Gifts: Mystery

Good Sunday morning, good citizens of the cosmos. So, the calendar holds lots of really rich material for my morning meditation.

Today is the fifth day of Hanukkah. It is also the 5th day of Christmas, wherein every true love gives their true love not one but five gold, not silver, rings. The rings are said to symbolize the first Five Books of the Old Testament, the “Pentateuch,” which gives the history of "humanity's fall from grace" in the Garden - well, that is if you believe in "original sin".

It's the fourth day of Kwanza which is devoted to Ujamaa, or Cooperative Economics, which urges Black communities to invest in themselves financially by operating or supporting Black establishments and creating ways to earn profits together.

Today is the feast day of the martyred St. Thomas Becket, the Archbishop of Canterbury, murdered in his own cathedral on this day in 1170 by four knights of King Henry II. When Henry said, "Will no one rid me of this troublesome cleric?" the knights believed it was Henry's wish that Becket should die.

It was also on this day in 1890 that federal troops killed almost 300 Lakota men, women, and children in the massacre at Wounded Knee.

One of the survivors was Black Elk, the famous medicine man, who was 27 years old at the time of the massacre. He wrote:

"I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people's dream died there. It was a beautiful dream. And I, to whom so great a vision was given in my youth, - you see me now a pitiful old man who has done nothing, for the nation's hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead."

Between all of that and John's Gospel for the First Sunday after Christmas, I've been thinking about the gift of Mystery.

The first verses of the first chapter of John's Gospel always make me wonder what was in the incense when he started to write down, "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God."

It's the Nativity Story - not of Jesus but the birth of Christ. It's a mystery because it is about the Nativity of Love Incarnate and love is the greatest mystery of all.

I'm not sure who said it, I only know it's true: "The mystery of Love is greater than the mystery." Love has nothing else to explain it. It often makes absolutely no sense.

It can be both sacrificial as well as jealous. It can lead people to amazing acts of courage but it has also been blamed for heinous acts of cruel, cowardly violence. "Love of country" has led some to do both in the same act.

Love can lead to acts of generosity but it can also be the impulse to hoard and covet. Love can set free and love can enslave.

It has been said that you will know the greatest love when you can stop waiting for a deserved apology that will never come and forgive a wrong that can never be made right.

I don't know where Broken Dreams go. I don't know where the dreams of the Lakota went after the blizzard stopped and the bloody mud dried. Neither do I know what was in the hearts of the four soldiers when they realized that they had killed Becket for naught.

Indeed, I don't understand why people - good, so-called Christian people who say they have read the Bible and know the Ten Commandments and love Jesus - kill other people - especially a whole nation of people - because they don't believe what they believe and they want what they have.

I'll never understand it. Not any of it.

All of those things are a Mystery to me, but the greatest Mystery is not the birth of Jesus but The Birth of the Christ.

Which is why John is right: the only way to tell the story is through great word clouds filled with poetry and metaphor.

I'm heading into church to deacon for the 8 AM Mass and then will stay for the 10 AM to be present for the Blessing of the 99th Birthday of my dear friend, Hendie. I'll meet up with Ms. Conroy and some dear brothers at church and then, after the service, we'll head on over to Bob Evans for breakfast.

Ah, the things we do for the Love of Jesus.

I hope something good happens to you today.

Bom dia.