"I've had dim glimmerings of a mood of trust and faith in the Divine will a couple of times of late. Very faint to be sure, but there nonetheless.
"It seems, in my mind, to be connected to today - March 25th - the Feast of the Annunciation; a feast which was very important to Charles Williams, for instance; and also the date on which Sauron was overthrown in The Lord of the Rings.
"From a Catholic point of view, it's also worth noting that on the next Sunday - March 29th - England will be solemnly rededicated to Our Lady.
"It's one of the best ideas that English bishops have had in recent years, and when it was announced I had the feeling that it would be both significant and important. I didn't, of course, realise how much so!
"My sense, then, is that there are good things happening and God is very much at work.
"I don't know if any of this will be visible, or whether it'll be more in the nature of 'seeds planted'; but it'd be nice to think that we might be about to reach some kind of turning-point.
'Watch and pray,' etc.
"Happy Restoration of Gondor day!"
Edited and published, with his permission, from an email message I got this morning, from John Fitzgerald.
The first Lady Day (at dawn or dusk,) being the day celebrating the conception of Jesus by Mary, was in earlier times regarded as the beginning of the Christian era; and the true New Year's Day.
ReplyDeleteIt is also - in English folklore tradition - a special day for meeting fairies; much like Halloween and Midsummer's Night. Presumably, the walls that separate seen and unseen worlds are thinner at such times...
I missed this post earlier, but now that I have noticed it want to briefly share an experience of my own which seems significantly relevant.
ReplyDeleteI was lying awake in the very early morning of the 25th just gone, shortly before dawn (would probably have been around 8 AM British time, which is not necessarily relevant). I was having trouble sleeping despite being quite tired. Then, suddenly, though with no especial drama, I became aware that Christ was apparently there, and that we were holding a conversation.
It was really quite a relaxed, almost casual sort of affair, its overall tone and straightforward directness seeming rather like much of William Arkle's material, especially where he was attempting to write from God's perspective. It seemed to take some focus and concentration to maintain properly though - almost as though it was being conducted over a shortwave radio on which the connection, though clear and strong, kept requiring minute adjustments to the dial in order for it not to fade out or be interrupted by other broadcasts.
For the most part, I asked questions about a variety of topics on which I felt like I really needed answers, and he provided these. The answers were for the most part straightforward enough in their form, but many needed considerable later thought to explore their full ramifications and significance. I'm still working on many of them. Without giving too much detail, I got what seemed like profound and comprehensive, if challenging, answers to most of my theological doubts (not all I have, but all I actually asked about), including a rather surprising one to the question of "How can you actually have a personal relationship and specific knowledge of everyone, at once?", which I am still trying to better understand.
Verification of most of these answers will probably not be attainable this side of the grave, but I did also ask some questions about more personal matters, specifically certain of my personal relationships, the answers to some of which were easily verified if I had a mind. I attempted to do so after I had slept a bit. Those that could actually be tested, proved fully correct so far as I could gather (at the expense of my wife wanting to go and get the thermometer, in case my sudden noticing of things to which I was usually oblivious meant that I had caught the Birdemic or something).
One additional thing I will note here is that he seemed quite pleased that I had finally communicated with him directly at last, which had (apparently) been an option more or less available at any time in my life. I asked why, then, I had not been able to. He told me that it was because I had not really, seriously, tried to contact him, as a person, rather than something else, like an abstract ideal or font of power or wisdom. The former was (so far as I could gather) the only kind of attempt to which he was willing to respond, at least in my case.
I have been puzzling over the experience since and trying to determine what the many things I learned ought to mean for me (while having shied off trying to actually repeat it so far, quite as much in case it does work as in case it doesn't). I've had various "spiritual" experiences before, but nothing directly comparable to this, and had been wondering whether the day and time itself could have had some kind of significance. Perhaps a partial answer is being hinted at here...
Thanks Hrothgar.
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