January 6 was a Wednesday and also a first class feast of the Christian calendar: the feast of the Epiphany of our Lord Jesus Christ. On Wednesdays (and Saturday) we live stream our office of Vespers on Facebook. Typically, we get about 20 people to join in live (more stop by the recording later). But on this Wednesday, we gathered over 110 souls at the moment of our prayers. In the comments field, people shared how much they needed to pray in the midst of the havoc.
We keep praying. Thanks be to God for our prayer. I don't know where I'd be without it these days.
It's been over ten days since the insurrection by a mob of Trump supporters on the Capitol. I've come out from under the shock of the events but I have still not fully processed what all this means for our yet-to-be-perfected democracy. About our perfectible democracy I strongly encourage you to listen to Season 4 of the "Scene on Radio" podcast. Its theme is "The Land That Never Has Been Yet."
The institutions of our democracy have creaked under the ongoing assault of the last four years. But they have held up to the challenge; so far. What happened on the feast of the Epiphany was a scary and sad epiphany. One definition of the term is " an experience of a sudden and striking realization." We all got to see what extremes our society has come to. Can we stop and go no further, please !? What can we do to become a more complete democracy out of this mess?
In the last couple of days, I received an e-mail from the Belgian Consulate in NYC advising precautions to take in case of insurrection (I hold dual American and Belgian nationalities). Clearly what happend on January 6 is a symptom of an illness that has affected our democracy for a while but we are in the midst of a crisis (I don't believe our troubles are over yet). And the world is worried with us and for us. Weren't we supposed to be a "City on the hill" for the world to look up to? It is becoming harder to claim American exceptionalism. Our democracy is vulnerable to the same factors as democracies elsewhere. All democracies need deep ongoing nurturing to stay democracies.
And I believe, as a nation, we have not yet looked at the sins of our history and properly repented from them (the obvious place to start being white supremacy but that's not all of it). And once the soulsearching and repentance has started, we should seek reparations for the damage that has been and continues to be wrought on whole segments of our population. When are we going to accept that the level of inequalites of income, wealth and opportunities amongst us are a poison to our common life?
Our Br. Josép preached a great sermon on what an authentically Christian attitude to our crisis could/should be. It's well worth the listen/read. That's right, we've got the Reign of God to contribute to; a reign of peace, justice, mercy and love! Let's see how American democrary can be a more vibrant part of that construction. Time to roll up our democratic sleeves.
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Oh and then there is a pandemic going on. The good news is that three of our over-75 brothers have already been able to get their first shot of the Covid-19 vaccine. The difficult part is that the vaccination effort is mayhem. We are trying to navigate it so that more brothers get vaccinated. Apparently, there is a guideline to vaccinate people in "congregate living." That would apply to these fourteen monks but we have to find out the how, where and when of it all. To be continued.
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My niece Luka in Brussels keeps her piano practice going on her white Yamaha piano. From time to time our whole family gets little WhatsApp concert clips from her. Recently, it was a Beethoven sonata. But two days ago, her practice was held up by a catfight. Since there is nothing like Internet Cats to soothe the nerves, I finish with Luka's latest video clip to me.
Thank you, Luka. At least, nobody got hurt in this kerfuffle.
Be safe, stay home, wear a mask, get a vaccine, save lives. Peace.
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