Sunday Intercessions ~ The Presentation of the Lord

Blue Bird ~ Tyler Arboretum ~ Media, Pennsylvania

In the new month of February/ we pray for those who celebrate birthdays,/ anniversaries and other days of remembrance,/ asking for the blessings of good health,/ peace,/ growth in goodness and healing./ We pray to the Lord.

The Winter Olympic games at Sochi begin shortly/ but terrible terrorist threats are being made./ We pray for the protection and safety of athletes,/ tourists and visitors./ We ask for the turning of violent hearts to peaceable living./ We pray to the Lord.

Monday is the Feast of St. Blaise the early 4th century martyr-bishop of Armenia./ Throats are traditionally blessed./ We pray for good health and safety,/ and blessings for those who care for the sick or who research cures./ We pray to the Lord.

The winter has been very hard on many people./ We pray for those who are suffering  the lack of those things we need for life and well-being:/ shelter,/ food,/ employment,/ clothing and friendship./ We pray to the Lord.

Pope Francis and President Obama will meet at the Vatican in March./ We ask for fruitful blessings to be born of that meeting/ as they discuss global poverty and the inequality of persons./ We pray to the Lord.

We pray for children everywhere./ We entrust to God's kind mercy the children who are sick or afraid,/ and pray for the strengthening of those who have entrusted to them the care of children./ We pray to the Lord.

Soon/ in the smallest of increments/we will be able to detect  the lengthening of the day./ We ask for the inner light of love/ which translates into the practicalities of new understanding,/ cooperation and justice./ We pray to the Lord.

We pray for those who have died to enter the fullness of God's Kingdom,/ and for the forgiveness of the global sin which creates death in genocide,/ abortion,/ created famine,/ neglected disaster and war without genuine peace efforts./ We pray to the Lord.

"...and the swallow a nest..."

How lovely is thy dwelling place,
O Lord of hosts!
My spirit longs and pines
for the courts of the Lord.
My heart and my flesh give a shout of joy
for the living God!

Even the wren has found a house,
and the swallow a nest for herself,
where she may put her young.
Even thine altars, O Lord of hosts,
my king, and my God.

Psalm 84: 1-3

The psalmist is singing about his delight in the enormous and beautifully decorated temple in Jerusalem - God's house containing the Ark of the Covenant on Mount Zion. When we go to one of these great American warehouse stores today, containing over a million products (the thingdom come!) often we see and hear noisy sparrows that have somehow gotten in and made themselves at home. The temple in Jerusalem had many openings and apparently swallows built mud-nests against the high walls near the altars where they raised their families.

The psalm-singer isn't giving us a bird study or trying to charm us, but giving an image of the soul - joyfully delighting in God, finding security in God, taking pleasure in being near God, entrusting to God what's most precious to us. 

As a boy growing up on Long Island in the 1950's and early 60's, I recall my father taking me one Sunday afternoon for a drive out east along the Sunrise Highway and our visiting the small the wooden churches each village had, some time before the population explosion which required the building of new mega-churches. The churches were all dark, except for the vigil lights which still burned after the last Mass: the smell of wax and the moment when the flame jumped from the wooden stick to the wick of the candle in the blue or red glass, the little glow at the end of the stick after it was blown out, the whiff of smoke and then the silent prayer which acknowledged an invisible world. "...even my flesh gives a shout of joy..." All sufficiently soul-impacting that it's easily and clearly remembered more than a half century later.

In a book length interview Pope Benedict shared that on the day of his ordination to the priesthood, upon returning to his sanctuary seat after the bishop ordained him, a lark flew into the cathedral and sang and sang from the rafters above. The pope didn't make too much of it, but he did say it seemed to be a lovely sign, "You're on the right track." 

I imagine everyone has some memory of experiencing a particular joy and pleasure in God. We might take a few moments to gratefully acknowledge and ponder it.

"...and the rocks for the coneys."

The trees of Yahweh drink their fill,
the cedars of Lebanon which he sowed;
there the birds build their nests,
on the highest branches, the stork makes its home;
for the wild goats there are the mountains,
in the crags the coneys find refuge.

He made the moon to mark the seasons,
the sun knows when to set,
You bring on darkness, and the night falls,
when all the forest beasts roam around;
young lions roar for their prey,
asking God for their food.

The sun rises and away they steal,
back to their lairs to lie down,
and man goes out to work,
to labor till evening falls.

How countless are your works, O Lord,
all of them made so wisely!
The earth is full of your creatures.

Psalm 104:  16-25

These nine verses come from the much longer psalm 104, happily musing on God's creation - so alive and wondrous. The verses are full of lovely images: the young lions ask God for their food by roaring, the sun has its own mind and knows what it has to do, storks build stick-nests on the highest branches of the trees.

We're so in danger of losing this mysterious intimacy with God's creatures - trudging off to work in our cars, to hermetically sealed and climate-controlled offices. Remember Joni Mitchell's 1970 hit song Big Yellow Taxi:

They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hot spot.

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise 
And put up a parking lot.

They took all the trees
Put 'em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and half just to see 'em.

Don't it always seem to go...

Hey farmer, farmer
Put away that DDT now
Give me spots on my apples
But leave me the birds and the bees,
Please!

Don't it always seem to go...

The plants and animals are becoming extinct at an alarming rate, largely due to habitat destruction. The sad thing is we aren't paying it much mind, so long as there's at least one elephant left (if even cloned) to take our kids to see in the zoo. 

Anyway, this psalm translation uses the word coneys for small mammals that live in groups on the mountain. One bible note calls them mountain mice. Perhaps they're what we would know to be rabbits.

The mountains would have been an unexplored frontier in the ancient bible world. Today our frontier is outer space. Who knows what we'll find there someday. But the psalm-sense is that even in the un-explored places, God has made animate and inanimate things for God's own delight. And God provides what the creatures need: dew on the morning grass to drink, the green vegetation and a place to escape from the enemies in the sky - whether it's the scorching sun or the hawk. And we're to share that delight!

But we also might see this refuge among the rocks as an image of Christ the Rock (1 Corinthians: 10:04) - Christ, to whom we can fly in times of danger, sorrow, over-whelming challenge or trouble, where the spiritual enemy to despair lurks. Christ, when life seems too much to bear.

And oh, here's a final thought. The little rabbit in the mountain crag might call to mind the teaching of Jesus in Matthew 6: 5,6.

And when you pray, do not imitate the hypocrites, they love to say their prayers standing up in the synagogues and at the street corners for people to see them. In truth I tell you, they have had their reward, But when you pray, go to your private room, shut yourself in, and so pray to your Father who is in that secret place, and your Father who sees all that is done in secret will reward you.

I dare say, if this rabbit had a door to her private room here, she'd close it.