‘The trees are coming into leaf …Is it that they are born again?’

The trees in the rectory gardens in Askeaton this afternoon, barely beginning to show signs of coming into leaf (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)

Patrick Comerford

I am back in the Rectory in Askeaton this weekend, and the trees are showing signs of coming into leaf – just barely, but still a sign that last year is dead and that there is hope of new life this year, despite the Covid-19 pandemic.

Once again this year, I was invited by Christian Aid Ireland to contribute to ‘Footprints,’ their daily reflections each morning throughout Lent and Holy Week. In my reflection (9 March 2020), I recalled words from Pastor Martin Niemöller, whose cell I visited in Sachsenhausen.

Last week (24 March 2020), Stephen Trew, a member of Magheralin Parish in Co Armagh, who campaigns for churches to respond to the climate emergency and take meaningful actions like divesting from fossil fuels, contributed a reflection that included Philip Larkin’s poem, ‘The Trees.’

Philip Larkin (1922-1985), who had been the librarian at the Queen’s University of Belfast in 1950-1955, wrote ‘The Trees’ in 1967. Stanzas 1 and 2 between 9 April and 2 June, the birthday of Thomas Hardy, and it was finished on 3 June 1967.

The poem was published in New Statesman on 17 May 1968, in other journals in 1971 and 1973, and was included in his book High Windows in 1974. It is one of several poems he wrote about Spring and it contains elements of sadness and happiness, grief and joy, despondency and hope, that are so typical of his poems.

In ‘The Trees,’ Larkin is resigned to the fact that both trees and human will eventually succumb to the natural processes that are constantly at work and that are impossible to avoid. But still there is a promise in Spring of new life.

Trees in May in Saint Michael’s churchyard, Lichfield, where many members of Philip Larkin’s family are buried (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Trees, by Philip Larkin

The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said;
The recent buds relax and spread,
Their greenness is a kind of grief.

Is it that they are born again
And we grow old? No, they die too,
Their yearly trick of looking new
Is written down in rings of grain.

Yet still the unresting castles thresh
In full grown thickness every May.
Last year is dead, they seem to say,
Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.

‘Be merciful … do not judge …’

I am one of the people who have been asked by Christian Aid to contribute to the morning reflections each day in Lent this year. These reflections are being posted and shared on the web and by email each morning, drawing on the lectionary readings each day. My reflection was circulated and used this morning (Monday 9 March 2020):

‘Be merciful … do not judge …’

(Canon) Patrick Comerford

Luke 6: 36-38:

‘Do not judge, and you will not be judged (Luke 6: 36-38).

Reflection:

Many of us have been heart-broken as we took part in or watched the commemorations marking the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz and the end of the Holocaust.

In recent years, I have visited Yad Vashem, Auschwitz, Birkenau, Sachsenhausen, and the ghettoes in Berlin, Prague, Krakow, Bratislava, Venice and other cities.

It is difficult at times to reconcile memories of the Holocaust with the words of Christ in this morning’s Gospel reading: ‘Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven’ (Luke 6: 36-37).

But as I took part in these commemorations, I was reminded of the words of Pastor Martin Niemöller, whose cell I visited in Sachsenhausen:

They came first for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn’t speak up because I was a Protestant.

Then they came for me,
and by that time no one was left to speak up.

Prayer:

Lord, when there is no-one left to speak up for me, be merciful to me; when others judge me, do not condemn me; when others are not being hears, give me courage to speak out.

Luke 6: 36-38 (NRSV):

36 Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

37 “Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven; 38 give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap; for the measure you give will be the measure you get back.”

Biographical note:

(Revd Canon Professor) Patrick Comerford is a priest in the Church of Ireland Diocese of Limerick.

Pastor Martin Niemöller’s cell in Sachsenhausen (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

From dying unprepared, save us

Footprints: Christian Aid’s
Lent and Holy Week daily
reflections (7 March 2019)

Thursday 7 March 2019

From dying unprepared, save us.

Author: Revd Canon Patrick Comerford

Bible reading

Luke 9: 22-25

If any want to become my followers,
let them deny themselves and
take up their cross daily
and follow me.
Luke 9: 23

‘Let them take up their cross daily and follow me’ (Luke 9:23). The cross on the sandbanks of Laytown, Co Meath. Credit: Patrick Comerford

Reflection

In this morning’s Gospel reading, Jesus talks to his disciples about the fact that he is going to suffer, be rejected, be killed, and then ‘on the third day be raised.’ But, just in case they think he is only referring to himself, he tells them that they must deny themselves and be prepared to lose their own lives.

Throughout Lent, we are looking not only towards the Crucifixion and Good Friday but looking forward to the Resurrection and Easter Day.

In the Litany in the Church of Ireland, we pray, ‘from dying unprepared, save us, good Lord’. As Christians, we know that death is not the end. In his death, Christ breaks through the barriers of time and space, bringing life to those who are dead. Those who hear the voice of Christ live.

Back in the 1980s, I once interviewed Archbishop Desmond Tutu and asked him about the death threats he faced in South Africa at the height of apartheid. He engaged me with that look that confirms his deep hope, commitment and faith, and said: ‘But you know, death is not the worst thing that could happen to a Christian.’

He must have been tempted at times to give up being a thorn in the side of the regime, to stop being a ‘turbulent priest,’ and to live a comfortable life. But his conscience would never have been comfortable.

As Christ reminds us in this morning’s Gospel reading, ‘What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves.’

Prayer:

(The Book of Common Prayer, p.175)

From fire, storm and flood, from disease, pestilence and want, from war and murder, and from dying unprepared, save us, good Lord.

Bio

Revd Canon Patrick Comerford is a priest in the Church of Ireland Diocese of Limerick, and has been a journalist and a theology professor.

This Lenten reflection was shared this morning by Christian Aid Ireland as the second in the series ‘Footprints: Christian Aid’s Lent and Holy Week daily reflections’ (7 March 2019)