Mtr Taylor Devine

Dear friend,

Over the past month or so the five Corps Members of the Beloved in the Desert intentional community have been working on wood block prints of the Great O Antiphons. The corresponding Antiphon for today is Key of Jesse or Clavis Jesse.

In our own tradition there are stories and stories and basements and basements of ways of experiencing and knowing God Almighty, hence the various names to which we call out in the O Antiphons. The Great O Antiphons use mostly language from the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible that God’s people used to describe this God they encountered through Covenant and the Wilderness and prayer and presence. Today's O Antiphon that is prayed before and after the Magnificat during Evening Prayer, Key of Jesse comes from a prophecy in Isaiah, "I will place on his shoulder the key of the house of David; he shall open, and no one shall shut; he shall shut, and no one shall open." Isaiah 22:22

The O Antiphons are most famously preserved and prayed in the favorite hymn O Come, O Come Emmanuel, whose lyrics date to the 8th century. (Have you heard that the original latin forms a reverse acrostic: ero cras,” which means, “I shall be with you tomorrow.” So good for Advent and every day all these centuries later!)

O come, O Key of David, come
and open wide our heavenly home;
Make safe the way that leads on high,
and close the path to misery.

May God's presence among us through Christ be known as a deep comfort, a shattering of the way of sin and death.

In Christ,
Mtr. Taylor

PS, The wood block prints, numbered one through twenty, are for sale in the Little Shop in La Paz at Saint Philip's. Seven sets remain, if you would like to have a set for yourself or as a gift, they are $100 and the proceeds go to programming for the Beloved in the Desert Community. The fourth one from the left is the Key of David Antiphon, depicting the door to death being shattered.

PPS, If you now have O Come, O Come Emmanuel stuck in your head and need more Advent music this week, check out this playlist on Spotify: Advent with Sacred Ordinary Days.