A Maundy Thursday Prayer for the Notre Dame Cathedral

(Associated Press photo)

Prayer for the Notre Dame Cathedral

Our Lady graces many chapels throughout the world, often as a nook off to the side where she draws in the seeker who has become weary from the crush of the world. She also comes in grandeur, calling to our highest hopes and aspirations, as on the River Seine in Paris where that ancient cathedral stands shattered and smoldering from devastating fire.

Many stood to weep and to sing hymns of devotion even as the flames continued to rise. We join our hearts with the people of that ancient city who feel immeasurable loss. We join hands with the people of that ancient faith, many of whom have come in recent years to see their Church shattered as well. 

May Our Lady instill in all of us the courage to rebuild this ancient and sacred space to speak beauty and hope to all the world.

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The Fire that is Insight

Sacredness

Three things are sacred:

   the searching heart,

      the name of God,

         and the voice of the oppressed.

There is a burning which

   purges the dross

That hides these.

May we live

To see that fire.

                     ~ Charles Kinnaird 

*

Some Days We See the Fire

                                                                    “Earth’s crammed with heaven,
                                                                     And every common bush afire with God;
                                                                     But only he who sees, takes off his shoes,
                                                                     The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries,
                                                                     And daub their natural faces unaware.”

                                                                                           – Elizabeth Barrett Browning

                                                                                              From Aurora Leigh 

Fire in the Morning

I saw fire this morning

As I looked out at the trees.

Its light shined through every leaf and twig.

Flames leapt from behind the bark

The way lightening crackles in distant skies,

While soft fire glowed around every root.

Liz Barrett and I took off our shoes.

I walked on a teeming sea of life

That churned beneath my feet

As I moved across the field.

There was joyful imbalance

When the back of the beast swayed –

The trees and I noticed it for just a moment.

Then just as quickly,

As with a cleansing breath,

All grew still.

I walked back home

On dew-laden grass

While cicadas sounded

From the limbs above.

                                   Charles Kinnaird

* 

A Poem for the Longest Night

This year, December 22 marks the Winter Solstice, the shortest day and the longest night of the year. It is no accident that Christmas, which celebrates the Light of the world in the coming of Christ, and Hanukah, the Festival of Lights, both come at mid winter when people have for ages celebrated the joy of light on the darkest day of the year. There are many festive Christmas lights adorning homes, shrubs and trees in my neighborhood this year. 

Here is a poem I wrote several years ago after contemplating some of those ancient times and thinking about how fire and light calls to something universal and cosmic within us. 2,500 years ago, maybe even 3,000 years ago, after people in Persia had organized themselves into cities, Zarathustra (or Zoroaster) became the prophet of Ahura Mazda (the Wise Lord) and Zoroastrianism became the first urban religion. A central ritual was something called the fire sacrifice which Zarathustra may have borrowed from even older religious practices. Thinking about these primitive beginnings inspired me to write the following poem.

 To Zarathustra

       

        Did the Wise Lord request an offering of fire?

        Or did we simply want to share

           our deepest fascination,

        Watching the fire split the night

        As an echo to the distant stars?

       

        Our hearts danced as our hands trembled

        Before the carefully contained flames

        As fire without

        Called to fire within.

        We made for ourselves lights in the night

        As we began to find our way.

       

        Today the fire is surging.

        It trembles beneath the surface

        And flashes into the open.

        Day is cast forth into the night

        As the energy lines our streets,

        Flickers in our cinemas,

        Flashes upon our billboards

        And flutters in our homes.

       

        Did anyone request an offering of fire?

        Or did we simply want to share

           our deepest fascination?

                                           Charles Kinnaird