Justin Appel

Dear Friends,

Today is the beginning of the Lenten season, Ash Wednesday.

Recently, Pope Francis made a public appeal to his audience at the Vatican ‘to everyone, believers and nonbelievers alike’ to make this day, Ash Wednesday, ‘a day of prayer and fasting for peace.’

Given this request, and given the urgency of it in light of recent geopolitical events, I thought I would share a simple video combining Arvo Pärt’s work Da Pacem Domine with some wartime photographs.

Some believe that Pärt dedicated this work to the victims of the 2004 terror attack in Madrid — although, as the Arvo Pärt Center’s description reads ‘Da Pacem Domine is in fact a universal prayer about the pain and suffering of all of humankind, expressing our firm belief that God is our only true protection, especially during restless times.’

The text comes from a prayer we sing at every Evensong:

Da pacem Domine 
in diebus nostris 
quia non est alius 
qui pugnet pro nobis 
nisi tu Deus noster.

Give peace in our time, O Lord,
For there is none other
That fighteth for us
But only thou, O Lord.

Please remember the notion that this music expresses a universal prayer. We all suffer; we all experience pain and separation, and this commanality helps us to empathize with those who live through truly harrowing experiences like war. Let us pray for those caught up in this war in Ukraine, and for peace.

Yours in Christ,
Justin

(Please note that some of the photos in the collage are quite disturbing.)