Redemptive sadness

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I spent three nights last month at Mercy Center in Burlingame, California. The Mercy Center has several walking paths that were created years ago by Father Thomas Hand, S.J. One of the paths, called the Water Way, leads you down a slope and into an area shadowed by trees, then alongside a dark creek that is criss-crossed with fallen branches and tree trunks.

This depiction of the Tenth Station of the Cross is nailed to a post at one end of the Water Way. At this point in the story, Christ's clothes are taken from him: one last humiliation before death.

I am struck by the sadness in each man's face, and by the way in which Christ is clasping the man's hand. I don't believe that redemptive violence is part of the Christian story.* Instead, I believe that God willingly entered into our suffering to be with us, because of love for us. It is a different story.


* Shout-out to Shawn Anthony at Lo-Fi Tribe.

Handmade

I gaze at the heavens,
searching for you, my God. (Ps. 123:1, ICEL Psalter)

Barefoot in the dirt outside our tent
in the dark, I bend back my head
and open my heart to the sky.

I hope to see heaven unravel,
galaxies take up the thread
then spin, then snap as
larger, more practiced hands
pull spacetime taut
weaving, reweaving
uncountable yards of stuff and nothing,
endless bolts of evidence—

Meanwhile, after billion-year trips,
photons land without fanfare
in my skin
in my eyes
right where I stand;
primordial lights
like jewels, sewn by hand
onto the dress
of a princess.