Spiritual Sunday
If you feel at all discouraged by skyrocketing Covid cases or rising rightwing terrorism or (fill in the blank), here’s a wonderful poem about St. Jude, patron saint of impossible causes. Joseph Awad, a Lebanese-American, knows as an impossible cause when he sees one. “Once beautiful Beirut,” he laments, has been “bloodied by Christian, Jew and Druze” and “weeps like a wound just under the world’s heart.”
St. Jude, one of the twelve disciples, may have been martyred in Lebanon. Awad doesn’t know what impossible acts he performed, but he is “beginning a novena [series of prayers]” to him.
When something seems impossible, don’t stop praying.
For Jude’s Lebanon
It is said he was a relative of Jesus,
That his apostolate
Was to the land we know as Lebanon,
That he gave his blood for Christ.
What wonders did he perform
To win the Barnum & Bailey blurb,
“Patron saint of the impossible.”
I’m beginning a novena to St. Jude.
His lone epistle opens lovingly:
“Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ
And brother of James, to the called
Who have been loved in God the Father
And preserved for Christ Jesus,
Mercy and peace and love
Be yours in abundance.”
I’m beginning a novena to St. Jude.
He had a poet’s way with words.
Evil, sensual men he called
“Wild waves of the sea,
Foaming up their shame,
Wandering stars for whom
The storm of darkness
Has been reserved forever.”
I’m beginning a novena to St. Jude.
In Lebanon there is loud lamentation.
Beirut, once beautiful Beirut,
Bloodied by Christian, Jew and Druze,
Weeps like a wound just under the world’s heart.
Pontius Pilates in world capitals
Wash their hands, pronouncing solemnly,
The situation is impossible.”
I’m beginning a novena to St. Jude.
