczak, Mental Floss (Thanks Steve.)

        Also, watch this short (6:20) video exploring the ancient bald cypresses of Black River near Wilmington, North Carolina.

Altar call. “From the true Light there arises for us the light which illumines our darkened eyes. / His glory shines upon the world and enlightens the very depths of the abyss. / Death is annihilated, night has vanished, and the gates of Sheol are broken. / Creatures lying in darkness from ancient times are clothed in light.” —English translation of one verse from “The Coming Light: Hymns of St. Ephrem the Syrian, 4th century CE"

Benediction. “Dark Times lie ahead of us and there will be a time when we must choose between what is easy and what is right.” —Albus Dumbledore in “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire”

Recessional. In the Arab version of the hit TV show "The Voice Kids", Ghena Bou Hemdan (9), sings the song "Atouna Ettofouli" ("Give us our Childhood") and breaks into tears. Heartrending moment, despite the cheesy props.

Lectionary for this Sunday. “Happy are those who walk in the Way of Beauty, harnessed in the Bridle of Mercy and according to the Weal of Justice. From Creation’s Promise to Redemption’s Assurance, may Your Faithful Word leap from our lips and exclaim with our limbs. In this Law I delight! May it rule soul and soil and society alike.” —continue reading “In this law I delight,” a litany for worship inspired by Psalm 119

Lectionary for Sunday next. “Oh, visit the earth, ask her to join the dance! Coax rain from the sky. Drench thirsty fields awaiting your touch, ready the land for blossom and fruit. Burden every stalk with grain sufficient to satisfy the hunger of all.” —continue reading “Set our hearts on fire,” a litany for worship inspired by Psalm 65

Just for fun. Comedic juggling, with Michael Davis. (Thanks Rex.)

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Featured this week on prayer&politiks

•  “Amazon fires and Brazilian history: Some things we need to know (including a US-orchestrated military coup)," a new essay

• ‘Storm coming: How to tell the truth about climate collapse without counseling despair,” a new essay

• “Sacramental operative in a sullied world,” a new prose poem

©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org. Language not otherwise indicated above is that of the editor, as are those portions cited as “kls.” Don’t let the “copyright” notice keep you from circulating material you find here (and elsewhere in this site). Reprint permission is hereby granted in advance for noncommercial purposes.

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Your comments are always welcomed. If you have news, views, notes or quotes to add to the list above, please do. If you like what you read, pass this along to your friends. You can reach me directly at kensehested@prayerandpolitiks.org.