PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION

To acknowledge and cross a new threshold is always a challenge.

It demands courage and also a sense of trust in whatever is emerging.

This becomes essential when a threshold opens suddenly in front of you,

    one for which you had no preparation.

This could be illness, suffering or loss.

Because we are so engaged with the world,

    we usually forget how fragile life can be and how vulnerable we always are.

It takes only a couple of seconds for a life to change irreversibly.

Suddenly you stand on completely strange ground

    and a new course of life has to be embraced. 

Especially at such times we desperately need blessing and protection.

You look back at the life you have lived up to a few hours before,

    and it suddenly seems so far away.

Think for a moment how, across the world, someone’s life has just changed –

    irrevocably, permanently, and not necessarily for the better –

    and everything that was once so steady, so reliable, must now find a new way of unfolding.

Though we know one another’s names and recognize one another’s faces,

    we never know what destiny shapes each life.

The script of individual destiny is secret;

    it is hidden behind and beneath the sequence of happenings

    that is continually unfolding for us.

Each life is a mystery that is never finally available to the mind’s light or questions.

That we are here is a huge affirmation; somehow life needed us and wanted us to be.

To sense and trust this primeval acceptance can open a vast spring of trust within the heart.

It can free us into a natural courage that casts out fear and opens up our lives

    to become voyages of discovery, creativity, and compassion.

No threshold need be a threat, but rather an invitation and a promise.

Whatever comes, the great sacrament of life will remain faithful to us,

    blessing us always with visible signs of invisible grace.

We merely need to trust

~ John O’Donohue, “Benedictus” (To Bless The Space Between Us)

Mark 13:1-8

13 As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” 2 Then Jesus asked him, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.”

3 When he was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, 4 “Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?” 5 Then Jesus began to say to them, “Beware that no one leads you astray. 6 Many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray. 7 When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come. 8 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. This is but the beginning of the birth pangs.

Endgame was a Marvel movie that Brennan, may son, and I saw together a few years ago.  It was the culmination of several Marvel movies depicting the end of the world.  In this movie, the villain, Thanos, had grabbed all six of these powerful stones that enabled him to destroy half of the universe and 1/2 of its population.  But, the Avenger superheroes find a way to reverse time and restore the universe and its population…including many of the Avengers who had vanished.  

Now, that was a movie, and as good it was, it’s still fantasy.  Yet, and we have heard this before, we live in “apocalyptic” times.  That doesn’t mean the end of the world, but it does mean the end of some things so that new things can emerge.  It also means that things are being revealed that were hidden, or not recognized before.

Friends, as we read the gospel story, can we not see that this was not only true 2,000 years, but so true today!  

Jesus makes a statement, that the temple, this grand building in Jerusalem that was built by King Solomon, was one of the most amazing structures in antiquity, and made a huge impression on the disciples.  The disciples kept on falling into the same patterns, going after surface things, wanting to be great, wanting to be a part of a system that kept them from realizing their full humanity.  

Jesus literally goes after them with a blunt statement meant to cause them some dissonance, to make them think, to shake them out of their comfortable status quo and visions of grandeur.

You see this temple that you are so impressed with?  See how powerful it looks?  How permanent?  Well, nothing is permanent, these stones, large stones, will all fall down, this building will be destroyed…and, so will all of your notions that have been created to give you some sense of control, when in reality, those notions control you and keep you from becoming the person that you have always wanted to be.

It’s interesting though, the disciples stick with Jesus.  They know his words and actions carry meaning.  It often happens that when Jesus makes these statements in public, there’s a sidebar conversation with the disciples where he explains further.  After three of the disciples ask in private the meaning of his words, Jesus goes on to say that there will always wars, rumors of wars, human conspiracies, and all sorts of disasters, but something deeper is going on.

Friends, look around!  We see this today, everything is being exposed.  We see our political structures exposed…both sides, all sides.  There are some good people in government in different seasons, yes, but we have a system that is collapsing from lack of trust, greed, and a lust for power…and everyone blaming others rather than working towards the common good.  The church universal is complicit at times with this empire and being exposed as it became complacent and sold out to being an entertainment center, a walled fortress, or a sales pitch.  We have become a society based on business, on transactions, of living above our places, or locations, and zipping around like ants marching towards a slow death,  rather than a community of people, in a location, living in place, being transformed and transformational, and growing into life, the abundant life that Jesus came to show and to reveal to us…and give to us freely without condition!  

Yet, apocalyptic times are necessary, and a part of the deal we call life.  It happens in culture as we build and live into systems that, honestly, need to be exposed…sometimes destroyed, sometimes reformed, and often let go of in order for something new and more humane to emerge.  

They are actually a threshold time.  A time where we are crossing a doorway from one room to the next, from one season to another, leaving things behind and going into the unknown.  St. Brigid, the Celtic saint and abbess, was also the patron saint of thresholds as she helped to bridge the span between the pre-Christian and Christian Celtic worlds.  

Anthony Murphy says this:  Brigid stands at the threshold of the old and the new and refuses to budge. And we should be glad that that is the case.

She was born at the threshold of a home and that is a significant metaphor for what she represents.

She is a woman of two worlds, of two states of mind, of two ways of seeing the world. 

Who among us shares her holistic vision?

The world needs that right now.

This is true in our personal and corporate lives.  We go through the throes of life holding on to things, notions, bias, image, and relationships.  They all have to be brought into the light, because often we try to hide behind them and present an image to the world that is so much work.  

God wants us to give us life, real life.  God wants us to live freely and in love with ourselves, others, and to be experiencing God’s movement, God’s love, in every aspect of our lives.  

But, giving birth to life requires pain.  Jesus compares apocalyptic or threshold times in our life as “birth pains”.  I have not given birth, but as I’ve shared before, I’ve watched it happen…and I did experience pain when Debbie punched me while giving birth to Brennan.  Birth is hard, we don’t want to leave the comfort of the umbilical cord, the womb, and enter into this crazy, painful, sad, joyful, wonderful world.  Yet, we can’t stay in the womb, that will eventually kill us and kill the mother…we have to leave, we have to grow, we have to trust, and risk.  We really do not have a choice, yet, we also do have a choice to how we live and respond.

Friends, apocalyptic times, threshold space, are all around us, we can accuse, scream, take sides, put others down, live in despair, or we can lean into them, grow and learn, and become more aware.  Our world, and our own personal worlds, will end and are dying, but it’s not the end of the world, or our own worlds…no, it’s actually the beginning of a new world, a new birth.  

May we live into the possibilities as we embrace the changes in and around us.  

May the power of Brigid inspire you,

The grace of Brigid attend you,

The flame of Brigid enliven you,

The story of Brigid engage you.

May the God who provides her all these gifts

Provide them also to us,

That we may go into the world

With her lavish generosity

And her creative fire.

–Jan Richardson