WHO'D BE THE DEVIL ON ASH WEDNESDAY?

WHO'D BE THE DEVIL ON ASH WEDNESDAY?

He's been labouring all year with his schemes and attractions, some of them quite ingenious in their simplicity, and then with the first sign of the Blessed Ash we humans suddenly get wiser than we've ever shown oursleves before. The poor chap has to listen to us renounce him, denounce him and generally tell him to be off. We have finished with his blandishments and will now listen only to the Good News of the Gospel. He must be wondering as he limps off, "what on earth do they put in those blessed ashes?"

Well I'll tell you, but don't breathe a word to him. Mine, (ashes that is) come from Hayes & Finch. Sometimes I blacken them up with a spot of the old crushed charcoal but mostly I like to believe that they are as people say they are; the ashes of last years blessed palms. What would old "Nick the Trick" think if he knew that on the first day of every Lent he falls a sucker to one of the simplest tricks of all, Ashes?

Why ashes? Simple. Those ashes are all that is left of our proud Palm-waving of last year when we felt sure we could do something for Jesus. Well, we've learned our lesson and smearing ourselves with those ashes we freely, happily, joyfully admit that it is Jesus who does things for us. He is to be the centre of our Lent, not ourselves. Ashes to everything else. No wonder recovering Alcoholics say, "a power greater than ourselves!"

Mind you, you probably don't you see yourself as recovering from anything. You're absolutely determined to impress the Lord with your own determination, discipline and self-denial, aren't you? Ah, well! Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, if God doesn't have you etc. etc.

SINGING LENT'S SONG

ALWAYS THE SAME TUNE: 

The Gospels of the first two Sundays of Lent are always the same, 

• The Temptations of Christ, and his 
• Transfiguration. 

Together they are “pitch-perfect” for the season, setting the tone just right. 


Satan’s “IF” in the desert - implied rather than spoken in Mark - (Week 1) and the Father’s Voice of Approval on the mountain of the Transfiguration (Week 2) set the score clear upon the page. 


There can be no mistake. Between these two Gospel Poles (Temptation and Transfiguration) the drama of our Faith Lives is given to us like a Chorus Line for Lent. This will be the tune whatever the action.


Our diocese (Lancaster U.K.) has intensified the rhythm for us this Lent with the "RECONCILIATION" initiative outlined in the image above. It seems entirely in keeping not only with the ever-present song of this Holy season but especially apt for us in this parish,"Holy Family, Blackpool". 


Here we will once again find our heartbeats quickened to words we have sung for many Lents now, words we learned many years ago from a recording made by the monks of Weston Priory, "Come back to me, with all your heart”.

I'M NOT AFRAID OF DEATH, AM I?

A friend warned me not to go here. "Put Death on the blog,"he said, "and it may be death to the blog. If you feel you must engage with the subject, at least hide it away somewhere. If you put it on top spot like you seem to do with each new topic, every Blogger in the place will leave and you'll never hear from them again. Nobody wants to talk about death, unless to make a Will."

I think he's wrong. I even think that there can actually be a spirituality of death. Put it another way, engaging with the thought of being dead can nourish our living and not just in making us grateful that they have not yet carried us off.

So here we go out along the rim of our existence, out along Eternity's Edge. Let's first of all have a brief look at what others have made of it; we may learn something.

William Wordsworth, for instance. In the last of his Duddon sonnets, he reflects on how the river (Duddon) was there long before us and will remain long after we have gone. This leads him to speculate about how it may all turn out. Lovely lines these, listen.

For backward Duddon as I cast my glance,
I see what was, and is, and will abide;
Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish; — be it so!

Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,
Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent dower,
We feel that we are greater than we know.

Not much mention there of meeting up with old friends in heaven and a smiling God assuring us that we have laid aside all aches and pains, have had the "joy of our youth restored." We can play out now for the whole eternal day. How does that sound?
The most W.W. seems to hope for is some kind of good reputation others can remember us by and on the strength of that that are to go calmly to our graves.

There is a passage from the biblical "Book of Wisdom" or "The Wisdom of Solomon" which we often hear at Roman Catholic funerals. It was written just before the time of Jesus, 1,900 years before Wordsworth. Why is it that Wordsworth cannot sound as sure of himself as the writer of Wisdom? Hardly a failure of the imagination, this is Wordsworth! Watch the contrast in styles, in wording and most of all in imagery. Here's the reading from Wisdom, compare and contrast with Wordsworth above.

The souls of the virtuous are in the hands of God,
no torment shall ever touch them.
In the eyes of the unwise, they did appear to die,
their going looked like a disaster,
their leaving us, like annihilation;
but they are in peace.
If they experienced punishment as men see it,
their hope was rich with immortality;
slight was their affliction, great will their blessing be.
God has put them to the test
and proved them worthy to be with him;
he has tested them like gold in a furnace,
and accepted them as a holocaust.
They who trust in him will understand the truth,
' those who are faithful will live with him in love;
for grace and mercy await those he has chosen.

In the early years of the 19th century, there lived in the hills near my native village in Ireland a poet by the name of James Tevlin. He was not a great poet but was gifted with a colourful imagination which he expresed best in his native Irish. He was given to personifying death in a vivid way that witnesses to the place it occupied in the minds of people at that time. Listen to just one small example of his imagination at work.

One afternoon late,
as I sat in my seat, Death from a dark shade did threaten me,
And when he drew near,
I trembled with fear,
His ghostly cold sneer did so frighten me.
His bones were all bare,
half joined here and there,
His visage was pale and all horrible,
No pencil or pen can picture to men,
An object so grim and so terrible.

In complete contrast, or to go from the ridiculous to the sublime, we have the Four Last Songs of composer Richard Strauss. Strauss wrote these towards the end of his life, reflecting on the journey that was now coming to a close. The last song, “In the gloaming” gives a peaceful, almost welcoming picture of death, very different from poor James Tevlin
Through want and joy we have
walked hand in hand;
we are resting from our travels
now, in the quiet countryside.

Around us the valleys fold up,
already the air grows dark,
only two larks still soar
wistfully into the balmy sky.

Come here, and let them fly about;
soon it is time for sleep.
We must not go astray
in this solitude.

O spacious, tranquil peace,
so profound in the gloaming.
How tired we are of travelling -
is this perchance death?



The Christian belief about death is stated in the creed, "We believe in the resurrection of the body and life everlasting" but writers and poets may be able to help us imagine what our beliefs look like. And since Death is something we must all face, it would be helpful to hear from members on just how they imagine it. Just click the comment line at the end of this post.

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But let us finish (for now) with Cardinal Newman's well known prayer so often a feature of funeral services and memorial cards.

"May He support us all the day long,

till the shades lengthen and the evening comes,
and the busy world is hushed,
and the fever of life is over and our work is done!
Then in His Mercy
may He give us a safe lodging
and a holy rest
and peace at the last."

CANDLES IN THE PARK

I wrote this piece eleven years ago, and I  have trotted it out from time to time since then. I hope it helps as we endure this present cold spell.

For days it had been bitterly cold. A wind too. Not a blowing wind you'll understand, but a stealthy, biting, hostile air, that seemed to seek out and penetrate every chink in bodily insulation. And it was dry, though not with the dryness of fair-weather days, a bare, barren, unsmiling dryness. The streets seemed swept clean of even the tiniest trace of rubbish. Not the smallest sweet paper or discarded bottle top to be seen. It would indeed have been a most welcome sight had it not been so bitterly, bitterly cold. In weather like this, people did not delay to remark on such things as the bareness of the streets. It was far too cold to stop for anything much.

But some things still had to be done, which is why he found himself seeking the scant shelter of the Hawthorn hedge. There he stood, reminding others how bitterly cold it was, or being told by them in turn. Plastic bag in hand he kept an impatient vigil, while his dog worked up the energy to perform. "Come on, boy", he muttered, "get on with it, this is no weather for hanging about" and the dog seemed to agree. There was something forlorn and desperate about the hunched back, as he bent to his task.

It was when he broke from his flimsy cover to clear the mess the dog had made that the flash of yellows and whites and purples caught his eye. He came that way every morning but had not noticed them before. Yet suddenly they were here. He can't have looked closely enough yesterday! Surely they could not have come through the hard barren earth of the park in just one night.

However it had happened, there they were, and his heart lifted. "The crocuses are up" he called, and then felt a little silly for there was no one there to hear. Of course, had there been someone there, he would still have called out, for this was surely good news indeed. If the crocuses were up, the snowdrops were too. Spring must surely be on its way.

Though he could not claim to be young, the thought of spring brought a rush of fancy to his head. Perhaps during the dead days since New Year, there had been some kind of underground convention, a gathering of snowdrops, crocuses, and all such as bring the yearly news of spring's arrival. Overnight these standard bearers of hope had agreed that today would be the day when they would arise and wave the flag of warmer days ahead. They had resolved to cheer the hearts of all those who trod the cold earth above. "Surprise, surprise, here we are".

This seemed to him to be such a proper concept of nature's affairs that he stood there in the otherwise cheerless air, positively enraptured by these first flames of spring. So uplifted of heart was he that he failed utterly to notice the white fall of flakes coming to him from out of the leaden skies. He did however have the distinct impression that it was not now, quite so cold.