Lutheran Ping!
Posted on 07/05/2009 6:59:48 PM PDT by lightman
Prayer for the Celebrity’s Purgatory
There are no eyes that watch me in this place.
Did I not spend my earthly life in faith
that when the people saw me and adored,
their adulation brought its own reward?
But truth be told, that faith was never sure.
I was bound up, I know - could not break free.
The whole of life, from youth, was on a stage.
The habits of the child live into age
and tempter’s lies so sweet are hard to leave.
At least I grew suspicious of the scripts:
all different in detail, all ends the same.
The cameras flashed, the headlines claimed my fame.
They called me Genius, Rebel, Superstar.
They sold the tickets, albums - made the lies
more sure that told me I must ever shine.
I don’t know just what time it was, the line
I crossed – I only know that soon the cameras
found faults and sins would suit them just as well.
The pundits made me famous; just the same,
they were the ones who now invoked my name
in shock and shame - to titillate, to blame,
to mock, to mourn, to wonder at the waste,
sell and profit, shake the head, move on in haste:
Next victim! in the sacrificial game.
Upon the altar which they built for me
they set me up, they worshiped and adored;
and then, my sin and shame exposed, they gorged
themselves upon my naked, bloody flesh.
Can namelessness be grace? A start afresh?
For I can guess the stories that they tell
now that I sing in heaven, or in hell.
My corpse may rot; my memory may still
the needful place upon the victim’s altar fill.
Now that I’m gone, they feast upon this dinner –
“Gifted, brilliant! But was he saint or sinner?
Do blessed ones remove their shining halos
as he draws near, and laud him for his gifts?
Or rather, do the demons from the rifts
rise, flay him in just payment for his crimes?”
I once believed that death would bring the same –
Shouts to praise (or curse, condemn) my famous name.
But if I could, I’d tell them we were wrong.
There are no eyes that watch me in this place,
no ears that beg the singing of my song,
no mouths that speak of me, no deference
nor reference to me, no making sense
of me, blessed, cursed, or misbegotten soul.
They’re giving me no part to play, no starring role -
I’m merely fellow penitent and friend.
I’m neither king nor god, thank God! I’m no
anointed, no pariah – just a man.
I’m making sense of this as best I can.
The habits of the child live into age
and tempter’s lies so sweet are hard to leave,
but I believe I’ve come to disbelieve
the speaking of my name in praise or rage.
But here, one Name is spoken, if at all.
Our ears are pricked to hear His forward call.
O strange, O new, amazing, glorious grace!
There are no eyes that watch me in this place.
He offers this poem in response to the news of the death of Michael Jackson.
Ping.
Bump for later.
[8] We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
It's too late besides, Michael was a follower of Islam and by no stretch of the imagination is that Christian.
Pray for his family.
Michael Jackson is dead???????
A Lutheran purgatory?
I call it the ELCA.
I cannot say that I found the antics of Michael Jackson amusing or anything more than distasteful in life; yet he was a human being and therefore created in the image of God.
Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon him.
May he rest in peace.
Amen.
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