Welcome Home!

Welcome Home!

Then

 

Longing for home,

anticipating an arriving,

engaging in

hearty back slapping,

experiencing the

sweetest hugs,

hearing

an inquiry

from the heavens above,

tell me, how was the journey?

 

Now

 

Confined to a sick bed,

in the final throes of mortality,

with the welcome

companion of memory,

surrounded

by a loving family,

recalling footsteps

once taken tentatively

on earth’s changing soil,

a life of Christian service,

faith led,

seeking a way home,

through the

sweat on the brow,

created by a lifetime

of joyful endeavour

of wholesome toil,

not always right

not always wrong,

in humility,

learning the melody

of life’s

tremendous song

walking side by side

with my dearest treasure,

faith in God, that constantly danced along.

 

Forever

 

Listening from within,

that is prayer,

finally understood

after a lifetime of talking,

finally realising

all those words were not needed,

just a listening ear,

tuned into

the most

gentle of all voices,

that of love,

hearing in the silence

from love himself

that you are loved,

so return

that love

in your every moment,

no matter how ordinary

or extraordinary,

prayer is creating

the atmosphere

where Christ’s voice is heard,

now, the priest prays..

 

“Go forth Christian soul..”

 

sweet words,

caressing the mourning air,

decorating the dying moment,

heard from

the mystery of distance,

of leaving behind,

when a final breath

exits the ailing body,

now, then, and forever

Christ’s final words

are whispered

on the gentle breeze

of eternal life,

intoned in sacred ritual,

heard with immeasurable joy….welcome home!

Fr Patrick Brennan 2020 ©

I was recalling my priestly ministry to the dying. Thinking of the souls that I have accompanied in prayer at the end of life. It is one of the priests most humbling and sacred responsibilities, to pray the words of anointing and usher with loving words, a soul into the hands of God. I offer the above poem and prayer as fruit of these many encounters over the years of my priesthood.

May eternal rest and peace be granted, and the greeting with Christ be joyful, a final homecoming.

Source: http://humblepiety.blogspot.com/2020/08/welcome-home.html