{"id":120160,"date":"2023-04-10T07:26:25","date_gmt":"2023-04-10T11:26:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=120160"},"modified":"2023-04-10T06:27:22","modified_gmt":"2023-04-10T10:27:22","slug":"seven-stanzas-at-easter-7","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=120160","title":{"rendered":"Seven Stanzas at Easter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Make no mistake: if He rose at all<br \/>\nit was as His body;<br \/>\nif the cells\u2019 dissolution did not reverse, the molecules<br \/>\nreknit, the amino acids rekindle,<br \/>\nthe Church will fall.<\/p>\n<p>It was not as the flowers,<br \/>\neach soft Spring recurrent;<br \/>\nit was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled<br \/>\neyes of the eleven apostles;<br \/>\nit was as His Flesh: ours.<br \/>\nThe same hinged thumbs and toes,<br \/>\nthe same valved heart<br \/>\nthat pierced died, withered, paused, and then<br \/>\nregathered out of enduring Might<br \/>\nnew strength to enclose.<br \/>\nLet us not mock God with metaphor,<br \/>\nanalogy, sidestepping transcendence;<br \/>\nmaking of the event a parable, a sign painted in the<br \/>\nfaded credulity of earlier ages:<br \/>\nlet us walk through the door.<\/p>\n<p>The stone is rolled back, not paper-mache,<br \/>\nnot a stone in a story,<br \/>\nbut the vast rock of materiality that in the slow<br \/>\ngrinding of time will eclipse for each of us<br \/>\nthe wide light of day.<\/p>\n<p>And if we will have an angel at the tomb,<br \/>\nmake it a real angel,<br \/>\nweighty with Max Planck\u2019s quanta, vivid with hair,<br \/>\nopaque in the dawn light, robed in real linen<br \/>\nspun on a definite loom.<\/p>\n<p>Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,<br \/>\nfor our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,<br \/>\nlest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are<br \/>\nembarrassed by the miracle,<br \/>\nand crushed by remonstrance.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013John Updike (1932-2009)<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Today (4\/9): The Resurrection of the Lord<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/angels?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#angels<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cOn Easter Sunday the Church celebrates the Resurrection of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ from the dead, the greatest feast of the liturgical year.\u201d<br \/>We joyfully proclaim,\u201dHe is risen!\u201d with the response,\u201dHe is risen, indeed!\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/dVm44v38ft\">pic.twitter.com\/dVm44v38ft<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; WritingAngels (@LectorGirl85) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/LectorGirl85\/status\/1645099943575838721?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">April 9, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Make no mistake: if He rose at all it was as His body; if the cells\u2019 dissolution did not reverse, the molecules reknit, the amino acids rekindle, the Church will fall. It was not as the flowers, each soft Spring<span class=\"ellipsis\">&hellip;<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=120160\">Read more &#8250;<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!-- end of .read-more --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":794,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571,113],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-120160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-easter","category-poetry-literature"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/794"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=120160"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120160\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":120162,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120160\/revisions\/120162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=120160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=120160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=120160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}