A poem about liturgy and life that I wrote this morning:

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Watch a storm roll in.
The sky darkens on the horizon,
thunderclaps in the distance,
the winds pick up,
the temperature drops,
light rain begins to fall,
and, imperceptibly,
it is upon you.

Then, the denouement,
the rain is still intense,
but the thunderclaps are less
and farther away.
Then the rain lightens,
and the sky brightens,
and the wind dies down,
and you enter a new world
transfigured by rain and sun.

We view the world through lenses
with a pace and at a speed
that was never meant for us.
What we have built,
the metaverse we have created
since the first book was written,
the first edition printed,
the first photograph taken,
the first film captured,
the first computer networked,
is a far cry from the quiet,
patient,
slow-paced world
for which we were built,
and which was built for us.

The noise cannot be drowned out
with more noise,
pleasant noise --
because the problem is not
that the noise needs drowned out.

The problem is that
the noise drowns us out,
keeps our heads below water
that is rising even as we swim up
and up and up, but never fast enough
to reach the top,
like trying to scroll to the bottom
of an endless newsfeed
on a social media platform
of your choice (but you don't have a choice).

When I first met the Latin Mass
(we really hit it off)
I found an act of worship
that was not conceived
with the cold efficiency
of a business meeting
or the awkward conviviality
of dinner with extended family,
but rather a place
where the King of Kings
enters again this world of ours
as he did before,
like a thunderstorm

slowly, deliberately,
with silence
and with regal sound,
in solemn majesty,
portended in a thousand subtle ways,
and upon you imperceptibly,
leaving all before and behind
transfigured.

Like a thunderstorm:
not narrated,
not explained,

Like a thunderstorm:
needing no introduction.

Like a thunderstorm:
making no apology.