The trees, whose leaves had been stolen, are clothed again with flowers. All the earth is in blossom, proclaiming the greatness of the Creator, because He has adorned her like a spouse. We also shed our wintery heaviness, tasting the meek air and the richness of fruit. Creation groans that we too may produce the fruit of a new life.
These words are taken from a fourth century Christian hymn composed in present-day Turkey. They show how human beings have always had the intuition that the patterns of nature have something to say about our life.
The passage from winter to spring always had a highly symbolic value since the earliest of civilisations, a passage marked by the dread of winter, with its shorter days and lower yielding crops, to the gratuitous springing forth of new life on the branches of trees and the plucking of early fruit. In short, nature has its inner patterns, and so does our life.
There is an art to be learned to sail through life and live it to the full
Nowhere did this become clearer to me than when I bought an orchid a few days after settling in Rome for my studies. For the first two months my orchid was in full blossom with large, intricately patterned flowers. Gradually however, every few days, a flower would start to wrinkle and shrink and fall off until the plant was bare branches, apparently destined to its natural death. But a wise friend told me to give it time as it would start blossoming again in a few months. It took some time, but finally new life emerged.
Isn’t this the story of our life? How tragic it is that, like radio hit by static, many times we cannot adequately interpret the signs given by what is happening around us – in our relationships, our own body, and even in the natural environment. We have come to believe that life is like an on/off switch, a matter of cause and effect, when in reality, life is more complicated because it is organic and symbolic, it has its patterns and is ultimately a mystery being unveiled.
There is an art to be learned to sail through life and live it to the full. The coming seven days, which Christians have always called Holy Week, are like the crucible that holds the deepest truth underlying our life.
Christians do not simply commemorate the life, death and resurrection of a middle-eastern man who lived 2,000 years ago. In Jesus Christ they witness the mystery of their life – a life that as we know very well, whether you are Christian or not, many times looks like a lock whose key has mysteriously been hidden away.
There are all sorts of ways to be in denial that life is patterned by a passage from death to life. Some of us hang on to dear life, keeping afloat by high ideals that in reality are never achieved. Such a utopic take on life is like me desperately hanging artificial flowers on my half-dead orchid. Another option is to give up on life, setting very low aspirations so as to avoid being disappointed, doing what we know best but never tasting a true new beginning.
There is a third option, which is the most difficult: living through the winters of our life knowing that spring is not a false promise but a certainty for those who are willing to embrace it. “I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” (Isaiah 43:19)
Fr Alex Zammit is a religious priest from the Missionary Society of St Paul. He currently resides in Rome studying for a Master’s in Missiology at the Gregorian University.