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A Prayer for Those in Feverish Pursuit of Frivolous Pleasures Lord, the words of our Holy Father in Rome, echo through the voice of our parish priest, who gazes from the pulpit upon a congregation as silent and stunned on a chill November morning as a stillborn lamb delivered out of season. Lord, the echoes bounce off our forms, spaced irregularly across the array of pews, clumped in family-sized clusters, few and far between, to ricochet off the stain-glass saints, who add their own vehemence to the call, in such a way that the sermon gains energy with each subsequent reflection, until colliding against the new ceiling, not yet fully paid for, it crashes down upon us like a sonic storm of meteors, miraculously deflected, so I suppose, by nothing less than a collective, blunted conscience. It dissipated just so, leaving no trace. Afterward, I searched for it on the internet, but found only so many words without motive force. Although the impact of the message eluded me, I nevertheless perceive clearly both the importance of the message and the fact that I lack the capacity to receive it. Lord, I pray for the growth of antennae, attuned to whichever frequency over which you continue to broadcast, for I concede that I feverishly pursue frivolous pleasures and lack the character traits required to desist. |
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A Prayer for Those in Feverish Pursuit of Frivolous Pleasures David Keffer Knoxville, TN December 1, 2014 |