Here we are! In a world of liminal space – that in-between-ness where time seems to stand still. This is the threshold experience, transition or perhaps transformation, the chrysalis time between what was and what is next. It has a timeless quality, an eternal-feeling of waiting, crouching possibility, which can result in both anxiety and hopeful expectation – fear and joy. Inasmuch as it seems to be a nowhere landscape, it really is the most present – It is as it is, and somehow we are asked to stand or sit in it. This could describe our current experience of the world within the context of the pandemic. What is it asking of us? What is the response? For that matter, what is the question? I don’t pretend to be able to answer these, but perhaps there is an invitation to reign in the fragments of our lives – the past and future that we constantly substitute for the present and synch the energies of the mind, heart and body – the mental, the courageous and the visceral.
There is a wholeness about the liminal space of Holy Saturday. In the throes of death, there is still the movement of life, even though we may not be able to conceive it, see it, feel it or name it. The Divine Faithfulness seems to have submerged within that deep ocean of mystery that we now seem afloat on. Yet, we are being held! Held by the that Divine Wisdom that has traversed the ages as a great buoy in times of turmoil and synthesis. Bobbing up and down on the waves of chaos, She draws us ever closer to a horizon barely visible. Can we recognize Her?
Some of the most beautiful Scriptures are selected for the liturgy of Holy Saturday, the Easter Vigil. One of the most poignant comes from the prophet, Baruch (Bar 3:9-15, 32–4:4), who is attempting to tune us into this great Divine Wisdom that beckons us and promises safe passage through the liminal and into the treasuries of New Life always present and always hidden:
Learn where prudence is,
where strength, where understanding;
that you may know also
where are length of days, and life,
where light of the eyes, and peace.
Who has found the place of wisdom,
who has entered into her treasuries?
The One who knows all things knows her;
he has probed her by his knowledge–
The One who established the earth for all time,
and filled it with four-footed beasts;
he who dismisses the light, and it departs,
calls it, and it obeys him trembling;
before whom the stars at their posts
shine and rejoice;
when he calls them, they answer, “Here we are!”
shining with joy for their Maker.
Such is our God;
no other is to be compared to him:
he has traced out the whole way of understanding,
and has given her to Jacob, his servant,
to Israel, his beloved son.
She is our guide and our Way, and she is known – Divinely known – Here we are! Where will we find Her? Matthew’s Gospel (MT 28: 1-10) from the Easter Vigil gives us a hint perhaps.
After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning,
Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to see the tomb.
And behold, there was a great earthquake;
for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven,
approached, rolled back the stone, and sat upon it.
His appearance was like lightning
and his clothing was white as snow.
The guards were shaken with fear of him
and became like dead men.
The women in Jesus’ life say HERE WE ARE and approach that tomb at dawn, not knowing what they would find, but willing to risk being on and in that threshold of whatever was to come, whatever newness may await them? Directed to go tell the other disciples that Jesus is Risen, they went away quickly from the tomb, fearful yet overjoyed! They are moving forward trusting amidst fear and joy. They are experiencing what Baruch has described as a whole way of understanding, which integrates the mind, heart and body in a wholeness that can hold tensions without being paralyzed. So much more than just the shaking fear of ‘dead men,’ this is the movement of Divine Wisdom in New Life/Resurrection, carried liminally here in the integrated treasuries of clarity in mind, courage in heart, and visceral presence in body.
Who has found the place of wisdom,
who has entered into her treasuries?
Their Way becomes even more personally revealed to them at the end of the Gospel:
And behold, Jesus met them on their way and greeted them.
They approached, embraced his feet, and did him homage.
Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid.
Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee,
and there they will see me.”
“Do Not Be Afraid” is told to the women twice in this Gospel, once by the Angel at the tomb and then by Jesus. However, it is quite clear that fear does not have a hold on these women. On the Vigil of Easter, could the first appearance of the resurrection be telling us that divine wisdom dances upon the liminal path of presence and wholeness, moving within fear and joy, not necessarily one or the other, but unattached to either? As we will hear throughout the upcoming Easter season, presence and absence are siblings in the accounts of Christ’s resurrection appearances. Is there a lightness to the depth of the Easter mystery that we overlook? In other words, are we being asked to loosen our grip a bit to really fall into the depths of what this Newness is all about? I wonder what treasuries we could find in our present day world if we consider the possibility for New life in such a liminal way.