Today’s invitation to stillness is particularly challenging these days. How is it possible to be ‘undisturbed” when death, quite literally, stalks the land, and I am locked away
inside my home to keep out of his way?
With my Catholic brothers and sisters all over the world,, I enter the sacred Easter Triduum.
For three days, I will be in two places at once.
As the sun goes down, a candle will be set in my window, as a prayer for the people who are suffering right here and now - and for the many amazing people who are literally laying their lives on the line for me: health workers, public service workers, everyone who must carry on despite the danger.
First place, then,: United in prayer with the saints, living and dead, for the suffering world, suffering which Jesus takes physically into his body on the Cross. The Cross has always spoken to me in this way: as far as I cause suffering to others in this world, I bear responsibility for the Crucifixion. Christ hangs there dying. His message: “This is what sin does. Be free of it!”
Second place: Here, now. Living my ordinary day in an extraordinary way. Quietly joyful, Quietly sorrowful - both are present, both are true.
Letting nothing disturb me is a devotion, learned surprisingly perhaps, from Buddhists, who practice “equanimity’ as a step on the path to enlightenment. Yes, it has to be practised.
Be here now, for sure, but be too, in that extraordinary place between worlds: join the eternal dance where suffering and death is overcome by resurrection and renewal. Always.
“Save us Saviour of the world, for by your cross and resurrection, you have set us free.’
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