Category Archives: All Things Catholic

Under the Fig Tree

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“I Saw You Under the Fig Tree.”

All our yesterdays are forgotten
With the rush of Tomorrow.
All the words fade away.
Images are fleeting.
All praise passes into oblivion.
The compliments lost,
As unrecorded history.

All things are sand
Falling through the fingers of the Future.
None endure the winds of Time.

So, what of me?
What is the why of me?
Why do You long for me?
I feel your desire pleading
In all about me.

“I saw you under the fig tree.”
What did you see of me, O Lord?
Did you see my yearning?
Were You witness to my sin?
Did you hear the prayer I whispered,
The call of my heart.

Did you see resolve written on my face?
Did you see the love
Swelling my heart?
What did you see of me, Oh Lord,
Under the fig tree?

Because You saw me
Under the fig tree,
My heart opens to see You.
You reveal a world and love
Beyond all that is matter,
Beyond all that once mattered,
Surpassing all that is,
A world of God ,
A world of God in all,
And for all,
Dying to live in all.

I didn’t see You,
Until now,
This precious Now,
Surviving my mortality,
With the reason of my being,
With the holy vision of Thou.

© 2016 Joann Nelander

Love’s Reach

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I reach for You
With my life,
All my life.

It is not for naught,
That You labored,
Bore my sins.

I reach for You
With my thoughts.
In the night,
I contemplate Your Dying.

Writhing in agony,
Alone with hell’s phantoms,
Blood called
From Your flesh.
More than a drop
Spoke my name.

Here in the dark,
The echo resounds,
Scatters my foes.

I reach for You
With my heart,
All my heart.

The scourge,
The nails,
The Cross,
Crown Your life,
Given for my life.

You reach out,
Nailed to Your Cross,
Stretched across the ages.
I am but one
Who feels Your Pain.

Your Passion reaches me,
Saves my life,
All my life.

Copyright 2013 Joann Nelander

All rights reserved

The Robe

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Lord of the centuries,
Knit, of our pain, the knots,
That mysteriously arrange themselves
Across our days.

Guide, by unseen fingers,
Each little pearl,
To form a cloth
Alive with Your Golden threads,
Infinitely more than happenstance or tragedy.

Each strand of Time a mystery,
Bathed in trial and tears,
Yet rich in Awe,
Resplendent in Beauty,
And the gracious beneficence
Of sacrificial love.

Whole cloth,
Woven into a seamless robe,
You don in majesty,
Humble and meek in triumph o’er our graves,
As Life welcomes to the Banquet,
Our souls, now clad in bodies,
One with Your Own.

© 2015 Joann Nelander

Fully Human

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Just think about it, the conception of our Savior!
Mary had a choice, and chose the Will of God.
Fiat! “Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum,”
“Be it done to me according to Your Word.”

Mary, the Women, the New Eve, welcomed her Son,
The Son of God, into her womb,
Into our world.

From this moment until His Death,
Jesus, Emmanuel, God with Us,
Dwelt on earth.

He lived as one cell,
An egg, a fertilized egg,
Fertilized by the action of the Holy Spirit.
He lived and grew,
Soon a tiny cluster of cells,
Then embryo,
Then fetus,
And at all times,
And stages was human
And was God with Us.

He dwelt on Earth,
Not somewhere ethereal,
Outside of our reality,
Outside Time and Space.
He was wholly human and divine.
He was here in a womb,
Living, and growing,
As God deemed Man do.

Why do we not cherish
Each and every human life,
That God choses to come into this world?
He deemed humanity worth and worthy
Of His, Life, Death and Presence,

Copyright 2016 Joann Nelander

The Church Militant

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The Church Militant

“Behold the Lamb of God,
Behold Him Who takes away
The sins of the world.”

A priest holds aloft,
The consecrated Host.
“Behold…”

One by one.
Standing in adoration,
Each receives.

They pass before me.
I hear, “Behold, My army,
Each, a living monstrance.”

©2016 Joann Nelander

Brink of Eternity

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Good morning, Jesus.
Here we are again,
At the beginning of a new day.

Can you feel me?
Here I am in Your Great Heart,
Reaching for You with my heart.

I feel Your eyes upon me.
You are perfume to my senses.
You are the touch of sweetness
I taste wafting on the breeze of Spirit.

You sound in my heart
With the beating of Yours.
Ever near, ever dear, everlasting,
Song of my soul.

Good morning, my Jesus.
Hold me here,
On the brink of eternity.

©2014 Joann Nelander