At the heart of David Whyte’s poem, “The Winter of Listening”, are the lines,
Inside everyone is a great shout of joy waiting to be born.
We are in the midst of the season of Lent, during days that can be described as complicated. To the relief of many, we are seeing a receding in the numbers and severity of COVID cases, but the aftershocks of the first rounds of the pandemic are still with us. We have seen many people working so well together in the midst of strain, and we also are a divided people with a contentious public conversation. And while we can be excited locally about things as delightful as a Sweet Sixteen appearance by the IU Women’s basketball team, at every turn we hear reports from a devastating war in Ukraine that many fear could spill out of that country, and could include devastating weapons of mass destruction. Can joy be born in the midst of all of that?
This season during Lent, we are concentrating weekly on the lives of “saints”, those who have modeled the virtues on which we are reflecting. Toward the end of their lives, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama collaborated on a book called, “The Book of Joy”. Noting that each has had painful experiences in life, both were deeply joyful people, and had an equally joyful connection with each other. The Archbishop would say, “Discovering more joy does not, I'm sorry to say, save us from the inevitability of hardship and heartbreak. In fact, we may cry more easily, but we will laugh more easily, too. Perhaps we are just more alive.”
So what would it mean to honor the delight of joy in the heart of Lent, and in the midst of crisis? We’ll chat about this on Sunday morning, as the sermon is titled, “Waiting to Be Born: Finding Joy During Lent”, arising from Philippians 4: 1-9. It is also a Jazz Sunday at St. Mark’s, with Jazz musician Pat Harbison and several Jacobs School of Music Students leading us musically. Join us for this time of hymns, prayers and a moment with children.
We do hope, whether you have been a part of St. Mark’s for a while, or are just engaging us, that you join us in person or online. For the livestream, visit www.smumc.church, and click on the Live Stream banner at 10:30 on Sunday morning.