The Navajos and Saint Patrick
I’m having difficulty with a prayer that is suggested on the televised Mass on Catholic TV. The part that makes me go hmm is “Jesus I love you above all things”…. Hmmm…
Do I? I want to, I know that they should, that it is my ultimate joy, but… I love my family so much, and my close friends, and I want to mean what I say and pray, so I don’t know that I can honestly say that I love Jesus more than them. But, then, I started thinking…
Definitely, I have particular affection for these individuals in my life, I love them dearly, but, what do I love in them, through them, and beyond them…?
Truth … Beauty… Pure, innocent goodness… Love.
Aren’t all these Christ?
I’m sharing this post that I wrote on another Saint Patrick’s Day exploring the deep and profound mystery of Christ…
Beauty Ever Ancient, Ever New…
Unknown to each other, unheard of in distance of time, their two lands with what might as well be a universe than an ocean between them, men with spiritual eyes and spiritual ears walked the selfsame way of pilgrimage. From the Navajos (as retold by Joseph Campbell):
Oh beauty before me, beauty behind me,
beauty to the left of me, beauty to the right of me,
beauty above me, beauty below me,
I’m on the pollen path.
From a prayer, known as the breastplate of Saint Patrick:
I arise today, through
The strength of heaven,
The light of the sun,
The radiance of the moon,
The splendor of fire,
The speed of lightning,
The swiftness of wind,
The depth of the sea,
The stability of the earth,
The firmness of rock.…Christ with me,
Christ before me,
Christ behind me,
Christ in me,
Christ beneath me,
Christ above me,
Christ…
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Christina Chase View All
Although crippled by disease, I'm fully alive in love. I write about the terrible beauty and sacred wonder of life, while living with physical disability and severe dependency. A revert to the Catholic faith through atheism, I'm not afraid to ask life's big questions. I explore what it means to be fully human through my weekly blog and have written a book: It's Good to Be Here, published by Sophia Institute Press.
Christina Chase 
Or whatsoever you do to the least of my brethren …
Happy St Patrick’s Day!
Will
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Yes! Matthew 25 sums up the mystic reality of Christ here and now, in every person we encounter. It was one of the passages of Scripture that helped me want to become Christian. Perhaps, Patrick’s living of it helped his former captors want the same… Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you!
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