Stations of the Cross

 

This is very strange. It's Thursday evening here in Texas and there hasn't been a storm following Stations of the Cross. Who knows, perhaps someone craftily paid off an installment of the hated Weather Tax to appease our idolatrous carbon deity. 

Perhaps, but that didn't detract from the power of this evening's devotion in which we prayed and meditated on our Lord's Passion and Crucifixion, all to the end of finding greater union with his sacrificial action; the same union which is given to us in the Sacrament of Altar.

I find this powerful, by Austin Farrer:

What, then, was done to this body? It was stripped, scourged, and nailed to a cross: stripped of all dignity and all possession, scourged with the stroke of penal justice, and nailed up like a dead thing while it was still alive. The body you receive in this sacrament accomplished its purpose by nailing to a tree. You are to become this body, you are to be nailed: nailed to Christ's sacrificial will. The nails that hold you are God's commandments, your rules of life, prayers, confessions, communions regularly observed. Let us honour the nails for Christ's sake, and pray that by the virtue of his passion they may hold fast.

 

Yes indeed,

God bless,

LSP

Storm

 

What is it about Stations of the Cross on Thursday evenings which invites ferocious weather. I don't pretend to understand the mystic corollary between the Via Dolorosa, Golgotha and our ancient adversary the Weather, but there it is, the battle between Good and Evil played out in the cosmos itself.

It started with brisk wind and slight rain, which fast escalated into a beating tempest. A lull, a calm, a quiet point as birds sang thinking it was Spring. And then?  Clouds rolled in from the South, tornado watch, and it was time to capture the moment from the front porch.

Would this burgeoning storm blast our bucolic farming community or would Weather's wrath pass us by? Thank Gaia, our enemy the Weather chose to strike East and punish the Deep South, like Sherman's army. We pray our brothers and sisters survived.

Stand firm, resolute, and draw the moral of this story as you take it.

Your Old Pal,

LSP