A Marian Reflection

Hello, all! And happy Feast of the Birth of Mary! I’m sorry I’ve been out of touch and not blogging for some time. I hope to get back on track with monthly posts. In the meantime, I hope you will enjoy this reflection. I originally wrote it for the Assumption of Mary, but I thought it was appropriate for the Birth of Mary also, the day her body made its appearance. Blessings!

The Body of a Life Well Lived

Blessed as she was among women, Mary’s day-to-day life was much like everyone else’s—a life that no doubt took its toll on the body. Scars, sunspots, wrinkles—she would not have escaped them. And why would she want to? Life tells its sto­ries and leaves its beautiful marks on every body.

Like you, I’ve lived into every scar on my body. I’ve earned these wrinkles! Every sunspot is a part of my story—a story of long childhood days in the Texas sun, of every moment I can squeeze into my backyard garden. Every ache and pain is a reminder that I’ve birthed children, carried them on my hip long past when I should have, hauled baskets of laundry up and down basement steps for decades, bent my knees infinity-plus-one times for weeds, socks, and Legos.

My body hasn’t been through as much as Mary’s, working as she did in heat and sun, carrying water, walking great distances, toughing out pain. But it has its own good stories to tell.

Mary always goes before us—but not to show us how dif­ferent she is. Sometimes the likenesses are what prod us for­ward, to know what it really means to be Marian. Clothed with the sun, the moon at her feet, crowned with stars—sun­tanned, vibrant, aging, loved—the body of a life well lived.

She goes before us, body and soul, and we will follow. In heaven as on earth, our bodies will tell their stories.

 

Amy Ekeh, “The Body of a Life Well Lived,” from the August 2022 issue of Give Us This Day, www.giveusthisday.org (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2022). Used with permission.

A Reflection and Prayer for Holy Saturday


The following reflection originally appeared in Daily Reflections for Lent: Not by Bread Alone 2022 (Liturgical Press). The corresponding meditation and prayer were written by my co-author, Thomas D. Stegman, S.J.

Our Lenten journey has brought us here, to this quiet moment of “already but not yet.” It is a place where we are strangely comfortable, and yet perpetually uncomfortable. Comfortable because we are so accustomed to living “in-between.” Uncomfortable because we want to finally arrive.

Tonight’s vigil, with its litany of ancient readings, begins with the spirit of God sweeping across the waters (Gen 1:1–2:2). With that first command of God that light be scattered across our world, a drama of relationship, covenant, and redemption began. That drama plays out in our everyday lives, in chapels and churches, even more in kitchens and cubicles.

The last reading of tonight’s vigil is the Gospel (Luke 24:1-12) which begins, fittingly, with a reference to “daybreak.” From light to light we go, searching for the glory of the risen Christ.

The women come to the tomb expecting to find a dead body, ready to prepare it for burial. But the body is not there. Peter, running to the tomb, also seems to expect a body: bending down and looking inside, he sees for himself the emptiness of the tomb, the burial clothes cast aside.

Holy Saturday is a day when we accept and even celebrate the “in-between” reality of our lives. We know he is raised. We have seen his glory! And yet we still come to the tomb again and again, prepared for something different—just in case—needing to see for ourselves.

This is the empty tomb, where the Spirit of God hovers, where the light has broken in. Our journey has brought us here. We have arrived.

Meditation: The Easter Vigil is the pinnacle of liturgical celebrations. In addition to the litany of Scripture readings, we experience the lighting of the Paschal fire, the clanging of bells and joyous singing of Alleluia, the proclamation of the Exsultet, and the celebration of Sacraments of Initiation as we welcome new members into our communities. All in celebration of the victory of Christ over the grave. How have I experienced new life at Easter celebrations?

Prayer: God of life, open our hearts to the newness of life we celebrate. Thank you for leading us on our Lenten journey. Help us to bear witness with our joy to the resurrection of your Son.

Photo by Tim Vineyard. St. Joseph Catholic Church, Richardson, Texas.

Is Prayer Enough?

Sr. Irene Nowell, a beloved Benedictine scholar of the Hebrew Bible, makes a striking recommendation. She suggests that we pray with the book of Psalms in one hand and the newspaper in the other. While few of us read an actual newspaper anymore, we get the point: pray with the pain of the world.

Sr. Irene says it this way: “Take the psalm book in one hand and the daily newspaper in the other. After every few psalm verses, read another headline. The voices that cry out in the daily news also cry out in the psalm. Every time we pray the psalms, we pray in the name of the whole Body of Christ, in the name of the whole world. We carry all those people in our prayer; by praying the psalms we take responsibility for the well-being of all of them.”

The current situation in Ukraine is agonizing. Other situations come to our minds—school shootings, abuse, drought and famine, the toll of pandemic, wars and violence around the world. What are we to do? “Thoughts and prayers” are not enough.

Or are they? It depends, of course, on how we understand prayer. According to Sr. Irene, prayer is not an individual, inward exercise. It is a communal, universal experience. My prayer, with the newspaper in one hand, is what joins me to my suffering brothers and sisters in Ukraine and around the world. And once joined with them, I must do what I can to alleviate their agony.

Prayer is not an escape from reality or action. It is a commitment to community, a sinking into community, an authentic identification with both the joys and sorrows of others. It is only natural, then, that prayer—which begins as words, silence, the state of the heart—should spur us to action, love, commitment. This too is prayer. Prayer reminds us who we are. It reminds us that we are a people of love. We need the discipline of prayer because it reminds us of this, and we are very forgetful.

Is prayer enough? If prayer is just words, then no, it is not enough. But if prayer is engagement with God and others, words-leading-to-love, an identification with every human being that is lonely or afraid or hungry or hurting, if prayer is action that addresses affliction, silence that clarifies, self-poured-out-for-others, only then is prayer “enough.” Only then do our lives become prayer—when the newspaper, the psalms, and whatever other love we have pondered or uttered have moved us to understand, to be, to change, to serve. Thus the instruction of St. Paul: “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thess 5:17).

Hear, Lord, my plea for justice; pay heed to my cry; listen to my prayer (Psalm 17:1).

A Prayer for Lent

Let’s pray for one another and for our world as we journey together this Lent. May the days ahead be rich with peace, prayer, and the giving of ourselves.

Loving God,
we offer you these sacred days.
May they be days of peace and prayer,
days of change,
days saturated in your presence.
May they be days to listen and understand,
to encounter and serve,
to heal and be healed.
May they be sacred days.
Amen.

New Book for Lent! . . . And a Reflection on Sunday's Gospel

Hello all! My new book of reflections for Lent is now available!

My co-author is the wonderful Tom Stegman, S.J.—New Testament scholar and dean of the School of Theology and Ministry at Boston College. We had a great time writing this book together and are excited to share it with you.

The book is available from Liturgical Press in two sizes — the small version is $2 (or $1 each for orders of 50 or more).

The large print edition is $6. And it’s available in both sizes in Spanish!

We look forward to being with you this Lent!

"To open this book is to embark on a quiet and intimate Lenten journey with two friends. The distinct but interwoven voices of the authors—one a priest, the other a married mother of four—invite readers into an ongoing dialogue on the daily readings that is both wise and personal. Through the framework of reflections, meditations, and prayers, Ekeh and Stegman offer their readers a rich tool for prayer that is grounded in their own experiences and the incarnate beauty of daily life." 

Mahri Leonard-Fleckman

Assistant Professor of Hebrew Bible,
College of the Holy Cross

I’ve recently participated in U.S. Catholic’s Sunday Reflection series. The video below corresponds with this Sunday’s Gospel reading (2/20/22). You can read the Sunday readings here and the reflection in full here.

The reflection below is for Sunday, 1/23/20, which was Word of God Sunday. The readings are here, and the reflection can be read here.

You are all in my prayers as Lent approaches!

Blessings!
Amy