23 January 2007

In Convertendo

...Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy!
He who goes out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing,
Shall come home with shouts of joy,
Bringing his sheaves with him.

Ps. 126:5,6

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Whar are his sheaves?

William Weedon said...

Sheaves are bundles of wheat.

Israel went out into her exile carrying her seed for sowing, her children, and when God turned her captivity, she came home to the land, with many descendants, her sheaves. The harvest of her seed.

Similarly, our holy mother, the Church, weeps as she plants the seed of the body of one of her children in the earth, but that she knows that when the final Morning dawns, she will "come home" to the heavenly Jerusalem, bringing the "harvest" - the raised bodies of all her children.

Anonymous said...

Our thoughts and prayers are with the Altevogt and Weedon family as you go through this period of grief.

Hope you were healthier today.

Deb

Anonymous said...

Hearing these words, as proclaimed in the music of the first movement of Brahm's "Ein Deutsches Requiem," can be very therapeutic in times such as these. Brahms is particularly effective at describing musically the contrast between "mit Tränen säen" and "mit Freuden ernten." In fact, the whole Requiem is, for me, a place I return to again and again in times of grief.