a good friday blessing in the midday night, Kate Bowler, OSLC, Good Friday C, April 18 2025

On Good Friday, a sermon or even a homily seems overdone. We're already deep in the meditation on the cross in front of us. We already feel death in our spirit and bones. This felt like the right words at the moment.

a good friday blessing in the midday night

Kate Bowler  

o dear God,
we’re in darker places
then we’ve ever known

God, light the way
for this whole sad earth,
for the helpless ones,
and for me

God have mercy.
Christ have mercy.
Spirit have mercy.

night has fallen
on the light of the world
and betrayal seems
the order of the day.

love itself is handed over
to brutal ignorance
and cunning that loves the dark.

o God,
you chose to feel what we feel—
how it is to die totally alone,
ghastly to behold
in your outstretched
arms of the cross.
are you gathering to yourself
every hideous thing?
every failure,
travesty, and wrong?
blessed are we
who shout: yes! do it!
turn things right side up again!

blessed are we
who bow and wait
for the morning of the world.

The light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness
has not overcome it.
John 1:5

God have mercy.
Christ have mercy.
Spirit have mercy.

open your hands.
receive it–
love that comes
gently as the dawn.