As we approach Palm Sunday and Holy Week, I’m thinking about the strange mixture of hope and heartache that we experience. Even messages of welcome, acceptance, and inclusion can bring hateful responses when folks feel their power is threatened. And somehow Jesus shows resistance to oppressive regimes and love for the marginalized without dehumanizing his oppressors or proliferating the rhetoric of hate.
I wrote this song for Palm Sunday a few years back. It’s really a musing on Jesus’ gracious movement between solitude and service, humanity and the divine. He finds rhythms that lead to openheartedness and help him find a way of justice and peace while living under the thumb of Empire. Jesus moves in unexpected ways that invite us to find the trajectory of grace in the dust and shadow.
Here’s a blessing for the week:
As you go,
May you find yourself more awake.
More aware of the warm sun and the cool breeze.
More attuned to birdsong.
More attentive to each unique smile you encounter.
May you find yourself more awake.
More aware of the heavy loads folks bear.
More attuned of the the uneven ground beneath us.
More attentive to the heartaches that reverberate from one heart to another.
May you find yourself more awake.
More aware of each possibility for love to flourish.
More attuned to the songs of peace and justice.
More attentive to the presence of the divine who leads us into beloved community.
So go, in peace.
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