| DAY 24 - THE END OF ADVENT - 2010 |
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John Fogerty's been writing and singing songs
about the end of things for quite a while now. "Bad Moon Rising"
came out in 1969. This is from his '01 CD Eye Of The Zombie,
put out on the DreamWorks label. Further below is another song in the same vein -
"Premonition," the title cut from an '04 release on the Geffen Records label.
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Michaelangelo's "The Last Judgment"
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The One Who Cries in the Wilderness
This is another passage from a piece we used
earlier in the series, written by a Father Alfred Delp S.J.,
who was condemned as a traitor in Nazi Germany.
He wrote this shortly before he was hanged in 1945.
Woe to an age when the voices of those who cry
in the wilderness have fallen silent, outshouted
by the noise of the day or outlawed or swallowed up
in the intoxication of progress,
or growing smothered and fainter
for fear and cowardice. The devastation will soon
be so terrifying and universal that the word
"wilderness" will again strike our hearts and minds.
I think we know that.
But still there are no crying voices to raise
their plaint and accusation. Not for an hour
can life dispense with these John-the-Baptist
characters, these original individuals, struck by
the lightning of mission and vocation.
Their heart goes before them,
and that is why their eye is so clear-sighted,
their judgment so incorruptible.
They do not cry for the sake of crying
or for the sake of the voice.
Or because they begrudge earth's pleasant hours,
exiled as they themselves are from the
small warm companionships of the foreground.
Theirs is the great comfort known only to those
who have paced out the inmost and furthermost
boundaries of existence.
They cry for blessing and salvation.
They summon us to our last chance,
while already they feel the ground quaking
and the rafters creaking and see the firmest of
mountains tottering inwardly and see the very stars
in heaven hanging in peril.
They summon us to the opportunity of warding off,
by the greater power of a converted heart,
the shifting desert that will
pounce upon us and bury us.
Let us ask for clear eyes that are able to see
God's messengers of annunciation;
for awakened hearts with the wisdom to hear
the words of promise. Let us ask for faith
in the motherly consecration of life as shown
in the figure of the blessed woman of Nazareth.
Let us be patient and wait,
wait with Advent readiness for the moment
when it pleases God to appear in our night too,
as the fruit and mystery of this time.
And let us ask for the openness and willingness
to hear God's warning messengers and to
conquer life's wilderness through repentant hearts.
We must not shrink from or suppress
the earnest words of these crying voices,
so that those who today are our executioners
will not tomorrow become accusers because
we have remained silent.
Let us then live in today's Advent,
for it is the time of promise.
To eyes that do not see, it still seems
that the final dice are being cast
down in these valleys, on these battlefields,
in those camps and prisons and bomb shelters.
Those who are awake sense the workings
of the other powers and can await
the coming of their hour.
Space is still filled with the noise of
destruction and annihilation, the shouts
of self-assurance and arrogance, the weeping
of despair and helplessness.
But just beyond the horizon the eternal realities
stand silent in their age-old longing.
There shines on us the first mild light of
the radiant fulfillment to come.
From afar sound the first notes as of
pipes and singing boys, not yet discernible
as a song or melody. It is all far off still,
and only just announced and foretold.
But it is happening. This is today.
And tomorrow the angels will tell
what has happend with loud rejoicing voices,
and we shall know it and be glad,
if we have believed and
trusted in Advent.
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.Close-up detail from Michaelangelo's "The Last Judgement" -
Christ, known in universal circles, according to The Urantia Book,
as Michael of Nebadon, Creator Son and Soverign of the Universe of Nebadon,
one of over 700,000 such universes that track through the endless skies.
Known on this planet in his incarnated person as Joshua Ben Joseph,
Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, Master, Teacher, Counselor.
"...and He shall come again to judge the living and the dead."
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Both songs here have the title "The Last Judgment."
On the left is the Russian Chamber Choir of Komi Republic,
Vladimir Kontarev conducting, from their CD - Nikolsky:Choral Works,
released in '95 on the Russian Season label.
On the right is a cut from a soundtrack for a movie, In Bruges, a black comedy
that has nothing whatever to do with the Apocalypse, but composer Carter Burwell
gave this piece the title - and it fits the theme well, or so I hope.
It came out in '08 on the Lakeshore Records label.
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Former member of The Band Robbie Robertson
has put out some unusual material in his post-Band solo career.
This is off his first CD after the group's end, titled Robbie Robertson,
brought out on the Geffen label in '87.
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