a beautiful day

Salve festa dies!!

toto venerabilis aevo

Latin, an Easter hymn of Venantius Fortunatus (ca 530-609), translated by John Ellerton

Welcome, happy morning!

age to age shall say

suitable for welcoming not only every Sunday morning (every Sunday being Resurrection Day for the church) but for welcoming every day of life. Now inscribed on his gravestone, my friend used to say, as he and we who loved him watched his life slip away,

"Every day is a beautiful day!"

And sure enough, it's all the symbol one needs for life every day and underscored, italicized, these days when a virus in the air we breathe makes tomorrow and next week, not to say Next Year, even more uncertain than life already is.

What's happening this morning? A good old Sunday School bible story:

Genesis 28:10-19a

Jacob left Beer-sheba and went toward Haran. He came to a certain place and stayed there for the night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place. And he dreamed that there was a ladder set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. And the Lord stood beside him and said, “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring; and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring. Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Then Jacob woke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!” And he was afraid, and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”

So Jacob rose early in the morning, and he took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up for a pillar and poured oil on the top of it. He called that place בֵּֽית־אֵ֑ל Bethel.

++++++++++++

And a summertime song around the campfire,

We are climbing Jacob's ladder

Soldier's of the Cross.

Not to overlook some of our praise songs,

This is holy ground,

you're standing on holy ground ...

and

Surely the presence of the Lord

is in this place ...

From a day and age when we were so bold as to sing "Onward, Christian soldiers" and "Stand up, stand up for Jesus, ye soldiers of the Cross". And "The Son of God goes forth to war, a kingly crown to gain. His blood-red banner streams afar; who follows in his train?"

"Jacob's Dream" by Marc Chagall (1887-1985)

who also painted "White Crucifixion"

and "I and the Village"

Photographs: Looking south from 7H, StAndrewsBay at 6:22 a.m. today.

TW+