Mtr Mary Trainor

Now when these things begin to take place…

Dear friend,

There are signs all around us. Beyond the literal forms of billboards, bus benches, and open-closed for business signs, there is an abundance of more subtle signs with which most of us are familiar.

When my brother and I were young children, we could read our small environment pretty well. One such situation stands out in spite of the many passing years. If our mother appeared with a scarf on her head, knotted on top as seen in the image of Rosie the Riveter of World War II poster fame, we knew we had best lay low. Whenever she wore that scarf, she was in the foulest of moods. Now, there was no science behind our thinking, but experientially we knew it to be true. Later we recognized a subtle connection between that knotted scarf and it being her cleaning day.

***

In the very end-times passage from Luke today, Jesus speaks of horrible events that will occur as precursors to his return. This passage is apocalyptic in that it offers signs about the end of the world, the end of time. It may be hyperbole, an extreme version constructed to scare us into being better. Conversely, it may be a representation of events that will occur as described. One cannot be certain.

For me, the problem with seeing it as “literal” is that we have had disasters in every age, every nation, cycles of recurring pain, suffering, war and famine, and heartsick mothers with children born out of and into desperation. The reality of these events has not yet ushered in the return of Christ. Or have they?

***

Today, June 19, is Juneteenth, just made a federal holiday with President Biden’s signature. Juneteenth acknowledges the end of chattel slavery in 1866, even though President Lincoln had signed the emancipation proclamation in 1863. Another law worth changing was the one prohibiting interracial marriage, which was made legal in 1967. 

The matter of racism, of white supremacy, remains far from being resolved. As are issues of sexism, ageism, ableism. Is it possible, though, that even our baby steps toward justice for all are signs of the coming of Christ?

The passage today may more nearly represent that Christ is able to break through the darkest of times. When all the necessary adjustments are made, perspectives altered, injustice corrected, wounds healed, perhaps that is when we will see Christ coming in full glory.

***

A colleague of mine lost her best friend. About a month after the death, my friend had a dream in which her former pal appeared to her briefly. “Tell me what’s it’s like, have you seen your parents?” The deceased woman answered softly, “Not yet. I am still being made whole.”

I believe our earthly journey is about being made whole—and if we die short of that accomplishment, when we awake, the heavenly completion awaits.

Perhaps in heaven my mother at last grabbed the knotted scarf from her head and tossed it to the four winds.

Mtr Mary