READINGS FOR THE 29TH OF NOVEMBER
COMMON PRAYER POCKET EDITION
A LITURGY FOR ORDINARY RADICALS
SHANE CLAIBORNE & JONATHAN-WILSON HARTGROVE
--for
Pastors Jim Engel, Obispo Medardo Gómez y Abelina Gómez, Ron Moen, Shane
Claiborne, Paul Benz, Jill Ross, Mike Scheid, Eduardo Cabrera, Ladd Bjorneby,
Emilio Benitez, Esau Cuevas, Mary Bosell, Eric Anderson, Alex Schmidt, Abiut Fajardo, Carol
Nelson, Carroll Hinderlie(s), pastors all, Lars Claussen, Paul Palumbo, Eliseo
Pérez-Álvarez, Chris Wogaman, Harvey Blomberg, Caroline Hellerich, Ron Marshall, Kerry Kesey,
Phil Nesvig, Cynthia Moe-Lobeda, Dean Stewart, Martin Wells, Susan Briehl, Rabbi
Abraham Heschel, and especially for
Pastor Harald Sigmar;
--for Fr.
Stanley Marrow, S.J., Pastor Rudolf Bultmann, Fr. Thomas Merton, Fr. John
O'Riordan, Fr. Dean Brackley, S.J., Brother David Steindl-Rast, Fr. Ignacio
Ellacuria, Fr. Rutilio Grande, Fr. Jon Sobrino; for the Mary Knoll Sisters of
Chile and El Salvador; Sister Elizabeth, Sister Mary Ellen Robinson, SNJM,
Kathleen Ross, Sisters of the Holy Name, SNJM, and Sister Roberta Rorke,
Sisters of Providence, Mary Rita Rohde, SNJM, Sisters of the Holy Name of Jesus
and Mary, and those classmates from SUMORE at Seattle University.
--for those
poets with begging bowls and without collars, and in other traditions, monks
all; all catholic workers, inside and out.
I. PRAYERS FROM THE POCKET EDITION
"We dream of a holy village in the midst of the urban
desert"
"Advent is the season when Jesus put on flesh and moved
into the neighborhood."
"Becoming the answer to our prayers: A few ideas"
"3. Dismantle a bomb. Or dismantle a theological
argument that dismantles bombs."
"With his coming, we learn that the most dangerous
place for Christians to be is in comfort and safety...Places that are
physically safe can be spiritually deadly."
To find each day's
scripture readings for the morning office, consult the following table. For
information regarding the person or event commemorated on a special day,
consult the 'Annotated List of Special Days.' pp. 105-151.
II. MY TAKE ON THE READINGS
11-29 Dorothy Day.
Psalm 139: 10-16. Micah 7: 1-10. Mk 13: 24-31
Micah first, post-harvest, gleaning.
Woe, woe, woe. To men and MSNBC.
My desire for first fresh fruit.
In your lover's arms, don't open your mouth.
50 years ago, when I was 23, newly married,
I found William Stringfellow's book
in Jerroll's bookstore in Ellensburg,
My people is the enemy.
Salmo 139: 10-16.
Lo contrario!
Aun allí, tu mano me guiaria
ni las tinieblas serían oscuras para ti,
y aun la noche sería clara como el día.
Sabe todo de mi, Señor.
Aprendí esto como
joven
en el estado de Dakota
Norte
en mi pueblo. Supiste
todo
de mi, incluyendo que
yo
identicaba con los
indígenas.
Begin by reading the wrong verse
in Mark. Go back to it this morning,
perhaps rushing now. Do I have
to do my lesson over? Fig branches
in spring. Sap running. Time--time
is urgent. It is when you're hungry.
If you're out in the cold
chances your neighbor knows this,
are high. You got it.
You're the neighbor.
What you gonna do, bro?
III. DOROTHY DAY AND THE ANGELS AT THE SPA
8 Nov
1897--29 Nov 1980
Entertaining Angels, title of the Paulist film,
doesn't Paul show up in the unexpected places?
An image from a friend in a moment of doubt,
You never know when you're entertaining
an angel. When you're working at this level
like Miss Day, you're blind to elevated talk.
It must come as epiphany, lifting and sustaining.
My take: she didn't see herself this way.
This film can be rented at Amazon
immediately for two dollars, 97 cents,
and for seven days, it's mine. Karen
says she's going to the fabric shop
to look for material. Epigraph on black
screen opens the movie: I wanted the abundant
life. I didn't have the slightest idea how to find it.
Moira Kelly plays Dorothy Day. 1996 movie.
Film opens with young black woman
screaming in chains--jail cell or mental hospital--
can't tell, Day with her, Camel cigarettes
and a Zippo lighter--I can still hear the click
from mine--set in NYC, 1963, year
I graduate from high school. Martin Sheen
plays Peter Maurin, who (I find out later,
Googling, wrote Easy Essays in verse,
If we are crazy, then it is because we refuse
to be crazy in the same way that the world is crazy.)
Eugene O'Neill, all the artists, right there.
Alcohol and cigarettes. Artists looking for more.
Day writing, wanting that. The unprinted stories,
looking the other way. Love at the beach,
and a daughter, Tamar--there's a good
Old Testament name. Tamar won't go away,
and she won't get off Scot-free. Children
off the obsessed may learn a better way
but they'll pay a price. Day write.
(After watching the movie, wondering about Tamar,
I discover her youngest child, Kate Hennessey,
has this year--2017--published her book,
The World Will Be Saved by Beauty.)
Day's granddaughter Kate says,
All of us are inside
Catholic Workers,
outside the Church. Inside/Outside.
I think Buddhists the only ones to get this.
Whatever we'll have, we'll have,
all the great talk, passing the nun on a bicycle.
looking back at the old man, startled.
Shucking oysters. Cutting the hands
looking for pearls, what else?
Cynicism. The poor people--
they seem to like the church.
How the best stuff cuts both ways.
To be an honest woman.
Who says I'm not honest?
We have a good life, the three of us.
Why isn't that enough?
Who are you?
I am a Catholic worker.
Who are you?
You drink, you wet your pants, you vomit.
How could anyone love you?
I am not who I thought I was.
You look awful. That word. Awful.
I've been thinking
about who God
wants me to be in a
very lonely life.
(Title of her autobiography.
How faithful we are
serving the poor.)
Peter Maurin will lose the language
that I find online,
that I'll end with--
some unfinished business
for me at home--
The coat that hangs in
your closet
belongs to the poor.
Jim Bodeen
29 November--1 December 2017
Posts
