The Song of Ascent

My Joy

by Depeche Mode

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My joy, the air that I breathe

My joy, in God I believe

You move me

My joy, the blood in my veins

My joy, flows in your name

You move me

I'm not a mountain, no

You move me

My joy, heavenly bliss

My joy, the pleasure I miss

You move me

I'm not a mountain, no

You move me

To your Joy (Depeche Mode), I am Rapture (Anita Baker); to your queen (Alicia Keys), you, love, are King (Sade). Together these few modern song examples form a coherent theme. Song for many is prayer; it's magic. It raises us up, outward, beyond our everyday selves. It inspires and lends insight. In the biblical Songs of Ascent there are the Psalms 120-125 of the Tanakh informing and encouraging: to be faithful, patient and true to our Lord, the one who makes, who creates with us, protects his creation, gives sight to the wise and sound to the prayerful. He is merciful and forgiving. Peace and justice are his ways; this is the way of the faithful Christian as much as the faithful Jew.

Thus the Psalm was born. Out of a deep desire for wisdom and prayer, psalms are to be chanted or sung, The following Songs of Ascent can be summarized by two great sixth century mystics, saying:

"My beloved children, I embrace you in the Lord, imploring him to keep you from all evil and to give you endurance like Job, grace like Joseph, meekness like Moses and courage in combats like Joshua, the son of Nun, mastery of your thoughts like the Judges, the subjection of enemies as to kings David and Solomon, fruitfulness of the earth as to the Israelites. May he grant you the remission of your sins with healing of the body like the paralytic. May he rescue you from the waves like Peter, and snatch you from tribulation like Paul and the other apostles. May he keep you from all evil, as his true children and grant you, in his name, what your heart requests, for the benefit of the soul and body. Amen"
--Barsanuphius and John of Gaza, Epistles

A part of the Song of Ascents follows here. For the complete Songs of Ascent, see the Psalms 120-134.

Prayer of a Returned Exile Psalm 120
A song of ascents

The LORD answered me
when I called in my distress:
LORD, deliver me from lying lips,
from treacherous tongues.

What will the Lord inflict on you,
O treacherous tongue,
and what more besides?
A warrior's sharpened arrows
and fiery coals of brush wood!

Alas, I was an alien in Meshech,
I lived near the tents of Kedar!
Too long did I live
among those who hated peace.
When I spoke of peace,
they were for war.

Who is St. Francis of Assisi?

In a nod of tribute to the newly elected Christian leader, Pope Francis, the simplexlife posts an article which first appeared here previously:

The Prayer of Saint Francis

Sung by Sarah McLaughlin

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Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love
where there is injury, pardon
where there is doubt, faith
where there is despair, hope
where there is darkness, light
where there is sadness, joy

O Divine Master, grant 

that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console

to be understood as to understand

to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive

for
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned

and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life

Who is Francis of Assisi that the world should recollect him still, nearly 1,000 years beyond his lifetime? The "Peace Prayer" of St. Francis has become a very well known attribute. However further search turns up that he did not write it at all, though it so well expresses the aims of Saint Francis of Assisi. It was written first in French about 1912, appearing in the journal, La Clochette, the poem written by an unknown author.
As for the flesh and blood Francis of Assisi, the saint's early life gave no indication of his future virtue. No one loved pleasure more than Francis; he had a quick wit, sang freely and often, delighted in fine food, clothes, women and ostentation. Handsome, cheerful, and chivalrous, he soon became most popular among the young nobles of Assisi, the very king of frolic. Still, he showed an instinctive sympathy with the poor, and though he spent money freely, he spent in such sums as to demonstrate a charity of spirit.

When about twenty, Francis went out with the townsmen to box and battle the Perugians (a neighboring region, Perugia) in one of the petty skirmishes so frequent at that time between the rival cities. The Assisians were defeated this time, Francis, was taken prisoner, was held captive for more than a year in Perugia. A low fever which he there contracted apparently turned his thoughts to spiritual matters, or at least to reflect upon the emptiness of the life he had been leading. 

With better health, Francis' eagerness to chase after after glory was restored; he wandered in search of opportunity for victory. Initially a military career appealed to him. His biographers record a story that the night before Francis was to set forth, he had a strange dream, in which he saw a great hall hung with armor, all marked with Crosses. "These", said a voice, "are for you and your soldiers." Francis had another dream in which the same voice told him to turn back to Assisi. With a change of heart, he did follow the voice this time and returned to Assisi in 1205 C.E..

His changed demeanor demonstrated that his heart was no longer attached to frivolities; a yearning for the life of the spirit had possessed him. As if to put his nature to the test, he exchanged clothes with a ragged beggar man and stood for the rest of the day without food or drink among the horde of beggars at the door of the church in Rome. He developed his beliefs strongly over time; the saint's convictions were simple and practical; he was no slave to theory or dogma in regard to the practice of Charity, or anything else. There was nothing fanatical or narrow about his way. He stuck to the roots of simplicity which figured so largely into his spiritual life and ideals, so that nothing threatened to stifle the spirit of prayer which he thought preferable to anything he had experienced prior.

Francis was nonetheless deeply a mystic in the truest sense of the word. The whole world was to him one shining, sun filled ascent, he climbed forward into the sky, ascending like a ladder, closer and closer to the source, to behold his love, his Lord.

This is a bit about who Francis is, and about those who would want to follow him. Watch, and the world is watching too!

Over the Sill, Close the Door

"Love sails around me; I walk two steps on the ground and four steps in the air." --Thomas Merton

Many without any other influence might come to think the world of a contemplative serious or even dry, but this and other thoughts by the late Thomas Merton shows another side to living a simple life-a life that is simply full. Read more of his thoughts:

"It's love; it's consolation. I don't care if it's consolation. I'm not attached to consolation. I love God. Love carries me around. I don't want to do anything but love. That love, secret, hidden, obscure love, down inside of me and outside me where I don't care to talk about it... I have only time for eternity, which is to say for love, love, love... Love is the only thing that makes it possible for me to tick... I am all dried up with desire and I can only think of one thing--staying in the fire that burns me...Sooner or later the world must burn...sooner or later it will be consumed by fire and nobody will be left--for by that time the last man in the universe will have discovered the bomb capable of destroying the universe and will have been unable to resist the temptation to throw the thing and get it over with... But love laughs at the end of the world because love is the door to eternity, and before anything can happen, love will have drawn him over the sill and closed the door, and he won't bother about the world burning because he will know nothing but love." 
--Thomas Merton, Cistercian monk, priest and mystic
A Thomas Merton Reader

Mysteries and Mystics

A Song for You

by Karen Carpenter

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I’ve been so many places in my life and time
I’ve sung a lot of songs I’ve made some bad rhyme
I’ve acted out my love in stages
With ten thousand people watching
But we’re alone now and I’m singing this song for you

I know your image of me is what I hope to be
I’ve treated you unkindly but darlin’ can’t you see
There’s no one more important to me
Darlin’ can’t you please see through me
Cause we’re alone now and I’m singing this song for you

you taught me precious secrets of the truth withholding nothing
You came out in front and I was hiding
But now I’m so much better and if my words don’t come together
Listen to the melody cause my love is in there hiding

I love you in a place where there’s no space or time
I love you for in my life you are a friend of mine
And when my life is over remember when we were together
We were alone and I was singing this song for you.

Often people talk about mysteries and mystics. Many do; I have too, but what about that? The singer, Karen Carpenter sings this beautiful song, all the more so because of her tragic struggle with mental illness.

She suffered from an eating disorder so severe, her life ended through self-starvation at the age of 33.

That in itself is a mystery; why does it seem, some are made to suffer and others prosper? What mysterious force in the universe sets this course; why could she not go another way? The lyric is passionate, elegant, insightful. She is aware that "precious secrets of the truth withholding nothing...I love you in a place where there is no space or time...listen to the melody... in there hiding." 

The artist speaks volumes. She sings; the author of all creation invites us to join in to sing this song. It is, as the mystic says, something of a mystery, felt but not seen. "Darling can't you please see through me?" Many of us ask for faith; we ask for hope. The Psalmist of old intoned, "Great is the Lord, and worthy of high praise; God's grandeur is beyond understanding."

-- Psalm 145- 3