Rogation Sunday

After waiting expectantly for some months, I finally received Malcolm Guite's newest book Galahad and the Grail. It is the first of four volumes in which Guite retells to the story of Arthur, but in verse. And, It. Is. Wonderful. I am a slow reader and I read it in just over a day, if that tells you anything about how splendid this book is. While there is so much I could, and would like to, say about this work, two things stand out to me which are timely for us. The first is how time is marked throughout the epic; the second relates to caring for the earth.

Throughout the epic Arthur and other knights continually note what "time" it is based on the seasons of the Church calendar: Pentecost, Hallowstide, Christmas, Easter. Such feast (or fast) days of the Church tell the people what time it is. Rather than our commercialized calendars, or the school calendar, it is the Church who reminds us of time. And this she does for she is the Body of Christ. Therefore all our time is related to the life of Christ. Second, throughout the epic, the land is diseased due to the abuse wrought on it by wicked knights. Naiads and Dryads have delved deep in the earth forsaking their rivers and trees, leaving a wasteland in their departure. (Perhaps this reminds us of Tolkien's Dead Marshes or what Saruman did to Isengard.) Part of the knights' quest is to bring healing to the land. 

I mention both of these things–time and the land–because this coming Sunday is known as Rogation Sunday. The Church reminds us of what time it is. And this day, and the subsequent Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, are days in which we remember that we are a part of this world (to take up Merriadoc's lament to Treebeard.) We remember that this earth is not ours; it is the Lord's and the handiwork of His creative love. We remember that it is only by His sustaining life that the earth continues to "seed forth seed." And so we ask for the Lord's mercy and grace, especially for those whose livelihood is tied to the land. (I think days such as this make Wendell Berry's heart sing.)

In our modern, technologically–advanced, consumptive age, we too easily forget that this is our Father's world. It is His good creation and we are to be His stewards of it; not usurpers. In our age of immediate Amazon deliveries we too easily forget the life of patience and prayer which depending on the earth is meant to bring forth in our lives. In this hurried and anxious age in which we rise early and go to bed late eating the bread of anxious toil, we forget that we were made to rely and depend on the Lord. For all things come from Him. It is His goodness and joy to give us good things; it is to be our joy to offer them back to Him in love.

Grace & Peace,

Fr. Matthew