Inside
NCR
I have had to fend off, this Lenten
season, the temptation (though I do not watch much) that comes of the
television age: instant resolution.
At this point in my life the rhythms of this season, the
anticipation of the Triduum and the sinking into mystery without end (I admit
fearfully sticking to the shallow end of things at times, only now and then
taking the plunge deeper) have seeped into my bones with the same reality as
the push against earth of an early crocus.
And yet this year, with so much seemingly at stake -- with the war
in Afghanistan and who knows where else in the coming weeks setting the world
on edge, and the relentless drone of the sex abuse crisis draining the church
of its voice and its direction -- I wanted a Resurrection payoff. I wanted some
sense of an ending, of good things coming of bad. I wanted proof, and soon.
It is at moments like this (Is there a market for a book on
Impatient Meditation?) that one can walk out of the shallow end and find
something else to do or wait and maybe be drawn into deeper waters.
This time I waited, and even listened a bit. And sometimes all you
get is the promise of the long haul toward new life. No guarantees of how or
when, no neat tie-up after an hour.
The listening this year came with the help of Jesuit Fr. Dan
Berrigan’s poem, “Shall These Bones Live.” It is a longish
piece, so I hope he’ll forgive if I go to the end:
One to one
behind the hand
word sped
like
birds in midair
sipping ambrosia
winging away
Still
“he goes before you”
The broken circle
healed,
closed
“I go before you”
toward we know
and know
not
what
And so I’ll take my Easter this year with more than a grain
of uncertainty. But I’ll also greet this Easter with the treasure, not a
little bit supplied by all you readers and friends, of knowing the good company
of fellow travelers.
The NCR staff found itself in
need of some images of hope in this year so full of images of death and
desolation. So we asked a simple question of a rather random crew around the
country, many of whom appeared in our pages in one fashion or another during
the past year. You’ll recognize some and meet others for the first time on
pages 13 to 17. I think it’s not a bad question at any time: Where do you
find resurrection?
The staff of the newspaper and the rest of the crew throughout the
NCR Publishing Company wish you a Happy Easter.
Finally, we give special thanks to the sixth grade students from
St. Sabina’s School in Chicago, who answered our question, and for our
young artists from St. Mary’s Academy in Denver, whose artwork graces our
pages.
-- Tom Roberts
My e-mail address is troberts@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, March 29,
2002
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