Anne Lastman
We live in a time of Divine Mercy an extreme Mercy. A time between Kairos moments and a time in which we need to both sow for the new and coming season and to harvest that which was sown in recent past.
This time of Mercy is Harvest time. It’s a time when all past labours are coming to an end and rest is possible because the work is done. Today we live in a time of both sin and Mercy. Wheat and darnel. Sin abounds and Grace and Mercy abound all the more. Sin against life (abortion, euthanasia, transgender, abuse, and other) abound, yet in His infinite mercy God grants another time of sowing in order to return and gather another harvest. His Mercy is from age to age and remains something mysterious. His ways so different from ours. His sowing unexpected.
Mercy does not only consist of empathy, sympathy, compassion, forgiveness, but in its totality is a divine, mysterious response. Like Grace, Mercy is experienced rather than explained because there are no words to explain these divine grifts. These two “gifts” from our Father show clearly the intrinsic worth and high estimation He has for the value of the human being which He has created and enlivened with His own breath. He enlivened dead worthless material (mud) into one in ‘His image and likeness” (Gen 1:27). The value of this being created in His own image. By His own hand and design. His love for those who through the decision of others, have been stripped of their humanity and the inherent dignity, worth, etched within their being. The very things of Himself which He shares with the creature.
It’s the dignity inherent in the human being which requires, and indeed demands, that Mercy be shown. It’s in the essence of its humanity where the restoration of worth through Mercy and Grace is most evident. The restoration of an aborted infant to the human family is not only an act of mercy but is followed by Grace which can heal the parents and those who aborted the infant but can also heal society whose ethos has embraced the abortion. The restoration of life rather than the chosen death (euthanasia). Moment of Grace. Restoration of the true, understanding that God created the human being male and female ((Gen 1:27) and this design, not be changed. It has His seal stamped on it which is to be forever male and female through whom creation of life will continue. Male and female who begin the human family and form human society. By this option to restore the human family through the Grace of recognition that humanity, its worth, its dignity, are enfolded in Grace. Not a word but a divine gift without the possibility of true understanding of the word but in surety that Grace filled time is God’s gift.
Intentional death is the enemy’s attempt at usurping God. The sins against life are enormous. but Mercy remains. it’s not withdrawn. There are three virtues, enfleshed in our beings faith hope and love and greatest of these is love, (1 Cor.13:13) and a preference for the primacy given to love. Mercy is love. Love is Mercy which restores the wounded and the broken and speaks, “ I have redeemed you. You are mine” (Isaiah 43:1).
Apart from sins against life (God’s domain) the anawim are found whenever the heart listens and yearns and the eyes see and ears hear. The hungry, the weak, marginalised, abandoned, homeless, cold, aged. Indeed the true “anawim” but also in charity bring into its embrace the aborted, who are truly the poorest of the poor. These little ones who live in their short lives, all the attributes which characterise the anawim. Dignity, worth, estimation. All the categories of anawim can rightly be seen to converge into one, beginning with life when thrown as medical waste, or those on the streets, starved of life, rejected, cold in death. A life, infused with divine spirit in a human form. An Anawim A society which has forgotten to love, It’s in the treatment of the anawim and that the character of a society which is remembered and honoured or not honoured. It’s in the treatment of its anawim, poorest of the poor. that the merciful will receive mercy.
With over 70 million known abortions per year, the hungry in a time of plenty, the pain of society, the bodies lying on the ground, in corners of buildings, on park benches, under the effects of addiction or the homeless, the anawim who in time cry out, when Lord, when. “He is just a cry away. the poor and the righteous cried and the Lord heard them saves and delivers them” (Ps 23:6 -17). and more aptly the anawim “Oh sovereign Lord Holy and true, how long before you judge? before you judge the people who belong to this world and avenge our blood for what they have done to us “ (Rev. 6:10). The anawim mirror a society’s condition, one full of wealth, but great poverty of love.
Our anawim call on the Lord to return Love, Mercy, Peace and the ultimate gift Grace to our world whose iron dome has again been breached by the enemy of our creator and the enemy of Our Creator’s creation.
We have almost completed the Lenten journey. Has it been a good journey or a missed opportunity, or even a moment of great Grace? Grace is the experience of knowing that our God has really touched us and it cannot be explained, even talked about, but known and it has left a change. Grace can even come in the guise of comfort when there is no comfort but suddenly appears in the guise of an Anawim, Mercy, Grace, Love, Lent.
