No Retribution

The resurrection of Jesus is a victory both of life over death and of forgiveness over the power of sin and retribution. It is a victory of love. And in this victory is a call to union in the life and the mercy proclaimed through the risen Christ.

On a very practical note, without the resurrection the disciples of Jesus would not have fully grasped their own forgiveness. With the resurrection, however, the despondent and probably guilt-ridden friends of Jesus begin to learn something new: they learn that the forgiveness Jesus has been preaching is an energy that changes lives, including their own. ...

Retribution would be a natural human response to being unjustly arrested, abandoned by friends, tortured, and executed, once one had returned in a body freed from earthly limitations. Instead the friends of Jesus experience that there is no vindictiveness in him, which means that there is none in God. In spite of any appearances to the contrary, love and goodness have triumphed. God is in control of the universe, and they themselves are forgiven.

[For more, see That God May Be All in All: Christian Life and Sacred Paradox, Chapter IV.] 

_____

The photograph for today has little obvious relation to the reflection above, but I took it early last evening (Holy Saturday), and it delighted me. We don't ordinarily see rabbits in our courtyard, but here was one (an Easter bunny?) nestled in the grass, seemingly unafraid of the two of us who were there. He (or she) just wiggled its nose at us, followed us with eyes and a gentle shift of the head, but made no move to run off.  This morning she was gone.

That God May Be All in All

That God May Be All in All: Christian Life and Sacred Paradox is the title of my new book, recently published.

But what does it mean for God to be all in all? Is this mysterious promise only for the end of time, or does it contain a call to us now?

How are we to let ourselves be transformed in the God who is Unknown, yet at the same time is our most intimate Knowing? And what about the wondrous mystery that the God who is supremely Other longs for us to share the divine life in Christ?

I invite you to take a look on Amazon.com, which will let you view samples of the book.  Just click on the picture of the cover, and you will be taken there.

Small Gifts

[Used with permission from "Caught Up in God."]

If you are like me, there are some days when, without intending to, you move through the day in a whirl, or in a stupor, or dragging in sadness, or simply preoccupied. On those days we may miss the small but precious gifts we are given.

One afternoon, distracted and a bit discouraged, I went outside and walked around the courtyard behind our house. As I walked I saw, floating through the air, a small seed surrounded by tendrils. I don’t know what kind of seed it was, but it was beautiful, and I reached out my hand toward it.

What amazed me was that it stayed with me. Perhaps there was a very fine tendril clinging to my finger.

 

 But it even changed hands at one point.

 

Taking photos was not easy. I had my cell phone with me, but getting a picture meant holding the phone in only one hand, tapping, adjusting, and snapping the camera with the same hand,  all the while not disturbing the beautiful seed hovering at my other hand.

After a while I blew on it gently and off it flew, only to settle gently toward the ground behind the nearby bushes.

The presence of the seed felt like a gift, just when I needed one. I wonder sometimes if it has sprouted.

The Prayer of Jesus

What we call the "Lord's Prayer" is the prayer Jesus taught to his disciples.

If we can't pray it sincerely ourselves, we can ask Jesus to pray the prayer in us.

Dawn into Flame

The essence of mysticism is not, as some think, visions, levitations, or other extraordinary phenomena. On the contrary, it is a growing into union with the God of love. “Christian mysticism,” writes Harvey D. Egan , “is a way of life that involves the perfect fulfillment of loving God, neighbor, all God’s creation, and oneself” (Introduction, An Anthology of Christian Mysticism).

Bernardo Olivera, speaking of the great 12th-century mystics, uses a dramatic but very beautiful image to describe this journey of the Christian life.

Thus, mysticism is the reality of grace accompanying the whole life of the believer, transforming him or her from dawn into midday and from an individual burning coal into an all-consuming fire.

The Sun at Midnight (Cistercian Publications)

Through the abundant grace of God, may we too be transformed from dimness into an all-consuming blaze of love in God.

 __________

(For more, see "The Mystic as Flame" on "Caught Up in God.")

Fire photo with fractal by Faylei (Rose Hoover, rc)
(Fractal created in Apophysis)

In Deep Waters

Mysterious Swamp

Save me, O God,
    for the waters have come up to my neck.

I sink in deep mire,
    where there is no foothold;
I have come into deep waters,
    and the flood sweeps over me.

I am weary with my crying;
    my throat is parched.
My eyes grow dim
    with waiting for my God.

. . . . .

But as for me, my prayer is to you, O Lord.
    At an acceptable time, O God,
    in the abundance of your steadfast love, answer me.

(Psalm 69:1-3, 13)

Golden Sunset

Golden Sunset

(Click to view full size.)

Sunsets in Chicago can be spectacular. (One theory is that the air pollution enhances the colors.) This one was indeed beautiful, but I confess that I have edited it and intensified it somewhat with Photoshop.

Surface Tension

 

I find surface tension—which is a simple phenomenon, I suppose, as far as scientific phenomena go—fascinating and beautiful. So when I saw the water in my teacup hovering above the rim, I took some pictures.

How great are your works, LORD!
How profound your designs!
A senseless person cannot know this;
a fool cannot comprehend.

(Psalm 92:6-7 NAB)

Big Baby

Baby Rhino King

Here is baby rhinoceros King about three weeks before his first birthday at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago.  On his birthday he weighed more than 1000 pounds. A zoo official told me, on the day I photographed King, that he was still nursing, even with that horn!

Troubled Planet

Troubled Planet

Let us pray for our troubled world and for all, including ourselves, who commit violence in deed, word, or thought.

See "Justice, Compassion, Prayer" on the blog, "Caught Up in God."

- - - - -

“Troubled Planet” image is by Rose Hoover, rc (with fire texture adapted from NASA photos).

How Manifold Your Works

Pepper and Tomato on Ledge

You cause the grass to grow for the cattle,

and plants for people to use,
to bring forth food from the earth,

and wine to gladden the human heart,
oil to make the face shine,

and bread to strengthen the human heart.

O Lord, how manifold are your works!

(Psalm 104:14-15, 24) 

Moon over Chicago

Full moon over Chicago from the Cenacle roof

(Click on photo to view full size.)

THE MOON IS ALSO BUSY

I bow to God in gratitude,

And I find the moon is also busy

Doing the same.

I bow to God in great happiniess,

And I learn from where the suns

And the children

And my heart

All borrow their Light.

I bow to the Friend in deep reverence

And discover a marvelous secret carried in the air:

This whole Universe is just as blessed

And divinely crazed as I,

And just as lost in this Wonderful Holy Dance.

My dear,

After such a long, long journey,

God has made another soul

Free!

Now all Hafiz wants to do

Is open a beautiful Tavern

Where this Sacred Wine

Of God's Truth, Knowledge and Love

Is forever and ever

Freely offered to you.

O bow to God in gratitude,

And some day

You will see how

The moon is also busy doing the same.

I Heard God Laughing: Poems of Hope and Joy (Renderings of Hafiz by Daniel Ladinsky) Penguin, 2006.

At Play in the Cosmos

(This image is composed of multiple layers: among others, a fractal flame and Hubble's photo of Galaxy Cluster 1E 0657-556.)

I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you. . .

Ephesians 1:17

Iced Tea Season

Now that the weather is getting warmer, it is time to share with you some of my photos of, yes, a glass of iced tea!

Light shining on glass of ice and tea

(Click on image to view full size.)

Variations:

 

 

 

 

 

I saw written as in letters of gold this word Goodness,

which I repeated for a long while with an indescribable sweetness.

I saw it, I say, written on all creatures,

animate and inanimate, rational or not — 

 all bore this name of goodness. 

(Saint Therese Couderc)

Flying Saucer?

(Click photos to view full size.)

This photograph is of a large soap bubble in a glass plate.  As you see, the room was dark except for one strategically placed light—which, curiously enough, looks a bit like an angel hovering in the bubble.

Since the picture reminded me of a flying saucer, I decided to have a little fun and situate it in a whimsical space scene.  The result is below.

Hawk Gazing

(Click photo to view full size.)

(This hawk is not the same bird as Hopkin's windhover, but this raptor can also inspire awe.)

The Windhover

To Christ our Lord 

I caught this morning morning's minion, king-
    dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
    Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
    As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
    Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird, – the achieve of, the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
    Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

   No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
    Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.

Rock and Hawk

  by Robinson Jeffers

Here is a symbol in which
Many high tragic thoughts
Watch their own eyes.

This gray rock, standing tall
On the headland, where the seawind
Lets no tree grow,

Earthquake-proved, and signatured
By ages of storms: on its peak
A falcon has perched.

I think, here is your emblem
To hang in the future sky;
Not the cross, not the hive,

But this; bright power, dark peace;
Fierce consciousness joined with final
Disinterestedness;

Life with calm death; the falcon's 
Realist eyes and act
Married to the massive

Mysticism of stone,
Which failure cannot cast down
Nor success make proud.

- See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15478#sthash.fwInHg0P.dpuf

Rock and Hawk

  by Robinson Jeffers

Here is a symbol in which
Many high tragic thoughts
Watch their own eyes.

This gray rock, standing tall
On the headland, where the seawind
Lets no tree grow,

Earthquake-proved, and signatured
By ages of storms: on its peak
A falcon has perched.

I think, here is your emblem
To hang in the future sky;
Not the cross, not the hive,

But this; bright power, dark peace;
Fierce consciousness joined with final
Disinterestedness;

Life with calm death; the falcon's 
Realist eyes and act
Married to the massive

Mysticism of stone,
Which failure cannot cast down
Nor success make proud.

- See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15478#sthash.fwInHg0P.dpuf

Rock and Hawk

  by Robinson Jeffers

Here is a symbol in which
Many high tragic thoughts
Watch their own eyes.

This gray rock, standing tall
On the headland, where the seawind
Lets no tree grow,

Earthquake-proved, and signatured
By ages of storms: on its peak
A falcon has perched.

I think, here is your emblem
To hang in the future sky;
Not the cross, not the hive,

But this; bright power, dark peace;
Fierce consciousness joined with final
Disinterestedness;

Life with calm death; the falcon's 
Realist eyes and act
Married to the massive

Mysticism of stone,
Which failure cannot cast down
Nor success make proud.

- See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15478#sthash.fwInHg0P.dpuf

Winter Sunsets

Pale Sun through Winter Haze

Same Scene on a Clear Day

January Icicles

January Icicles

 

Bless the Lord, light and darkness;
    sing praise to him and highly exalt him forever.

Bless the Lord, ice and cold;
    sing praise to him and highly exalt him forever. 

Bless the Lord, frosts and snows;

    sing praise to him and highly exalt him forever.

(Prayer of Azariah 1:48-50)

Snowy New Year's Eve

Chicago Snow with Yellow Cab and Red Snowplow

It has been snowing since mid-afternoon.  The flakes in this photo, though, I added using Photoshop brushes. 

Whether you are having a snowy welcome to the new year or a sunny, tropical one, may it be amply blessed.  And may we all be attentive to what God desires for us in the coming months.  May we welcome with open hearts the peace and love of the Prince of Peace.

I am about to do a new thing;

now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

(Isaiah 43:19)

Merry Christmas!

(Click picture to view full size.)

P.S. Christmas Day

I just discovered that Google automatically transforms a photo with Christmas lights into an animated, twinkling image.  So here's the same tree.  (Be sure to view it full sized.)