heartsteps

Easter God,
persuade us that Easter
is not a once-upon-a-time story,
but rather a moment by moment leaning into,
a deep trust,
that your name and nature
is Resurrection.
This rising up
from the dead,
of life from matter,
and mind from life,
and a promised future
where we see nothing
but dead-ends and a darkened tomb,
is your M.O.
This is the only miracle,
that you are always rising up
in willing hearts and souls,
unafraid to hope,
and to be hope,
for a world entranced
by despair.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

Matthew 23:32

Now we open
to the story of the Crucified and Risen One,
arms stretched out
across the chasms of fear,
pulling factions into his own broken body,
closer to his pierced heart,
so that this planet of pain
may one day claim as its own
the love flowing out from that
sacred, broken heart.

Yes, pull us in, Spirit of the Living God,
into the heart of our hearts,
that we might once and for all
lay down our arsenals of fear
and take up our tools
to build the kin-dom of God
for the sake of all creation.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

LUKE 15:11-24

We gather now,
harvesters of an all-pervasive grace,
unexpected benefactors of the deed
to this great and glorious cosmic inheritance.
We, the walking, waking stars,
ablaze with wonder,
imagination,
and hope,
gather to remember three words:
kinship with all that is;
debt that can only be paid forward;
gift, sacred mantra of the humble.
Creation,
the great and glorious sacrifice of abundance,
asks in return —
only —
that we shed our entitled egos
and drop to our knees,
uttering a single, simple prayer
that changes everything:
“Thank you.”
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

When will we learn,
O Lover of all creation
that self-diminishment is not a
prerequisite for the Christian life?

You do not ask us to
drag around our sad sack of sins,
raising clouds of dust in our footsteps
for all to see;
and you do not ask us to do one more
wretched thing from guilt -
particularly, serve you.

When will we learn,
O Tender One,
that all you ask is for us to open our hearts
and to love this precious planet
the love in your sacred heart?

Here, now,
we stopped running from the obvious -
we are:
Love enfleshed,
Love wounded,
Love crazed,
Lovesick;
and all that you ask
is for us to stop whatever it is we think we’re doing
and be who we are:
a sacred cosmos awakening to itself,
the mind of the planet fetching a new future,
your heart pulsing with possibility.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

Matthew 18:10-14

Holy One,
how long,
how long
until we realize that it is love
which set the stars in place
and binds the planets in their orbits?

How long until we understand that the cardinal’s whistle
is a love song,
a canticle of praise for the lover,
and that Earth’s long journey through this cosmos
is the time it is taken to awaken to Love’s embrace?

How long until we realize that we are here,
not to increase net worth,
but to awaken to our own intrinsic value
as Love’s progeny.
You are the hidden heart of the cosmos,
and when we turn our attention to the affairs of the heart,
there we find you,
smiling,
from everywhere and everyone,
joyous to know that another lost soul has been found.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

O God,
whose heart is broken
by the violence in the human race,
forgive us that we have lacked
the imagination and collective will
to create a warless world.

Forgive us for breaking faith
with those who gave their lives,
for the unconscionable gap between the rich and the poor,
for corruption and deceit in high places,
for the profit gained by the sale of weapons,
for the spirit of domination in our world leaders,
for learning so little from the deaths of 100 million
in the past century.

In you alone is our hope;
in your power, which can purify the human heart
and set our feet on the path of peace, do we trust.
You can do great things
in willing hearts.
Break, then, our hardened hearts.
Break them with grief, with memory, and with hope.
In the name of the Prince of Peace.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

Luke 5:1-11

Holy friend,
we gather this morning
weary and worn from the industry
of our living.

Like the Galilean disciples,
we have been fishing night and day
without a single sardine
to show for our troubles.
We have worked our fingers to the bone,
worried our minds into a fine mess,
and frightened our hearts into hiding.

But it is a new day.
Speak words of grace
into our anxious striving.
Stir us with a new purpose,
and grant us a vision
that a soul would want to drop its neck into.

Reveal to us the abundance,
the hidden, teeming life,
just below the surface of our
longing lives.

What is there to do but to follow
our beloved,
the depth-finder Nazarene,
with a new determination
born not of our grit
but of your grace?
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

Luke 19:28-40, Matthew 21:1-11, Mark 11:1-11

Jesus tells us that even the stones
would cry out if we kept silent.
How do we,
now the stones’ vocal cords,
express our awe?

The weight of pink cherry blossoms
drooping against the blue sky,
and the return of the yellow and oranges faces
we call “daffodil” leave us speechless.
Even as the word leaves our lips,
it must be followed by a confession
that are naming of things
domesticates the wild mystery of life
and manages the “spell of the sensuous”,
which threatens to stop us in our tracks
and grind the industry of our “getting and spending”
to a blessed halt.

We consent to this Sabbath from certainty,
Holy One,
so that we might be re-initiated into the mystery
of life on this planet,
this blue jewel came to life–
Love’s project–
and came to consciousness in us
so that we might break the stony silence
with praise for you,
whom we’ve learned never to bet against.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

Genesis 37:1–24

We have managed to roll together
the tangled strands of our lives
and get ourselves here.

We take this soft and colorful ball of life –
the school knapsacks filled with anticipation,
the news from home,
the co-worker we can’t stand,
the friend that means the world to us,
the dreams that become true if we just had time,
the failures that haunt our sleep,
the medical report we await,
the love received,
the healing laughter -
we take it all and entrust it as an offering to
the Cosmic Knitter,
who fashions – like an ancient granny -
from these ends our lives,
a coat of many colors.

We place these woolly bits of our living
in the knitting bag
of the sacred liturgy,
listen for the eternal click and clack of needles,
and eagerly await the finishing touches of Spirit.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin

The ancient ones saw it this way:
in the beginning the Holy One allowed the light,
“Let there be light,”
and from Spirit’s being,
a radiance emerged
that lit creation’s path toward its sacred future.

The scientists see it this way:
in the beginning, from the darkness and emptiness of nothingness,
an unaccountable explosion of radiation
expanded outward in all directions,
which now our instruments can measure.

The first disciples saw it this way:
Jesus, too, allowed the light
to brighten dark death’s reign,
announcing a new creation,
brightened by justice for all.

The Magi, lovers of the starry skies, saw it this way:
the heavens all pointed to an uncreated light,
now formed in a baby’s eye,
Earth’s native Star,
worthy of wonder and a gift-laden visit.

We might look at it this way:
that same light that shone in Jesus
shines now through us,
and this festival of epiphany is real–
or not–
depending on whether we allow
an eternal shining
to light our path
into a future that awaits
our distinctive stamp.

Let there be light.
Amen.

Bruce Sanguin