We Live, at the Same Time, in Two Realms…

We are living in the glow of the fifty days; yes – fifty to top the forty days of lent. We live in the fifty days of wild joy. The words of the Easter Entrance Song still ring in our ears: “I am risen and still with you.” The One our hearts seek was not kidding. He will suffer, and then after three days, he will rise. Yes, and so will we.

Why is it that in the midst of the wild joy of the fifty days of Easter, we wake up with the same pandemic limiting us, the same bills, the same laundry to be done? We are Christians, and as such we are pilgrims. We walk between the now and the “not yet.” We live simultaneously in the struggles and ordinariness of time/space, and in the promises of the gospel. Sometimes we wonder what is really “real.” The answer to that is a simple “yes,” for they both are “real.”

That is why the daily immersion in the Word is so important. It helps us “walk on water.” We don’t want to so sink into the pandemic, the bills, and the laundry that we drown. Nor do we want to have our heads so in the clouds that we neglect the pandemic, the bills, and the laundry. We need to navigate both realms. The early Christians were wrestling with this very challenge. How do we tend to our daily life in the light of the resurrection? How do we balance the both/and? The gift of his Spirit will teach us how. Our present Focus Statement calls us to develop a strong sense of presence…being “all there.”

 

Lord, are you “real?”

In your risen life you show us how we shall be.

No ghostly bloodless soul,

but flesh and blood even in your new life…even the wounds.

You show us…you are a living Word.

Send me that Breath that unites what we tend to break asunder.

Keep me whole, for in your risen glory …

you carry your whole story…

joys and tears, friends and fears,

and so shall it be with me –

nothing lost – really me.

It Cannot Be Taken Away…

We have been reflecting these past months, on the power of hope in our lives, and especially as a Racine Dominican community ‘Rooted’ in hope. Francis, our present Catholic Shepherd, has much to say about this theological virtue. It is given us in baptism as a special power from our Father/Mother-God. Hope is a longing…it is a longing born of religious love, for something we do not yet see. It is an ache of the soul, a longing for the face of the God who is hidden, for our Father/Mother-God’s face is hidden from us. Faith is the gift of the Word, for it is a form of knowing, and Charity is the merciful and compassionate active love of God in us, a gift of the Spirit. But little hope just keeps vigil. It watches for the dawn it knows will come. It manifests a holy stubbornness, for it is the waiting that is so hard.


This year, at the Saturday Easter Vigil in Rome, in the midst of a world pandemic and in the midst of the absence of a congregation before him, Pope Francis had this to say of hope:

"Tonight we acquire a fundamental right that can never be taken away from us: the right to hope. It is a new and living hope that comes from God. It is not mere optimism; it is not a pat on the back or an empty word of encouragement. It is a gift from heaven, which we could not have earned on our own. Over these weeks, we have kept repeating, “All will be well”, clinging to the beauty of our humanity and allowing words of encouragement to rise up from our hearts. But as the days go by and fears grow, even the boldest hope can dissipate. Jesus’ hope is different. He plants in our hearts the conviction that God is able to make everything work unto good, because even from the grave, he brings life."


These words make our hearts sing. We are the little ones who have the ‘right’ to hope…! No matter what happens, no one, or nothing, can take this hope from us, for it is from God. The security that our hope rests on is the fulfillment of the very word of God. Out of death itself, God brings life. This is a security that no virus, no government, no earthly power, can top. The ‘rock’ that tries to smother this hope is rolled away, useless.

And so we keep vigil. We wait for the ending of this pandemic. We wait to learn our future as a community. We wait, secure in the arm of the Shepherd, who has no intention of losing us. We do well in this time of the Easter-glow to open our prayer each day with that confident little smile – of hope. We can’t lose.