Category: meditations

  • Sonnet XII Lashing and Mocking

    Crack Forty times & more the lashes stingThe flesh of God which breaded now we eatis turned at pillory to bloody meatas Roman biceps leaded whips make sing Cut loose exhausted falle he at their feetawaiting his awakening a gamethe Romans play, arranging him the sameas Caesar Mock’d upon a bloody seat In purple robes…

  • Sonnet XI Pilate

    To Pilate sent to Herod then and backA hot political potato pass’dUnwantedly between them til at lastThe cock crow raises dawn which secrets lack To Pilate sent the final die to castHere Jesus stands awaiting human callalignment with the will divine as allThings will for those that won’t won’t last To Pilate sent the Mater’s…

  • Sonnet X – Friday Before Dawn

    Come Brethren here in darkness let us meetTransparency and light we can’t abideThe people’s sleeping dreams our secrets hidethis man will stand before our anger’s heat Aside my friends here comes he now aside!And say, Reb Jesus, what will you today?Did not your words blaspheming bend and swayto shake our people off the Torah’s hide?…

  • Sonnet IX – Peter

    Now Peter, liar, rock, Apostle, friendHere come I carefully to you: for pot& kettle are both black. May we be notby prayer that far each from the other’s end. The Priceless One betray’d by campfire hot:Your Galilean drawl just cant. Yet Ilike you without a legal threat will tryTo hide by options crafty, Christ forgot.…

  • Sonnet VIII – The Garden

    In lunar brilliancy they walking showmid leafy branches’ budding scented bloom& grasses warmed in vernal sun now groomGethsemane, in paschal light aglow. We waiting here, he forward goes for roomTo falling, praying, moaning, sighing, bledTo sobbing, straining, weeping, sweating, redTill far away is heard the tramp of doom Apostles wake upon their grassy bedTo find…

  • Sonnet VII Eucharist

    He wash’d their feet & now would make them free:a mundane miracle will here combine.The God-Man bids that man on God will dine& unity in daily liturgy These common building blocks of bread & wineour Saviour takes into his holy hands& those, around him sat, his love commandsin mystic rites to make all men divine.…

  • Sonnet VI Washing

    At Table, Christ: Mandatum Novum doto us that we in love should brothers holdas He embodies love for us. Thus boldin love the nations, seeing, might him know. Example: washing feet in servant’s mold!To each apostle come in turn: St Peterefuses God now kneeling at his feet.“An not I wash you then be gone” is told.…

  • Annunciation Palms

    JMJ For quite some time in the Western Church no feast is allowed to coincide with Holy Week or Bright Week (as it is called in the East), so, from today until the Sunday after Easter any feast that shows up gets either ignored or moved. Thus the Liturgical Celebration of Annunciation is, this year,…

  • Croquet in Eqypt.

    ✙ JMJ The Readings for Tuesday in Passion Week (B2) Numbers 21:4-9 John 8:21-30 Cur eduxisti nos de Aegypto, ut moreremur in solitudine? Why didst thou bring us out of Egypt, to die in the wilderness? In the Fathers, Egypt is seen as a symbol of our human bondage to sin. The Passover is a…

  • The Strong, Silent Type.

    ✙ JMJ The Readings for the Solemnity of St Joseph Monday in Passion Week (B2) II Samuel  7:4-5A, 12-14A, 16 Romans 4:13, 16-18, 22  Luke 2:41-51A For this Just Man was given by you a spouse to the Virgin Mother of God and set a s a wise and faithful servant in charge of your…

  • Sacramentum Oboedientiae

    ✙ JMJ The Readings for Passion Sunday (B2) Jeremiah 31:31-34 Hebrews 5:7-9 John 12:20-33 Nunc anima mea turbata est. Et quid dicam? Pater, salvifica me ex hac hora. Sed propterea veni in horam hanc : Pater, clarifica nomen tuum.  Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour. But…

  • Where you from?

    ✙ JMJ The Readings for Saturday in the 4th Week of Lent (B2) The Commemoration of St Patrick, Apostle to Ireland.  Jeremiah 11:18-20 John 7:40-53 Numquid et tu Galilaeus es?Art thou also a Galilean?An Anglican clergyman once told me that whenever he heard a Southern Drawl he immediately assumed he was talking to someone unlearned.…

  • His Ways are Very Different

    ✙ JMJ The Readings for Friday in the 4th Week of Lent (B2)  Wisdom 2:1A, 12-22 John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30 Factus est nobis in traductionem cogitationum nostrarum. Gravis est nobis etiam ad videndum, quoniam dissimilis est aliis vita illius, et immutatae sunt viae ejus.He is become a censurer of our thoughts. He is grievous unto us,…

  • Like a Swiss Army Knife

    ✙ JMJ The Readings for Wednesday in the 4th Week of Lent (B2) Isaiah 49:8-15  John 5:17-30 Dedi te in foedus populi, ut suscitares terram, et possideres haereditates dissipatas; ut diceres his qui vincti sunt : Exite; et his qui in tenebris : Revelamini. Super vias pascentur, et in omnibus planis pascua eorum.[I have] given thee to…

  • In the Vision-Time

    ✙ JMJ The Readings for Tuesday in the 4th Week of Lent (B2) Ezekiel 47:1-9, 12 John 5:1-16 Certe vidisti, fili hominis?Have you seen this, Son of Man? הֲרָאִ֣יתָ בֶן־אָדָ֑ם Son of Man in the Latin and English. In Hebrew it’s Son of Adam, like in Narnia. Yes, Adam means “man” and also “earth creature”,…