It could be that my location in Minnesota – and, actually, this weekend even further north in Minot, North Dakota! – that makes this poem so appealing to me. Those from warmer climes, I suspect, may wonder at its somewhat dour tone. Summer’s end, some may protest, is not occasion for...
Mark 10:45
posted by DJL
“For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.” I thought we should tarry on the final verse of this scene for a moment because it has occasioned so much speculation about the cross. Associating it with the cross makes total sense. Jesus is,...
St. Francis and The Work of the People
posted by DJL
On this beautiful late summer Friday (at least where I’m writing from ☺), I want to try to bring together two of my great interests: prayer, which I don’t understand but practice anyway; and video, which I think is an incredibly powerful medium for conveying the faith in an experiential, and not just cognitive, way. To do that – or at least to give a taste of doing that – I’m going to turn to a project exercised by a group of artists I greatly admire called The Work of the People. They’ve created a rather simple video based on the powerful prayer attributed to St. Francis of Assisi. I’ll print the words below; they also...
Mark 10:35-45
posted by DJL
James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” And he said to them, “What is it you want me to do for you?” And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in...
Petit Fours on 9/11
posted by DJL
I haven’t written about 9/11 this week. I’d thought about finding an appropriate prayer or something like that to mark the day, but didn’t. I think that’s for two reasons. First, so much is out there you wonder what you can contribute amid the flood of material. Second, I still...