An Advent Ode to Madeleine L'Engle

Madeleine L'Engle is one of my all time favorites ... from "A Wrinkle in Time" -- which I read as a young person when it was published in 1962 -- to all her "Crosswicks Journals" to ... well, virtually everything she ever wrote. I had the privilege of attending a writer's workshop she led at Mt. Calvary in Santa Barbara many moons ago ... and it remains in my mind one of the the most fruitful, inspiring weekends ever.

I always re-read "The Irrational Season" at the beginning of Advent ... and I'd pulled this poem out to "post at some point during Advent" from my collection of Madeleine Favs ... and then noticed today several Facebook Friends had posted it as well, so decided it must be a planet-in-alignment thing and I should make the "some point" today.

But first, here are a few quotes from the online biography I just read (checking the above referenced publication date!)

L'Engle was an Episcopalian and believed in universal salvation, writing that "All will be redeemed in God's fullness of time, all, not just the small portion of the population who have been given the grace to know and accept Christ. All the strayed and stolen sheep. All the little lost ones."As a result of her promotion of Christian universalism, many Christian bookstores refused to carry her books, which were also frequently banned from Christian schools and libraries. However, some of her most secular critics attacked her work for being too religious.

And then there was this great summation:

A theme often implied and occasionally explicit in L'Engle's works is that the phenomena that people call religion, science and magic are simply different aspects of a single seamless reality.

And now, without further ado:

First Coming
by Madeleine L’Engle

He did not wait till the world was ready,
till men and nations were at peace.
He came when the Heavens were unsteady,
and prisoners cried out for release.

He did not wait for the perfect time.
He came when the need was deep and great.
He dined with sinners in all their grime,
turned water into wine.

He did not wait till hearts were pure.
In joy he cameto a tarnished world of sin and doubt.
To a world like ours, of anguished shame
he came, and his Light would not go out.

He came to a world which did not mesh,
to heal its tangles, shield its scorn.
In the mystery of the Word made Flesh
the Maker of the stars was born.

We cannot wait till the world is sane
to raise our songs with joyful voice,
for to share our grief, to touch our pain,
He came with Love: Rejoice! Rejoice!