A Sunset Meditation (and Lenten Opportunities in March and April)

The meditation below is the first reflection in my new book Stretch Out Your Hand: Reflections on the Healing Ministry of Jesus. Unpacking Luke 4:40, a verse about Jesus healing at sunset, it reminds us that every beautiful sunset can be a sign of the deep compassion of our God.

See below for my upcoming Lenten programs in Milford, Hamden, and Hartford, CT, in March and April. Blessings!

AT SUNSET

As the sun was setting, all those caring for any who were sick with various kinds of diseases brought them to him, and he laid his hands on each of them and cured them (Luke 4:40).

A beautiful scene in a single verse, Luke’s image of Jesus healing at sunset in Capernaum takes our breath away. To have been there! But there is so much we can imagine.

First, the sick, those with “various kinds of diseases.” For many of them, travel was hard. Some were in pain. Some were exhausted. But all of them were hoping.

Second, the loved ones of the sick, those who “brought them to him.” If you have ever watched someone suffer, you know the stress and strain, the worry they carried with them. And you know the hope with which they came. Who knows how many miles they walked with their sick, to bring them to the healer from Nazareth?

Third, the sheer numbers! In Mark’s version of this scene, he remarks that “the whole city was gathered around the door” of the house where Jesus was (1:33). The whole city? The desire for healing is strong.

Finally, Jesus. One doesn’t suppose that Jesus had been sitting idle all day. So he must have been tired. But he didn’t turn away; he didn’t stop. No, one by one he touched “each of them.” We can only imagine the compassion that served as counterpoint to the hope of the people. Compassion that came from a well so deep that it gave no thought on this night to the numbers awaiting him in the next town—and the next, and the next. Compassion that knew no discouragement. Compassion that touched every single one.

It was sunset. The time of day when things begin to quiet down, when we are reminded of the rhythms of night and day, when we recall that an end does come and the light does not last forever. But across the sky are colors, beautiful colors. Across the hearts of the people, hope. Upon the mind of Jesus, love.

He laid his hands on each of them and cured them.

Meditation: The physical, created world can be a place of suffering, but it is also a place of profound compassion. Let the next sunset you see remind you of this scene from Luke’s Gospel. Imagine yourself in the presence of Jesus as day gives way to night.

Prayer: Jesus, as the sun sets on this day, remind me of your tireless compassion, your willingness to touch me, your refusal to ever stop healing.

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LENTEN PROGRAMS

An Evening of Music and Reflection for Lent: “Stretch Out Your Hand”

Monday, March 24, 7:00 PM (Snow Date: March 31)
Saint Ann Church, 501 Naugatuck Ave, Milford, CT

Join me, musician Peter DeMarco, and the Saint Ann Choir for a Lenten Evening of Music and Reflection on the theme of healing and hope. Come hear the incredible Saint Ann Choir, reflect on Jesus’ transformative healing ministry, and enjoy some time for prayer. No registration is required. All are welcome!

Stations of the Cross: “Come to Me, All of You”

Friday, March 28, 7:00 PM
St. Rita Catholic Church, 1620 Whitney Ave., Hamden, CT

Come pray the Stations of the Cross using Come to Me, All of You: Stations of the Cross in the Voice of Christ. Hosted by the parish’s Social Justice Committee. All are welcome!

Evening of Reflection: “Holy Week and Easter: A Time for Healing”

Saint Patrick — St. Anthony Church, 265 Church St., Hartford, CT
Thursday, April 10, 6:30-8:00 pm
Register here

Jesus was a remarkable healer. For much of his public ministry, he was surrounded by human need. Crowds followed him wherever he went, pressing in on him, asking for healing. We too long to encounter this healer from Nazareth. Join me on the cusp of Holy Week as together we reflect on how Jesus is still very much with us, healing and transforming us through his compassionate life, his saving death, and his glorious resurrection. The evening will include reflections, quiet prayer time, and discussion.

The sun on the horizon in Milford, CT. Photo courtesy Ono Ekeh.

NEW BOOK! "Stretch Out Your Hand: Reflections on the Healing Ministry of Jesus"

Hello, all! I’m excited to announce that my new book is now available for preorder from Liturgical Press. This book of reflections on Jesus’ healing ministry was originally conceived as a joint project with my friend Fr. Tom Stegman, SJ, but, as many of you know, Tom died of glioblastoma in 2023. I’ve written this book in his memory, in full knowledge of how much we are all in need of healing—whether of mind, body, or spirit.

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“This beautiful work will bring hope to so many in our broken world who seek the healing touch of Christ. Amy Ekeh has given us a treasure: an insightful, thought-provoking, soul-stirring look at the stories of healing in the Gospels that ends up being a kind of ongoing, heartfelt prayer. I was moved, uplifted, and consoled—and I know many others will be, too. Thank you, Amy Ekeh!”  — Deacon Greg Kandra, journalist and author of A Deacon Prays 
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I hope this book will bring comfort and healing to those who are going through difficult times, those who want to reflect more on healing and Jesus as a healer, and all who bring healing to others, whether as caregivers, medical professionals, chaplains, pastoral ministers, loving family members, or friends.

A big thank you to artist Jack Baumgartner for allowing us to use his beautiful painting of Jesus and Thomas on the book’s front cover.

Blessings!
Amy

 
 

Can't Sleep? Try Praying.

So many of us struggle with restless nights. Several years ago I posted a “Prayer When I Can’t Sleep,” which I’m sharing again today, along with a reflection about praying in “the night watches.” These dark and quiet hours are particularly vulnerable times. They can open us to surrender, self-offering—even praise—if we can transform them from empty moments of worry and frustration into vigils of prayer and connection.

From the October issue of Give Us This Day, shared here with permission.

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Holy One, Maker of the Stars,
In the beginning there was only darkness,
And your wind swept across the face of the deep.
Tonight I see this darkness. I hear its silence.
I feel its emptiness. It surrounds me.
In my home all is still except my mind.

Sweep across me, Holy One, whole and entire,
Across every undone thing in me, every unresolved thought,
Every restless rustling of my soul, every ache and pain of my tired body.
Speak with your creative breath into my night,
Speak the light of your presence into every crack and crevice,
So I may have peace and sleep, and wake to the gentle hope of morning.


Praying Through the Night

When the psalmist couldn’t sleep, he prayed.

He prayed in his bed, he prayed on his couch, he prayed in the sanctuary and under the stars. He cried aloud, he wept, he stretched out his hands, groaned, pondered, meditated, and exhorted. He blessed God. He felt God’s hand upon him. He remembered God’s name and proclaimed God’s faithfulness. And according to the psalms, he did all of this “by night,” in “the watches of the night,” or even “all night.” (See, for example, Psalms 6, 63, and 77.)

Most of us have struggled at one time or another with falling or staying asleep. Lying awake at night can feel frus­trating, wasteful, and lonely. But the middle of the night has traditionally been a fruitful, even intentional, time for prayer. In some religious communities, rising in “the watches of the night” to pray is customary.

The nighttime hours are dark and quiet, with fewer distractions than our full and busy days. If we live with others, they are likely asleep. We are not needed. We won’t be inter­rupted. There is nothing we need to accomplish. In the stillness and silence, we can turn our full attention inward, to our hearts, and raise our hands outward, to our God.

The dark of night can feel oppressive, but we can learn to experience it biblically—as the “original darkness” before creation, from which light sprang forth and life overflowed, out of which the relationship between God and human beings emerged. Darkness may feel like a void, but it is the void that gives way to all that lives.

The darkness of our sleepless nights teems with potential. Our wakefulness can become a vigil, our restlessness an invitation, our silence a summons to the Maker of the Stars to speak in us with the same creative breath that swept across the original darkness. In keeping this vigil, our own darkness may be filled with light—the light of Christ that cannot be extinguished.

And so it is that in the watches of the night, we may come to share another experience of the psalmist—faith that in the presence of God who neither slumbers nor sleeps, darkness is not dark at all, for the night shines like the day (Ps 121:4; 139:12).

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Amy Ekeh, from the October 2024 issue of Give Us This Day, www.giveusthisday.org (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2024). Used with permission.

Prayer vigils. Photo by Tim Vineyard.

From the Ground Up

This feature essay for April’s Give Us This Day was written immediately after the funeral of Tom Stegman, SJ, in 2023. I’ve lost three more friends in the months since. I’m not alone—you too have lost friends and loved ones, and you too have had times when you felt that the losses just kept coming. These are the days when we decide if we really believe what we say we believe, the days we hear each other whispering and encouraging, “We are an Easter people.” These are the days when we dig deeply within ourselves to find an Amen, even an Alleluia—when perhaps we finally understand what it means to say that death and resurrection are a single event, that we can speak them in a single breath, and share them with one another as a single gift. Happy Easter, all.

From the Ground Up

There was a man named Jesus. Born in Bethlehem, raised in Nazareth, preached in the land of Israel. In a time of political and religious tension, Jesus of Nazareth saw the writing on the wall. His work was coming to an end. One night after a meal, he walked the countryside, one foot in front of the other, to a grove of olive trees, a place he liked to go. He had a terrible decision to make, a terrible night to pass. He threw himself on the ground and lay face down in the dirt of the garden (Mark 14:35).

There were two women named Mary. One foot in front of the other, they were on their way to visit the body of a dead man. Wracked with grief, their sole consolation was the duty before them, to care for his body, the body of Jesus of Nazareth. And suddenly he appeared before them—himself but more, alive but more—risen, glorious, eternal. They fell to the ground in belief and disbelief, the two so often bleeding into each other (Matt 28:9).

There was a man named Saul. He traveled along a well-worn road, the road from Jerusalem to Damascus, on his way to stifle faith in a man named Jesus. One foot in front of the other, with zeal and determination, he walked. He walked until a flash of light and a voice like a waterfall—the voice of Jesus of Nazareth—knocked him to the ground. Face down in the dirt, life as he knew it fell apart as the sound and light scattered all around him (Acts 9:3-4).

Scripture insists, Scripture repeats: on the ground is not a bad place to be. This is the place where we grapple with life—and death. This is the place where we grieve and fight—the place where we believe, doubt, believe again—the place of resolve and resilience. The place we are remade.

Jesus stood up and set his face to Golgotha, dusting himself off in the center of that beautiful grove of trees, announcing to his drowsy disciples: “The hour has come!”

The two women stood up, letting go of the feet of Jesus. They dusted themselves off and stood tall. They looked him in the eye and knew. It was time to tell the Good News.

Saul stood up. He saw nothing but darkness. But within, all was light. He dusted himself off—the dirt of that road still clinging to his face and feet. That blessed dirt, the dirt of Damascus, that place of being utterly and completely changed.

Scripture insists, Scripture repeats: no matter where we fall, no matter how long we lie there, no matter the grief or fight that took us down, the dirt beneath us is sacred ground. It is from this place that we will stand again—ourselves but more, alive but more. Dusting ourselves off, we will walk on—all light within—one foot in front of the other.

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 Amy Ekeh, from the April 2024 issue of Give Us This Day, www.giveusthisday.org (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2023). Used with permission.

Christ and the Garden of Olives, Paul Gauguin (1889)

Resources for Lent 2024!

Hello all! Three things to share with you as Lent is just around the corner . . .

First: Liturgical Press asked me to create an informal Author Video answering some questions about Come to Me, All of You: Stations of the Cross in the Voice of Christ. They will be sharing short excerpts of the video on social media, but the full video is available on YouTube if you are interested in learning more background about this new version of the Stations, the artwork in the book, and different ways to pray with these Stations. (Tip: If you want to skip from question to question, click “Watch on YouTube” at the bottom of the video below. Once on YouTube, you’ll see a shaded box below the video where you can choose which parts of the video you’d like to listen to.). Here ‘tis if you are interested!

Second: Here’s a great book for Lent — Catherine (Cackie) Upchurch’s daily reflections, Not by Bread Alone 2024. Cackie is a wonderful writer and spiritual companion—wise and insightful—you will enjoy getting to know her this Lent. (You can read a few sample reflections by clicking on “SEE INSIDE” under the book image here.)

And finally: I leave you with one of my favorite quotes, written by Welsh poet and Anglican priest R.S. Thomas, who was known for, among other things, being a bit on the crotchety side. Oh well, I’ve always been a bit partial to crotchety types! I love this quote for Lent . . . always leaning toward Easter. Blessings!

“There have been times when, after long on my knees in a cold chancel, a stone has rolled from my mind, and I have looked in and seen the old questions lie folded and in a place by themselves, like the piled grave clothes of love’s risen body.”
— R.S. Thomas

It’s always an honor to be with Cackie!