Liturgical Entanglements

By David Russell Mosley

In the church year, in prayer, in liturgy we find a comingling of time and eternity. Without leaving our experience of time, we somehow, mystically, enter into God's eternity. And God, without leaving his eternity, has entered into our time. The poems in Liturgical Entanglements seek to engage with these strange realities. Starting with Advent, the sonnets in this collection look to both the human and the divine, everyday occurrences, and the spiritual realities that uphold all of reality. Read these poems as prayers and let them help you see the world around you in a new way.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Mar 17, 2022
• ISBN: 9781666796032

David Russell Mosley

David Russell Mosley is a poet and theologian living in the Inland Northwest. When he's not writing, David likes to drink a nice scotch, smoke his pipe, and go rambling in the woods with his wife and children.

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Liturgical Entanglements

David Russell Mosley

Liturgical Entanglemens

Copyright ©

2022

David Russell Mosley. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers,

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paperback isbn: 978-1-6667-3700-4

hardcover isbn: 978-1-6667-9602-5

ebook isbn: 978-1-6667-9603-2

March 21, 2022 12:56 PM

The following poems first appeared in Macrina Magazine: Jacob’s Ladder, The Milky Way, The Holy Fool, Ekstasis. The Stations of the Cross and Notre Dame first appeared in The Imaginative Conservative. Transfiguration first appeared in The Green Man published by Resource Publications. Liturgical Entanglement first appeared in Grand Little Things.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Preface

Acknowledgements

Introit

Liturgical Entanglement

Advent

How Long?

When

Fiat

Shortening

Fallowing

First Snow

Advent Wreath

Christmas

Christmas Day

Flight to Egypt

The Holly and the Ivy

Church Bells

Shuttered

Christmas Tree

Epiphany

Lent

Ash Wednesday

Quarantine

Notre Dame

Peniel

The River

The Robe

Confession

Triduum

Maundy Thursday

Good Friday

Holy Saturday

Easter

Arise!

Resurrection

Re-Creation

New Life

Christ in Creation

Apostles

Pentecost

Ordinary Time

Jacob’s Ladder

The Milky Way

To Strengthen the Heart

To Gladden the Heart

The Holy Fool

Ekstasis

Kairos

Stations of the Cross

Station I

Station II

Station III

Station IV

Station V

Station VI

Station VII

Station VIII

Station IX

Station X

Station XI

Station XII

Station XIII

Station XIV

The Planets

Luna

Mercury

Venus

Sol

Mars

Jupiter

Saturn

Mysteries of the Rosary

Glorious Mysteries

Resurrection

Ascension

Descent

Assumption

Coronation

Joyful Mysteries

Annunciation

Visitation

Nativity

Presentation

Finding

Sorrowful Mysteries

Agony

Scourging

Coronation

Carrying

Crucifixion

Luminous Mysteries

Baptism

Wedding

Proclamation

Transfiguration

Institution

Apostles’ Creed

I believe in God, the Father almighty, Creator of heaven and earth

and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,

who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary,

suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried;

he descended into hell; on the third day he rose again from the dead;

he ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty;

from there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints,

the forgiveness of sins,

the resurrection of the body,

and life everlasting.

Benediction

Ite Missa Est

To my wife, Lauren, and my sons, Theodore and Edwyn who have followed me into the strange complexities of the Church Year.

Just as the natural life also grows by means of large cycles of time, made up of many days, so does our Christian life. The liturgy, then, takes the natural year, the cycle of human life which is in harmony with the rhythm of the cosmos, and presents the great phases of the Mystery which we are to undergo throughout the year’s recurring days, while, in the celebration of the Eucharist, it transfigures each of these days.

—Louis Bouyer, Life and Liturgy

Preface

I love the Church Calendar. Every year, we go through a kind of non-identical repetition (to borrow a phrase from Kierkegaard). Christmas comes again, but this one is not exactly the same as the one before. Time moves in a spiral in the Church year. It moves forward, yes, but always passes over those key moments again and again. It is a deposit of heaven, a commingling