23 Speak to Aaron and his sons and say: This is how you must bless the Israelites. You will say:
24 May Yahweh bless you and keep you.
25 May Yahweh let his face shine on you and be gracious to you.
26 May Yahweh show you his face and bring you peace.
27 This is how they must call down my name on the Israelites, and then I shall bless them." [Exodus, Chapter 6]
And all the time you thought that came from Waterford so that they could make the best crystal in the world! Gotcha there. Turns out that God forgot the part about the "wind bein' at yer back" and the "road always risin' before you," the "sun always bein' warm upon yer face," and the "rain fallin' softly upon yer fields." I do admit that I like the whole thing. When I heard the God part of the blessing this morning, I was rather happy that God had beaten the Irish to the punch. It would be hard for a Canuck like me to have to admit that God hadn't thought of it first. But then again I figured that at least there's no argument about who made up the "Our Father."
As I was sitting there I was thinking, "Why was it the shepherds who got the news of the birth of Jesus first?" Imagine, shepherds. Of course maybe it was because there they were in the middle of the night, the only ones awake and alert. That's their job. Caring for sheep, not for themselves. Does that sound like someone you know? So, right from the first moment, we know why God has come among us. To serve. To stay awake. To care for others. The King of Kings doesn't show himself to those on earth who consider themselves to be high and mighty. He shows Himself first to the lowly and makes them look up into the heavens to see the angels before they look down and see Him in the manger -- the feeding trough that the shepherds use to take care of the animals entrusted to them.
French Frog that I am, I sat there listening to the Bible reading at Mass this morning and was thinking about the blessing that was dictated by Yahweh. I thought about the shepherds and then thought about the prayer dictated by God's Son, the Our Father.
I thought I was doing well, but then my French caught up to me and I had a fancy answer to the Shepherd question. Hang in there with me now. I know that there aren't too many of you out there who can follow this, but that's OK. I want to show you my silly mind at work.
Shepherd in French is BERGER.
To give shelter to someone in french is ÉBERGER.
So, Jesus born in a shepherd's shelter in a shepherd's feeding trough had to give the first nod to the shepherds, right? After all, He was in their house.
Now if I could only find out why everyone thinks there was a cow there too. The ass is no problem since that is the beast of burden who was galant enough to make Mary's trip a trifle more bearable. But a cow, in a shepherd's cave? Hmmm?
That's my French lesson to you for a while.
From Justa:
ReplyDeleteI like the picture and all the outfits. Father Moreno at Frances De Sales at Riverside church still says that blessing after mass. Matter of fact he sings it. How about that ?