Refreshment in the Wilderness
“Gather up the fragments that remain, lest they be lost.”
A 5th C mosaic adorns the floor of the Church of the Multiplication in Tabgeha, on the Sea of Galilee; where tradition remembers that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ fed the 5000 with the five loaves and two fishes. The church itself is modern building, completed in 1980s after nearly a century of archeological excavation at the site, but the earliest church was constructed here during the 4th C, and stood as an important site of pilgrimage until its destruction by Persian invasion in 614. An homage to its ancient predecessors, the new church is simple, reverent, and dignified, integrating the fragments of the old sites of worship and pilgrimage into the contours of its architecture, as if in stone echoing the promise of Jesus that what was left would be gathered together.
God, being rich in mercy…raised us up with [Christ] … so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
— The Apostle Paul (Eph 2:4-7)
Laetare Sunday (Fourth of Lent)
Texts for this Week
Prayer
Gracious Father, whose blessed Son Jesus Christ came down from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the world: Evermore give us this bread, that he may live in us, and we in him; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
All Shall Be Well …
This simple, accompanied chant by the folksy spiritual musician Ana Hernandez is soothing and hopeful; yet at the same time, represents a rich and complex fusion of musical and philosophical ideas. The soundscape brings together Eastern and Western sonorities; the chant, meanwhile, juxtaposes and then interpolates two different quotations from different contexts and different ages.
From Julian of Norwich, the 14th C English monastic and mystic:
All shall be well, all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.
And from the contemporary Indian author and activist, Arundhati Roy,
Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.
