A blessing for the times death has won.
A prayer for Holy Saturday.
“It is finished.”
It simply does not get worse than yesterday.
The world has ended.
And then there was evening and there was morning.
The second day.
Today is the day after the worst day of all.
Yesterday happened.
We are stripped of illusions now.
We have stared evil in the eyes, and it has won.
It’s OK to lie down and curl in on yourself for a little while.
It’s OK not to be vigilant today.
Today is the day of not knowing and not doing.
It’s OK not to know.
It’s OK to just be.
This is a day for silent shock and hushed sorrow.
It’s a day for heaviness, and slowness,
and not talking too much, or too loudly.
This is a day to tread tenderly on the earth,
to respect the pain that each one bears,
to be gentle with yourself,
and cautious with each other.
To eat simply and sleep hungrily,
and leave the lights and your shoes off.
Between the Friday and the Sunday
came a Sabbath day.
The greatest drama of all creation and eternity pauses
for the day of remembering God is God,
and we are not,
in an inconvenient,
and even ironic,
place in the story.
It stops at the absence of God from the earth;
the death of it all;
the day after the worst day.
And it stays here a bit.
Sometimes Sabbath is for keening.
After the worst day of all
comes the day of nothing left to lose.
So rest in the gaping hole of today.
It’s OK to pause here. (God did.)
It cannot swallow you whole.
It’s OK to stop and not look ahead.
Yet.
- Root, Kara K.. Receiving This Life: Practicing the Deepest Belonging (p. 122). Fortress Press. Kindle Edition.