It is dark now. We have witnessed, as pastor John Pavlovitz tells us, “a spectacular failure of the collective humanity of this nation: a defiant refusal to welcome in our better angels, a passionate embrace of the darkest recesses of our shadow sides.” For those of us who are white and cis gendered the wave of hate might take a little longer to reach us than our brothers and sisters of color, lgbtq and those who live on the margins, but none of us will be left unscathed. Seems almost impossible that it will be light again. But it will. It will because we, as people of faith, regardless of how hard it is to find our way in the dark, will create small pockets of light throughout the sea of darkness. It’s who we are. It’s what we are called to do. And each time it will become easier for us to see where to create the next one and the next one.

I cannot tell you
how the light comes.

What I know
is that it is more ancient
than imagining.

That it travels
across an astounding expanse
to reach us.

That it loves
searching out
what is hidden,
what is lost,
what is forgotten
or in peril
or in pain.

That it has a fondness
for the body,
for finding its way
toward flesh,
for tracing the edges
of form,
for shining forth
through the eye,
the hand,
the heart.

I cannot tell you
how the light comes,
but that it does.
That it will.
That it works its way
into the deepest dark
that enfolds you,
though it may seem
long ages in coming
or arrive in a shape
you did not foresee.

And so
may we this day
turn ourselves toward it.
May we lift our faces
to let it find us.
May we bend our bodies
to follow the arc it makes.
May we open
and open more
and open still

to the blessed light
that comes.

by Jan Richardson