It was legislated in Paradise.

Lent, quotes, ,

“Do you think that I posit the antiquity of fasting on the basis of the law? Indeed, fasting is older than the law. …Fasting is as old as humanity: it was legislated in paradise. It was the first command that Adam received: You shall not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. You shall not eat legislates fasting and self-control. …It is because we did not fast that we were banished from paradise. So let us fast that we may return to it.”

-St. Basil the Great, “First Homily on Fasting,” On Feasting and Fasting.

Prisoners in a thousand ways.

quotes, , ,

Metropolitan Anthony Bloom:

I remember something my grandmother told me when I was a child. She was talking to me about the Greek war of independence against Turkey…and she told the case of a soldier who, after the battle, in the dark night, called his lieutenant and cried: ‘Lieutenant, Lieutenant, I have taken a prisoner!’ — ‘Bring him here,’ answered the lieutenant.– ‘I can’t, he is holding me so tight,’ replied the soldier.

This seems absurd…and yet I have the impression that very often it is the situation in which we find ourselves with respect to the world when we who are prisoners of this world in a thousand ways — not so much outwardly as inwardly — think that we can transform it….

From God and Man

All my bones shall say it.

family, housework, prayer, shopping,

It’s always an ordeal going to the Department of Motor Vehicles in my county. If you don’t make an appointment, you might wait in line four hours to get your business done. I had an appointment but still had to wait quite a while before they started running me through the mill by means of one device and machine and screen after another.

At least there were (not too robotic) humans directing me when to put my thumb down on the black box and how to “relax your elbow” when doing it; and telling me where to sit and where to stand and where to look for the rows of letters for the vision test. I came away eventually with my newly renewed driver’s license, but feeling quite “too old for this,” and with more errands remaining.

So on the way to the next one, a stop at the Big Box store, I listened to a reading of the Psalter through the Bluetooth in my car. The verses gave words to my lament, and directed them in the right direction, so that by the time I was pumping gas into my Subaru, I was peaceful, having been especially struck by the line, “All my bones shall say, “Lord, O Lord, Who is like unto Thee?”  He is with us in our afflictions!

I don’t think I mentioned here yet that my dear daughter-in-law “Joy” is coming from Colorado with the four grandchildren this week, while my son is out of the country for a spell. At the store I found plenty of eggs to buy and have on hand for them, which was a blessing, as recently I’ve more than once found the shelves empty of eggs.

I went home with enough time to put all the groceries away, eat dinner, and then run my last errand, to the tax-preparer’s office, which was actually the least stressful part of the day. For a few years my taxes have been done by the same Nice Lady, and she and I have become friends; she really does like to see pictures of my garden, and we talk about our travel experiences and families. And now that pesky job is done.

The best thing that happened today, though, was the one unexpected event, of needing to clean out my big bedroom closet because of finding ants trailing through this morning. I haven’t put all the shoes and stuff back, but it was satisfying to do a thorough job of that, which, if it hadn’t been for a few ants, I would have continued putting off. Since I had to be driving all over for much of the day, it worked out well that I needed to do a homemaker-y thing right off the bat, because that is what all my bones love the most.

A prayer utters itself.

poetry, prayer

PRAYER

Some days, although we cannot pray, a prayer
utters itself. So, a woman will lift
her head from the sieve of her hands and stare
at the minims sung by a tree, a sudden gift.

Some nights, although we are faithless, the truth
enters our hearts, that small familiar pain;
then a man will stand stock-still, hearing his youth
in the distant Latin chanting of a train.

Pray for us now. Grade 1 piano scales
console the lodger looking out across
a Midlands town. Then dusk, and someone calls
a child’s name as though they named their loss.

Darkness outside. Inside, the radio’s prayer –-
Rockall. Malin. Dogger. Finisterre.

-Carol Ann Duffy

Eugene Jansson, Dusk