Of epilogues and prefaces

Again and again at the present moment, the daily lectionary readings are apocalyptic – visionary passages that reveal the death throes of the world as we know it, and the birth pangs of a world to come.

A timely reminder that scripture is not given to shape the communal imagination for holding back the tide, shoring-up a defensive wall against the world as we know it ending;

nor given to shape the communal imagination for hastening the end of the world as we know it, whether by forcing God’s hand or giving God a helping-hand;

nor even given to shape the communal imagination for survival beyond the end of the world as we know it, in some reduced circumstance;

but given to shape the communal imagination for enabling life to flourish, in the midst of the upheaval.

To join in with the One who declares, ‘See – I am doing a new thing!’

The apocalyptic imagination dares us to ask:

How will we shape our community for the flourishing of the asylum-seeker?

How will we shape our community for the flourishing of those whose dead we have buried?

How will we shape our community for the flourishing of the husband and wife pulled apart by dementia, yet held-together by love?

How will we shape our community for the flourishing of those whose world is violently falling apart around them, while those around them carry on as if nothing has happened?

The only answers that have any substance are those that give solid shape to a new world. That is to say, the only answers that have any substance are practices. The practice of eating together. The practice of listening to one another’s stories. The practice of hospitality.