An Ecclesial Way of Being?

The church is not simply an institution. She is a "mode of existence," a way of being. The mystery of the Church, even in its institutional dimension, is deeply bound to the being of man, to the being of the world and the very being of God.

Being as Communion, John D Zizioulas.

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Goodbye Harry

Another friend dies. Death is what happens to life.

May you know rest - not artificially in armchairs and in front of tvs
But deep rest held in the gaze of the King.

May you know the hope of recreation - not artificial hips and zimmer frames
But deep hope in a world flooded with grace.

May you know companionship again - not by timetable nor appointment
But the everlasting dance of the Trinity.

May you meet her again - not in a wrist bound locket
But face to face and cheek to cheek.

May you shake His hand, Harry. May you shake His hand.

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Kneeling

Moments of great calm,
Kneeling before an altar
Of wood in a stone church
In summer, waiting for the God
To speak; the air a suitcase
For silence; the sun's light
Ringing in me, as though I acted
A great role. And the audiences
Still; all that close throng
Of spirits waiting, as I,
For the message.
             Prompt me, GOd;
But no yet. When I speak,
Though it be you who speak
Through me, something is lost.
The meaning is in the waiting.

R.S. Thomas

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until we have faces

Until we have faces and are named

I need you stranger to drain my selfishness,
To avert my narcissism and self admiring gaze,
I need you stranger to wait for me while I stumble,
To smash my mirrors and burn my brands.

Until we have faces and are named

Will you dance with me oh three personned god?
Will you put to bed reticence in me and overwhelm?
Will you draw me inwards so that outwards may I face
With palms wide open and a heavy laden table to embrace?

Until we have faces and are named

I wish for a hell of many people to transform,
By a gardener planting tulips and daisies,
To push altogether Sisyphus' pebble,
And through calloused hands find our faces.

Until we have faces and are named

I wait tremuously in deliberate silence,
Beyond the hiss of brands on charred flesh,
To be named and for my face to emerge,
In the mirrors of my friends.

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