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SPRING FORWARD
. It’s that time of year when a sense of excitement stirs, and a new kind of energy weaves itself into our days and into our hearts. Earth is renewing itself. How can we not find ourselves caught up in it all?
I came across an interesting quote recently and share it here - one by renowned author Joseph Campbell. “People say that what we are all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we are really seeking. I think what we are seeking is an experience of being alive, of the rapture of being alive.”
Our liturgical season of Lent does have a somber quality about it – calling for self-examination and introspection. However, isn’t the theological focus of Lent all about the transition of death into renewed life? Getting ourselves ready to become alive again as we follow Christ towards and then through the cross to the other side of suffering where transformed life awaits?
This is a time to prepare to become alive again. We are called to explore the ground of our being, search for and find that what we thought was dead in us is putting out little green shoots. In our deep “soul” soil there is new life that wants to push through and bloom. Like with the tiny tips of tree branches – the miracle of life pushing through what had for a season seemed stark, bleak, barren. All this pushing through is really a miracle. Springtime, as with the season of Lent, is about getting ready for new birthing. Each spring as I see life being pushed out, I think about any birthing process, the pain that seems to be a natural part of the process. Giving birth, being birthed – difficult processes. But then exquisite joy as what emerges from the process sees the light, breathes in life and comes alive.
Our gospel passage this coming Sunday offers us the opportunity to listen in on a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus. It’s what could be fondly called the “born again” passage. Nicodemus is having trouble with the concept. The earth in springtime doesn’t seem to have trouble with the idea. Do we?
Torrence