Resurrection Thursday: Go mend!

Happy Resurrection, friends! Easter Sunday kicks off a week in the liturgical calendar known as the Easter Octave and a seven-week festival called Eastertide or The Great Fifty Days.

You are a Kintsugi generation.

“Your generation will mend, and pour gold into the fissures of our broken times. And you can not only mend; you can create anew, create a world in which an invitation will be given to those who are broken. Those who mourn, those who are persecuted and those who are poor in spirit will be offered a great light. Your lives can be an offering of peace in a divided time — a gesture of hope for those in despair. Your sacrifice will be an aroma of the New.

So go mend. Be the Kintsugi masters of your generation, of your own disciplines, in the workplaces and in your homes. Pour gold into the fissures of the world. May you grow, just like the abundant columbines on the sunny hills of Colorado — waving their tiny purple wings and proclaiming the glorious splendor of the aroma of the New.

And know that your own wounds may be the entry into the Feast of Making. Remember that in Jesus’s post-Resurrection Body, there remains still his nail marks and the spear wound is visible - for Thomas’s of the world to touch. As the ole’ hymn goes, “Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee; Let the water and the blood, From Thy riven side which flowed, Be of sin the double cure.” (Thomas Hastings, 1784-1872) Through His wounds, we are healed (Isaiah 53:5), and a river of gold flows into our hearts and culture.”

-Makoto Fujimura

“Trauma mended becomes something new. It becomes a language we can speak into the divide and into the gap.”

-Makoto Fujimura

Watch: Mending Trauma | Theology of Making, Fuller Studio. Makoto Fujimura describes the Japanese art of kintsugi and the value that arises in being mended and renewed. See more from this event here.

Watch more videos about repairing things, including a Kintsugi basketball court in LA, through the links at the bottom of this post.

Read: Psalms 37:1-18; Psalm 146-149; Ezekiel 37:1-14; Acts 3:11-26; John 15:12-27

Listen: I made us a new playlist for Eastertide - Resurrection 2021: Who Will Roll Away the Stone?

Pray: Book of Common Prayer, Collect for Easter Thursday

Almighty and everlasting God, who in the Paschal mystery established the new covenant of reconciliation: Grant that all who have been reborn into the fellowship of Christ's Body may show forth in their lives what they profess by their faith; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Do: In previous years, we've celebrated the Great 50 Days between Easter Sunday and Pentecost Sunday (aka, Eastertide) with a series I've dubbed Practice Resurrection (after the Wendell Berry poem). It's one of my favorite series all year, and I'm excited to start again.  To get the photo-sharing party started, I’ve created an 8-day Instagram challenge for the first week of Eastertide. Use the prompts as simply or creatively as you’d like, add the hashtag #practiceresurrection2021 and tag me @a_sacramental_life!

Can’t wait to celebrate NEW LIFE together this week, friends! May you know new life, peace, and hope today, tomorrow, and forever.

Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed!

Tamara

You can read here for a brief description of the liturgical season of Eastertide, and see previous Eastertide posts here.

You might enjoy the list of ideas I brainstormed for simple ways to practice resurrection. Choose 1 idea or 50, but whatever you do, do it with gusto!