Every Week is Holy!

O God, we pray for all those in our world
who are suffering from injustice:

For those who are discriminated against
because of their race, color or religion;

For those imprisoned
for working for the relief of oppression;

For those who are hounded
for speaking the inconvenient truth;

For those tempted to violence
as a cry against overwhelming hardship;

For those deprived of reasonable health and education;

For those suffering from hunger and famine;

For those too weak to help themselves
and who have no one else to help them;

For the unemployed who cry out
for work but do not find it.

We pray for anyone of our acquaintance
who is personally affected by injustice.

Forgive us, if we unwittingly share in the conditions
or in a system that perpetuates injustice.

Show us how we can serve your children
and make your love practical by washing their feet.

                                                             Mother Teresa

Palms of Hosanna!

 

 

 

Blessings of Palms
By Jan Richardson

This blessing can be heard coming
from a long way off.

This blessing is making
its way up the road
toward you.

This blessing blooms in the throats
of women,
springs from the hearts
of men,
tumbles out of the mouths
of children.

This blessing is stitched into
the seams of the cloaks
that line the road,
etched in the branches
that trace the path,
echoes in the breathing
of the willing colt,
the click of the donkey’s hoof
against the stones.

Something is rising beneath this blessing.
Something will try to drown it out.

But this blessing cannot be turned back,
cannot be made to still its voice,
cannot cease to sing its praise
of the One who comes
along the way
it makes.

From: Circle of Grace, Wanton Gospeller Press, Orlando, FL, 2015
 http://www.janrichardson.com/index.htmlichardson.com 
©Jan Richardson. janrichardson.com

Processions of Holy Week . . .

 

We are all familiar with public gatherings such as parades, marches, protests, demonstrations, rituals, and rallies. However, the Scriptures for this Holy Week invite us to observe, reflect upon, and actively participate in processions. Today, two Gospel readings guide us: one describes Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, and the other recounts the profound story of his passion and death as he journeys to Golgotha.

As Lent began on Ash Wednesday, we processed to receive ashes, a visible sign of our willingness to embark on a conversion of heart and listen more deeply to the Good News, both within ourselves and in the world around us. During Holy Thursday, we take part in the procession for foot washing and in moving the Blessed Sacrament to the Altar of Repose.

On Good Friday, we process with the cross, recalling Jesus’ journey to the hill outside Jerusalem. At the Easter Vigil, we participate in the procession with the new Easter Fire, carrying the Easter Candle and placing it among us as we sing our Alleluias.

Every liturgical celebration is rich with processions: the entrance procession, the Gospel procession, the offertory procession, the procession to receive the Eucharist, and even our own coming and going are marked by processions. We encounter many types of processions throughout our lives, prompting us to question their deeper meaning.

Processions are more than a method for moving people in an orderly fashion. They serve as ritual expressions of our identity and purpose. We are people of faith, traveling through life’s journey—an experience that is not a rehearsal, but the real thing.

This week, let us contemplate the processions that mark our personal milestones: Baptism, the reception of Sacraments, graduation, Jubilee, or Wedding processions, and even our eventual funeral procession. We might also reflect on the daily processions we make in our lives—standing in line for bottled water, driving to receive food at a distribution center, or waiting for a vaccine at the pharmacy. 

Praying for Openness

Let us ask the Spirit for insight, guidance, wisdom, forgiveness, and hope as we pray this week:

• for an open mind to understand the depths of our journey of faith,
• for an open heart to embrace the joyful and sorrowful mysteries of our personal and collective faith journey,
• for an open spirit to welcome, receive, and listen to the flow of life, so we may offer our “yes” to what is continuously unfolding for us as we journey in faith, celebrating both joyful and sorrowful mysteries. 
• Let us give the past to God’s mercy, the present to God’s love, and the future to God’s providence!

 

Palm Sunday reflection . . .

 The Decision: Who Is He?:

Palm Sunday 2026 

March 29, 2026

www.johnpredmoresj.com | predmore.blogspot.com

Ezekiel 37:12-14; Psalm 130; Romans 8:8-11; John 11:1-45

 

Jesus intended his arrival into Jerusalem to be unusual and provocative. His ministerial work was always on the margins of Israel where he met many non-Jews and had much dialogue with the Pharisees, Scribes, and Sadducees. Many were convinced of his identity as One who was sent by God, but the real test was always going to be the Temple Authorities and the leaders of Jerusalem. Jesus was headed to the center of belief, and he was calling the leaders to decide an important issue. What was the question: Who is Jesus?

 

Jesus preached an alternative viewpoint to those in the Temple. Whereas the High Priests and religious establishment insisted that the center of worship needed to be done in the Temple, Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of Heaven is among us. This new idea of the Kingdom occurred wherever believers gathered, it happened in the presence of Jesus’s preaching and healings, it happened wherever people sought the mercy of God. The Kingdom of Heaven was a direct threat to the Temple-centered belief, and Jesus knew that these perspectives would clash. A question that we still deal with today is: Does authority come from God or from religiously trained people who are speaking on behalf of God. Today, do we follow the Spirit, or do we tightly adhere to what our Tradition has taught us?

 

Jesus set up this clash around the Passover feast where all the Jews would gather for their sacred meal. He knew that all of Israel, but just the religious leaders, but also the regular citizens, would have to choose – to believe in God as shown through Jesus or adhere the customs and practices that have served people well for centuries? This was a clash. This was Israel’s decision day. The evangelist tells us: The whole city was shaken.

 

Jesus confounds the citizens when he rides into the city riding a donkey instead of a war horse. He does mean for battle, but he presents himself as a king who is meek, not as a military leader of power. This confuses the people who expect a political liberator. We still struggle with this. We want a God who fixes problems quickly, acts decisively, speak authoritatively, and has great power. What we get is Jesus who comes in humility, vulnerability, and peace. Could the people accept this image of Jesus or do they want him to be different. The question that he raised remains? Who is Jesus? Do I accept his portrayal of God’s project in the world today? The conflict remains.

 

A Courageous, "Yes" . . .

 

                    Annunciation Triptych (Merode Altarpiece) by Workshop of                           

                    Robert Campin, 1427- 32

Annunciation     

Denise Levertov

We know the scene: the room, variously furnished,
almost always a lectern, a book; always
the tall lily.

       Arrived on solemn grandeur of great wings,
the angelic ambassador, standing or hovering,
whom she acknowledges, a guest.

But we are told of meek obedience. No one mentions
courage.

       The engendering Spirit
did not enter her without consent.

         God waited.

She was free
to accept or to refuse, choice
integral to humanness.

                  ____________________

Aren’t there annunciations
of one sort or another
in most lives?

         Some unwillingly
undertake great destinies,
enact them in sullen pride,
uncomprehending.

More often
those moments
      when roads of light and storm
      open from darkness in a man or woman,
are turned away from

in dread, in a wave of weakness, in despair
and with relief.
Ordinary lives continue.
                                 God does not smite them.
But the gates close, the pathway vanishes.

                  ____________________

She had been a child who played, ate, slept
like any other child–but unlike others,
wept only for pity, laughed
in joy not triumph.
Compassion and intelligence
fused in her, indivisible.

Called to a destiny more momentous
than any in all of Time,
she did not quail,

  only asked

a simple, ‘How can this be?’
and gravely, courteously,
took to heart the angel’s reply,
the astounding ministry she was offered:

to bear in her womb
Infinite weight and lightness; to carry
in hidden, finite inwardness,
nine months of Eternity; to contain
in slender vase of being,
the sum of power–
in narrow flesh,
the sum of light.

                     Then bring to birth,
push out into air, a Man-child
needing, like any other,
milk and love–

but who was God.

This was the moment no one speaks of,

when she could still refuse.

A breath unbreathed,

                                Spirit,

                                          suspended,

                                                            waiting.

                  ____________________

She did not cry, ‘I cannot. I am not worthy,’

Nor, ‘I have not the strength.’

She did not submit with gritted teeth,

                                                       raging, coerced.

Bravest of all humans,

                                  consent illumined her.

The room filled with its light,

the lily glowed in it,

                               and the iridescent wings.

Consent,

              courage unparalleled,

opened her utterly.

Gabriel's Experience . .

 

Artist Unknown    

Gabriel’s Annunciation

For a moment
I hesitated
on the threshold.
For the space
of a breath
I paused,
unwilling to disturb
her last ordinary moment,
knowing that the next step
would cleave her life:
that this day
would slice her story
in two,
dividing all the days before
from all the ones
to come.

The artists would later
depict the scene:
Mary dazzled
by the archangel,
her head bowed
in humble assent,
awed by the messenger
who condescended
to leave paradise
to bestow such an honor
upon a woman, and mortal.

Yet I tell you
it was I who was dazzled,
I who found myself agape
when I came upon her—
reading, at the loom, in the kitchen,
I cannot now recall;
only that the woman before me—
blessed and full of grace
long before I called her so—
shimmered with how completely
she inhabited herself,
inhabited the space around her,
inhabited the moment
that hung between us.

I wanted to save her
from what I had been sent
to say.

Yet when the time came,
when I had stammered
the invitation
(history would not record
the sweat on my brow,
the pounding of my heart;
would not note
that I said
Do not be afraid
to myself as much as
to her)
it was she
who saved me—
her first deliverance—
her Let it be
not just declaration
to the Divine
but a word of solace,
of soothing,
of benediction

for the angel
in the doorway
who would hesitate
one last time—
just for the space
of a breath
torn from his chest—
before wrenching himself away
from her radiant consent,
her beautiful and
awful yes.

Author: Jan Richardson

Jan Richardson is an artist, author, United Methodist minister, and director of The Wellspring Studio, LLC.  Widely known for her distinctive intertwining of word and image, Jan blogs at The Painted Prayerbook.

https://www.janrichardson.com/

Annunciation . . . and a murmured "yes."

 March 25 - Feast of the Annunciation . . .

Poem” Fiat by Bp. Robert Morneau on viewing Henry O. Tanner’s
The Annunciation - 1988

On her bed of doubt,
in wrinkled night garment,
she sat, glancing with fear
at a golden shaft of streaming light,
pondering perhaps, "Was this
but a sequel to a dream?"
The light too brief for disbelief,
yet its silence eased not her trembling.
Somehow she murmured a "yes"
and with that the light's love and life
pierced her heart
and lodged in her womb.
The room remained the same
- rug still need smoothing
- jug and paten awaiting using.
Now all was different
in a maiden's soft but firm fiat.