The back cover of the Holy Week issue of Magnificat carries a spectacular image of a mosaic icon from a cathedral in Sicily, representing an empty throne on which are superimposed the instruments of the Passion, a crown of thorns placed on the Cross like a laurel wreath, a medallion of a dove at the centre, and draped across the back of the seat, a blue cloak. This is apparently the empty throne of Christ, “until he comes in glory”. It's a reminder that we are still, like the running deer, thirsting for God, a thirst which cannot be slaked until the whole drama of creation has been accomplished.
The icon is known by the name Hetimasia, a word from New Testament Greek meaning preparation. This month we have decided to talk about preparation for Easter, so it seems like a good visual image of what we have in mind. The detail of the icon is interesting, but it is really the wider significance of its message which I want to look at for now. How do we prepare ourselves for Easter? What are we waiting for ourselves, and how do we expect it to be manifested?
The conventional answer is that Lent is our preparation. By fasting, prayer and almsgiving we seek to make ourselves different people, renewed in devotion, cleansed by penance, purified by ritual observance, chastened by abstinence. An excellent ambition, but it's so tempting, to place the burden on Jesus' shoulders, and turn to Him saying Lord have mercy on me, a sinner, while not actually doing more than some perfunctory gestures of submissive conformity.
What our preparation should be about is the meaning of the Easter sacrifice. How does Jesus' complete self-giving entitle us to receive eternal life? And what is eternal life anyway? How is it different from the miracle of natural life, self-renewing life in the time and space happening within the framework of created existence? I'm sure I'm not the only one to have difficulty imagining a life which has no time or space, no action or reaction. Like a closed file, marked “NO FURTHER ACTION REQUIRED”. It sounds more like a mask covering a totally dead landscape. Fair to say, in this case anyway, that God alone knows the reality of what we are contemplating.
All I can suggest, is that we meditate again the image of the empty throne, “until He comes again”. As St Peter says in one of his Letters: “The Lord does not delay his promise, as some think, but he is patient with you, not wishing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.”
Our preparation for Easter has to be a deepening of our grasp on the reality of the Resurrection. It is like a wall to climb, and we need all the help we can get. It was a brave artist in the twelfth century, to put up an image of an empty throne, and expect future generations to see the meaning, even if it was all carefully worked out in symbols.
So I'm going to jump ahead and remind you what we will be talking about at Easter. Easter day is the first day of the new creation. Just as the Jewish Passover was a preparation for the coming of the Christ, so the Christian experience, which integrates and fulfils that of our Jewish forbears, is preparation for a greater glory – the promised kingdom of God's people on earth: that is, the achievement in the Spirit of the communion between man and God where we no longer have need of time or space because everything is contained in silent joyful contemplation and appreciation. Creation, if it was completed on the Seventh Day, was only a preparation for the advent of the Messiah. And the arrival of the Messiah, if it was accomplished on the first Easter morning, was only a preparation for the glory of the Kingdom. Which is when the owner of the blue cloak will return, and assume his glory for all eternity.
Gavin Feb 2024
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