Art & Theology

Roundup: Sister Wendy on the art of Holy Week, Fernando Botero’s “Via Crucis,” and more

March 1, 2026 Victoria Emily JonesLeave a comment

BOOK: The Art of Holy Week and Easter: Meditations on the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus by Sister Wendy Beckett (2021): Sister Wendy Beckett, a British Catholic nun and art enthusiast who died in 2018, is the one who first got me interested in art history. We watched clips from her BBC series Sister Wendy’s Story of Painting in my studio art class in high school, and I was so drawn to the way she looked at art and talked about it. Enthusiastic, warm, inquisitive, spiritually sensitive and theologically astute, and interested not just in the technical qualities of a work but also in its content—though I know I lack the same flair, my own voice and approach when it comes to art are indebted to hers.

So I was delighted to see that SPCK (and IVP in North America) has published two church calendar–based art devotionals by Sister Wendy: one for Lent, and one for Holy Week and Easter. I was disappointed with The Art of Lent: It has an admirable diversity of art selections, but Sister Wendy’s reflections are short and basic, and most don’t shine in the way I’ve come to expect from her; there were only two standouts for me. I also found it thematically confusing (for example, a section on “Confidence”?), unfocused, and redundant (especially in the “Silence” and “Contemplation” sections). I will grant that Lent is a more difficult season to structure for a project like this than Advent is, as I found the one year I published a daily Lent series; it can mean many things to many people.

Sister Wendy’s The Art of Holy Week and Easter, on the other hand, I did enjoy and recommend. I wish it had the same variety as the Lent book. (There’s only one modern/contemporary painting.) I care for only about half the featured artworks—two favorites are below—but even for the ones I was disinclined toward, her commentary helped me appreciate them.

Peter's Repentance — Cristoforo de Predis (Italian, 1440–1486), “Saint Peter realizing he has thrice betrayed Jesus,” from the *Leggendario Sforza-Savoia*, 1476. Codice Varia 124, Biblioteca Reale (Royal Library), Turin, Italy.

About a medieval manuscript illumination of Peter weeping by Cristoforo de Presis, Sister Wendy writes:

This magical little picture presents an unforgettable image of grief. It is that most painful kind of grief, lamenting of our own folly. Here we see Peter with his shamed face covered, stumbling blindly forward from one closed door to the next. There are ways out behind him, but Peter is too lost in misery to look for them. This claustrophobic despair, this helpless anguish, this incapacitating sense of shame: these are the result of a sudden overturn of our own self-image.

Peter had honestly seen himself as one who loved and followed Jesus, priding himself, moreover, on how true his loyalty was in comparison with that of others. ‘Even if all should betray you, I will never betray you’ – it was a boast, but he had meant it. Now he sees, piercingly, that he is fraudulent. He has been unmasked to himself, he has lost his self-worth.

The crucial question is: What next? Will he hide his face forever, destroyed by self-pity? Will he lose all heart, perhaps even kill himself, as Judas did? But while Judas felt only remorse, Peter feels contrition, a healing sorrow that will lead to repentance and a change of heart. Now that he knows his true weakness, he will cling to Jesus as never before. He will cling in desperate need and not in false strength, and will in the end become truly Peter, the ‘rock’, on which the Church, likewise dependent on Christ, will be built. (26)

El Greco_Christ crucified with Toledo in the Background — El Greco (Greek Spanish, 1541–1614), *Christ Crucified with Toledo in the Background*, 1604–14. Oil on canvas, 111 × 69 cm. Fundación Banco Santander, Madrid.

About El Greco’s Christ Crucified, she mentions how “Jesus . . . dies looking upwards, his determination set upon his Father’s will and its consummation. . . . His body spirals upwards like a white flame, radiating out as he spreads his arms to share the light with the defeated shadows” (38).

+++

HYMNS:

>> “O Love, How Deep, How Broad, How High”: I’ve enjoyed learning a few new-to-me hymns from the YouTube channel of Josh Bales. Attributed to the fifteenth-century German-Dutch Catholic mystic Thomas à Kempis, this hymn text was translated from Latin into English by Benjamin Webb in 1871. It appears in the Episcopal hymnal with the tune EISENACH by Bartholomäus Gesius, as adapted by Johann Hermann Schein in 1628, which is what Bales sings. It’s rare among hymns for emphasizing that our salvation was won not just by Christ’s death but also by his life—his faithful obedience to the Father.

>> “I Stand Amazed (How Marvelous)”: A favorite from my childhood, this 1905 gospel hymn by Charles H. Gabriel is performed here by the Imani Milele Choir, made up of orphaned and/or vulnerable children and youth from Uganda.

>> “Come Let Me Love”: I recently learned of this shape-note hymn from a book I’m reading by J. R. Watson. Written by the late great Isaac Watts, the text was first published in the 1706 edition of Watts’s Horæ lyricæ with the title “Christ’s Amazing Love and My Amazing Coldness.” I especially love verses 4 and 5, reproduced below. The tune, LAVY, is actually a new one (from 1993) that sounds old, by John Bayer Jr.

Infinite grace! Almighty charms!
Stand in amaze, ye rolling skies!
Jesus, the God with naked arms,
Hangs on a cross of love and dies.

Did pity ever stoop so low,
Dress’d in divinity and blood?
Was ever rebel courted so,
In groans of an expiring God?

+++

VIDEO: “Christ by Eric Smith”: This is the first video in the (Catholic) Archdiocese of Brisbane’s four-part Art Aficionados series from 2022. In it, Archbishop Emeritus Mark Coleridge, theology professor Maeve Heaney, and Rev. Dr. Tom Elich of Liturgy Brisbane discuss the semiabstract Ecce homo painting Christ by the modern Australian artist Eric Smith—its pathos, calm, and double irony. This Christ is crushed yet composed, Coleridge says. Smith won the prestigious Blake Prize for Religious Art six times, including, in 1956, for a painting similar to this one (see second image in slideshow below). I’d love to see more dioceses releasing videos like this!—close looking at art.

The other videos in the Art Aficionados series are on The Stories That Weren’t Told by Lee Paje, The Good Samaritan by Olga Bakhtina, and The Visitation by Jacob Epstein.

Eric Smith (Australian, 1919–2017), Christ, 1956. Oil on Masonite, 138 × 95 cm. Collection of Holy Spirit Seminary (Queensland Provincial Seminary), Banyo, Brisbane, Australia. Photo courtesy of Tom Elich.
Eric Smith (Australian, 1919–2017), The Scourged Christ, 1956. Oil on Masonite, 116 × 85 cm. Penrith Regional Gallery, Emu Plains, Australia.
Eric Smith (Australian, 1919–2017), Head of Christ, 1954. Oil on wood, 47 × 39.4 cm. Collection of Newman College, University of Melbourne, Australia.
Eric Smith (Australian, 1919–2017), Head of Christ, 1954. Oil on Masonite, 40.5 × 32.6 cm. Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.

+++

ART SERIES: Via Crucis: La pasión de Cristo (Way of the Cross: The Passion of Christ) by Fernando Botero: Executed in 2010–11, Via Crucis is a series of twenty-seven oil paintings and thirty-four mixed-media drawings by Colombia’s most famous artist, Fernando Botero (1932–2023) [previously]. Botero said he turned to the subject of Christ’s passion not because he’s religious, but out of admiration for the great works of art on the subject; he approached it with “a spirit of great respect,” aiming to portray God as a tortured man. The artist donated the series to the Museo de Antioquia in Medellín for his eightieth birthday. I can’t find a compilation of the whole series (the museum has digital records of the Boteros in its collection, but not all the images are showing up for me)—but you can view fourteen of the paintings in this article, and here’s a quick little Facebook reel.

Marlborough Gallery in New York offers a catalog of the series for $75, and Artika offers a much more expensive one (a gorgeous product, but $9,500!):

Here’s a news segment, in English, of the series’ exhibition at Lisbon’s Palacio de Ajuda in November 2012 (unfortunately, the video quality is low):

Botero, Fernando_Via Crucis — Fernando Botero (Colombian, 1932–2023), *Crucifixión* (Crucifixion), 2011, and *Jesús y la multitud* (Jesus and the Crowd), 2010. Oil on canvas. Museo de Antioquia, Medellín, Colombia.

+++

I have thematic playlists on Spotify for Lent and Holy Week—for the latter, don’t miss “From the Garden to the Tomb” by The Soil and The Seed Project, one of several recent additions.

But, by popular request, I also have a brand-new March 2026 playlist, a somewhat random assortment of songs I’ve been enjoying—some new releases, some not.

“Make Me River” by Abigail Carroll (poem)

February 27, 2026February 27, 2026 Victoria Emily JonesLeave a comment

Fernandez-Pol, Julia_Glacial Rain — Julia Fernandez-Pol (Argentine, 1984–), *Glacial Rain*, 2008. Oil on canvas. Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College, Colorado Springs. Photo: Victoria Emily Jones.

Make me river, cold
with mountain, green
with quiver, silver in

the run and churn of
winter leaving, valley
waking, sheet moss

breathing. Make me
flash of mica, drift of
foam. O Lord of flux,

make these dry bones
flow, teach me to spill,
pool, glide, fall, tutor me

to long for depth, seek
downward paths, indwell
the low. Oh teach me

liturgy of keel, swirl,
flume, the breaking into
mist, the pull, the press,

the song. Oh form me
into blood of bedrock,
quest of glacier, dream

of sea, release me, set
me free to course, surge,
pour, sweep, issue, eddy,

shower, plummet, roll.
O Lord of flood, O Lord
of spray, unstill my soul.

From Habitation of Wonder (Cascade / Wipf & Stock, 2018). Used with permission.

Abigail Carroll is a poet whose work, as Walter Brueggemann called it, is “an unflinching witness to the reality and goodness of God.” She has authored the collections Cup My Days Like Water (Cascade, 2023), Habitation of Wonder (Cascade, 2018), and A Gathering of Larks: Letters to Saint Francis from a Modern-Day Pilgrim (Eerdmans, 2017), and her poems have also been published in anthologies and periodicals. She makes her home in Vermont, where she serves as associate pastor at Church at the Well. In addition to writing, she enjoys walking, photographing nature, and playing piano.

“Demon Host” by Timber Timbre: A Song Analysis

February 24, 2026February 24, 2026 Victoria Emily JonesLeave a comment

Timber Timbre is the moniker of the Canadian folk blues singer-songwriter Taylor Kirk. The opening track on his 2009 self-titled album, “Demon Host,” establishes the album’s haunted tone. The song is mournful and mystical, and it references God, religion, sin, death, and repentance.

Death, she must have been your will
A bone beneath the reaper’s veil
With your voice my belly sunk
And I began to feel so drunk

Candle, candle on my clock
Oh Lord, I must have heard you knock
Me out of bed as the flames licked my head
And my lungs filled up black in their tiny little shack
It was real and I repent
All those messages you sent
Clear as day, but in the night
Oh, I couldn’t get it right

Here is a church and here is a steeple
Open the doors, there are the people
And all their little hearts at ease
For another week’s disease

And eagle, eagle talons scream
I never once left in between
I was on the fence and I never wanted your two cents
Down my throat, into the pit, with my head upon the spit
Oh Reverend, please, can I chew your ear?
I’ve become what I most fear
And I know there’s no such thing as ghosts
But I have seen the demon host

There are several different ways to interpret this song, but at its core, it seems to me it’s about an agnostic facing death. In the first four lines he hears death calling to him—personified, atypically, as a woman. The “your,” I think, is God, whom the speaker names a few lines later. (Alternatively, “death” could be a noun of direct address and “your” its pronoun, in which case “she” may refer to a female friend who has died, inciting the crisis that follows.) Unprepared for this sudden confrontation, the speaker feels woozy with shock.

Candles and clocks serve as memento mori, reminders of death. As the wax burns down and time ticks on, he’s jolted out of a nightmare about the flames of judgment. Awake now to the reality of God’s holiness, he repents, realizing that God has been pursuing him all along.

He enters a church, but he’s turned off by the apparent easiness with which the people greet “another week’s disease.” I’m not sure what that means—the horrors and suffering of the world? personal sin? If these Christians struggle with either, they mask it. He is not able to feel the same sense of peace and victory they do.

“Eagle, eagle talons scream” is an elusive yet evocative line that may refer to the feeling of being pierced or gutted, perhaps having one’s sin revealed by the Holy Spirit. Or maybe it expresses a more indefinable sense of anxiety and distress.

The speaker admits he had always been perfectly comfortable sitting on the fence, “in between” faith and no-faith, not committing to this or that system of belief and practice. He never wanted God to intervene with his “two cents” on what is real and how to live. He resents the church’s teachings on eternal punishment and hellfire. And yet he’s ambivalent about Christianity. He cherishes his indecision, but he’s also restless. He seeks out the pastor to talk with.

“I’ve become what I most fear,” he confesses. And what is that? Being sold out to Jesus? Engulfing wickedness?

Even the title of the song, taken from the last line, is ambiguous, as the word “host” has multiple meanings. The “demon host” could refer to an army of demons, to a body that’s possessed by a demon, or to a parody of the Eucharist (in Christian liturgies, the consecrated bread, the body of Christ, is called the host). It seems the speaker has either experienced a stark vision of evil, or some evil has taken hold of him. Or maybe it’s death that he’s characterizing as demonic, but if so, it’s manifesting supernaturally, as he calls it ghostly.

In the music video there’s a menacing hooded figure that stands outside the shed in which Kirk performs, looking very much like the Grim Reaper. This entity listens, then gradually approaches, then even holds the microphone for Kirk, but his face is always in shadow. In some shots we see a second figure, dressed in the same garb, holding a guitar.

Lyrically, the song is unresolved, and musically, the last minute is unsettling.

Is this a song about damnation? Or dying to self, crucifying the ego, part of the conversion process? What about addiction? Or surviving a near-death experience and living in light of that? Whatever the particulars, the song is in the voice of someone who is shaken from his equivocation into seriously considering faith; someone who wrestles with God, mortality, and evil.

I’m eager to hear what you make of it or what stands out to you.

Roundup: Kyries for Lent, refugee-themed art exhibition at Portsmouth Cathedral, “Forevergreen,” and more

February 21, 2026February 21, 2026 Victoria Emily Jones3 Comments

NEW BOOK: Bread and Wine: Readings for Lent and Easter, Second Edition: Plough is the publishing house of the Bruderhof, an international Anabaptist communal movement. This year they released a revised and expanded edition of one of my favorite Lent/Easter devotionals, increasing the original seventy-two entries to ninety-six to cover the full fifty days of Easter—although the last section is themed around Pentecost. The selections are all from previously published material, but what a treasure-house has been curated here from across denominations, countries, and eras, from early church fathers to medieval mystics to modern saints. Clement of Rome, Julian of Norwich, Kahlil Gibran, Watchman Nee, Gonzalo Báez Camargo, Thomas Merton, Simone Veil, Howard Thurman, Toyohiko Kagawa, Barbara Brown Taylor, Jürgen Moltmann, Tish Harrison Warren—these are some of the many voices included here that reflect on and expound the beautiful truths of the Lent and Easter seasons. Each reading is just a few pages long, so it’s easy to pick up with your morning coffee or just before bed.

Besides the expansion, other changes I’ve noticed in this edition are:

Thinner pages, which, despite the additional content, reduce the overall thickness of the book
The epigraph at the beginning of each reading was removed, as these were not the authors’.
Thirteen of the original readings were replaced, possibly due to permissions costs, but maybe also just to get in some fresh voices or content, and in one case, to remove an accused sex abuser.
A misattribution in the original to Mother Teresa was corrected to Joseph Langford, who founded the Missionaries of Charity Fathers with her.
There is a slight reordering of readings so that pertinent meditations appear during Holy Week.

I’ve provided a link to the Plough book page above, but you can also purchase through Amazon or your retailer of choice.

+++

SONGS:

I grew up in an independent Baptist church, ignorant of most of the historic prayers of the church at large. The first time I ever heard the phrase “Kyrie eleison” [previously] was on track 5 of the Christian recording artist Mark Schultz’s 2001 album Song Cinema, which is a cover of an eighties rock song by Mr. Mister. I was in middle school, and I had to look up what it meant. Derived from a prayer found in multiple places in the Psalms and the Gospels, “Kyrie eleison” (pronounced KEER-ee-ay eh-LAY-ee-sohn) is Greek for “Lord, have mercy,” and it’s traditionally followed by “Christe eleison”—Christ, have mercy. An inheritance from early Eastern Christian liturgies, it has been part of the Ordinary of the Catholic Mass since the fifth century, which means it’s recited or sung in every eucharistic service regardless of the liturgical season, and it’s used in many other Christian traditions as well. I’ve never been part of a church that sings the Kyrie, but I occasionally sing it in my personal devotions. It’s been set to music by hundreds of composers, for choirs, contemporary bands, and more. Here are two settings that I’ve recently come across and enjoy, followed by a song that entreats (God’s?) mercy on father, brother, church, country, and every living thing.

>> “Kyrie (Lord, Have Mercy)” by Robert Alan Rife: This song was written by Robert Alan Rife [previously], a minister with the Evangelical Covenant Church, serving in Edinburgh. It’s performed here by worship musicians at Great Road Church (formerly Highrock Covenant Church) in Acton, Massachusetts. The lead vocalist is Caelyn Jarrett Poetz; she’s accompanied on guitar by her dad, Travis Jarrett, the church’s music pastor, and Hannah Moulton provides backing vocals. Rife tells me you can purchase the sheet music here, and that other songs of his can be streamed on Spotify, Apple Music, etc.; he has not yet recorded this one, but it’s in the works.

>> “Kyrie” by Paul Smith: This peaceful, resonant setting of the Kyrie was composed by Paul Smith, cofounder of the Grammy-nominated British vocal ensemble VOCES8, who perform it here. The song appears on Smith’s 2025 album Revelations.

>> “Mercy Now” by Mary Gauthier: In this video from the 2010 Americana Music Festival in Nashville, folk singer-songwriter Mary Gauthier (last name pronounced go-SHAY) performs her most famous song, “Mercy Now,” originally released on her 2005 album of the same title. It doesn’t directly invoke God, but it feels like a prayer, asking for mercy (forgiveness, relief, compassion, lovingkindness) first for two family members—her father on his deathbed, and her drug-addicted brother—and then for the institutions of church and state, both in need of repair, and then for everyone: “We all could use a little mercy now / I know we don’t deserve it / But we need it anyhow,” and “only the hand of grace” can give it, can intervene to save us from our self-destructive ways. In response to the song’s being listed as “one of the saddest 40 country songs of all time” by Rolling Stone in 2014, Gauthier said, “It is not a sad song. It is about hope.”

+++

EXHIBITION: Sanctuary by Nicholas Mynheer, February 18–April 12, 2026, Portsmouth Cathedral, UK: One of my favorite artists, Nicholas Mynheer, has a show that opened on Ash Wednesday at Portsmouth Cathedral, aka the Cathedral of the Sea, and that will continue for the duration of Lent plus some. “The exhibition features paintings and sculptures that explore the experiences of refugees, both ancient and contemporary. The story of Jesus, Mary and Joseph fleeing to Egypt sits alongside the realities faced by people crossing the English Channel today. Mynheer’s work doesn’t offer easy answers – instead, it asks questions. What would we do if our home were no longer safe? How do we respond to those seeking refuge? What does it mean to hope for a better life when the risks are so great?”

Mynheer, Nicholas_The Holy Family Cross the English Channel — Nicholas Mynheer (British, 1958–), *The Holy Family Cross the English Channel*, 2025. Oil on canvas, 30 × 30 cm.

View artworks from the exhibition on the artist’s website at https://www.mynheer-art.co.uk/gallery/sanctuary-exhibition.html. Follow him on Instagram @mynheer_art. Mynheer writes:

As an artist, one of the themes that I’ve been drawn to repeatedly is that of the Holy Family on the Flight to Egypt. The fact that even Jesus, Mary and Joseph became refugees to escape the wrath of Herod reminds us that it could happen to any one of us.

Over the past years we have become increasingly aware of the plight of refugees; from Syria, Afghanistan, Ukraine, Somalia, along with daily reports of refugees attempting to cross the English Channel. Whether they flee from war, persecution, famine, political instability or for economic reasons, the risks are the same; all driven by hope, the hope of a better life.

I often wonder what I would do if I lived in a country ravaged by war? What would I do if I was persecuted for my faith, my colour or my culture? What would I do if scrolling on my phone, others’ lives seemed easier, happier, and all I had to do was get there?

It is my hope that these meditations in paint and stone might draw us in to question how we might respond if we, like Jesus, Mary and Joseph, were forced to seek refuge; to be refugees . . . to search for Sanctuary.

Starting February 25, Portsmouth Cathedral is offering a free four-week Lent course (classes are in person on Wednesday evenings) inspired by the exhibition. The first class will be a talk by Mynheer himself, and the other three will be led by clergy, exploring biblical themes of journey, rescue, and redemption through the art on display.

+++

CALL FOR ART: The Valley of Dry Bones, Museum of the Bible, Washington, DC: “The Valley of Dry Bones art invitational seeks to inspire the creation of new artwork based on Ezekiel 37:1–14, the biblical vision in which God brings life, renewal, and restoration to a valley of dry bones. Museum of the Bible invites Christian and Jewish artists residing in the continental United States to create original pieces in a variety of media that show their personal and spiritual reflections on this powerful theme. The goal is to show how the Bible can shape modern art and give visitors a meaningful way to connect with biblical themes through creativity. Museum of the Bible will choose 15 artists through a national call and design a professional exhibition to showcase their art from May 7–November 7, 2027. The museum will also help promote the artists and their work through talks, social media, and special events. Each artist chosen will be paid a stipend of $3,000 to cover the costs of creation, travel, and shipping.” Entry deadline: April 24, 2026.

Here’s a double print on the subject by my friend Margaret Adams Parker, aka Peggy:

Parker, Margaret Adams_Ezekiel 37 — Margaret Adams Parker (American, 1948–), *Ezekiel 37*, from The Vigil Etchings, 2013–14. Etching with roulette and aquatint on Somerset velvet white paper, each 8 1/2 × 5 1/2 in. Edition of 15.

+++

SHORT FILM: Forevergreen (2025), dir. Nathan Engelhardt and Jeremy Spears: With the announcement of the 2025 Academy Award nominations last month, I learned that Forevergreen is one of five nominees for Best Animated Short Film! Written and directed by two Christians in the animation industry (employed by Disney but working independently here) and executed by a team of over a hundred, Forevergreen is a thirteen-minute gospel-oriented film in which “an orphaned bear cub finds a home with a fatherly evergreen tree, until his hunger for trash leads him to danger.” I found out about it last November through the music artists who wrote the soundtrack, Josh Garrels and Isaac Wardell, and am delighted to see it recognized in such a huge way. I really dig its unique animation style, which uses whittled wood figures. The movie is currently streaming for free on YouTube (see embed below), but if you want to see it on a big screen, check your local theater listings.

Ash Wednesday: All Flesh Is like Grass

February 18, 2026 Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

All flesh is like grass
and all its glory like the flower of grass.
The grass withers,
and the flower falls,
but the word of the Lord endures forever.

—1 Peter 1:24–25

LOOK: French Exit by Tadao Cern

Cern, Tadao_French Exit — Tadao Cern (Lithuanian, 1983–), *French Exit*, 2020. Installation of dried grass.

In this installation by Tadao Cern, hundreds of thousands of dried grass stalks are suspended from the ceiling, creating a dense cloud under which viewers can walk. It’s an organic memento mori, a reminder of death. The title, French Exit, refers to the act of leaving a social gathering or a date without saying goodbye. The artist said he wanted viewers to consider their farewells.

Throughout the duration of the installation, some of the dead grass falls from the hovering field onto the floor, to be swept away.

LISTEN: “All Flesh Is Like the Grass (1 Peter 1:24–25)” by Fernando Ortega, on The Shadow of Your Wings: Hymns and Sacred Songs (2006)

All flesh is like the grass
The grass withers and fades away
All flesh is like the grass
The grass withers and fades away

The glory of man, like a flower
That shrivels in the sun and falls
The glory of man, like a flower
That shrivels in the sun and falls

But the word of the Lord
Endures forever
The word of the Lord
Endures forever

All flesh is like the grass
The grass withers and fades away
All flesh is like the grass
The grass withers and fades away

The glory of man, like a flower
That shrivels in the sun and falls
The glory of man, like a flower
That shrivels in the sun and falls

But the word of the Lord
Endures forever
The word of the Lord
Endures forever

Roundup: Ants after Carnival, organic memento mori, “Turning” by Deanna Witkowski, and more

February 13, 2026February 18, 2026 Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

Lent starts next Wednesday, February 18, so I want to remind you about my Lent Playlist on Spotify. There are plenty of songs for contemplative listening throughout the season. I periodically add new entries to the bottom. Recent additions include a song by Amanda Held Opelt about being in the belly of a whale; “Living Water” by Sr. Miriam Therese Winter of the Medical Mission Sisters; Paul Zach’s cover of Johnny Cash’s “The Beast in Me”; and a setting of Matthew 4:17 by Seth Thomas Crissman of The Soil and The Seed Project, whose parallel verse, Mark 1:15, is commonly recited with the imposition of ashes on Ash Wednesday.

+++

VIDEO ART: Quarta-Feira de Cinzas / Epilogue (Ash Wednesday / Epilogue) by Rivane Neuenschwander with Cao Guimarães: When visiting the Museum of Modern Art in New York last month, I encountered a video work from Brazil that I found mesmerizing. The Perez Art Museum Miami describes it this way:

In Rivane Neuenschwander’s video Quarta-Feira de Cinzas / Epilogue (Ash Wednesday / Epilogue), made in collaboration with artist Cao Guimarães, ants become the protagonists of a captivating journey. Shot on Ash Wednesday, after the end of Brazilian Carnival, the video follows a colony of leafcutter ants as they traverse the rough terrain of a forest floor, transporting pieces of colored confetti to their underground nest. The video is set to a digitally composed soundtrack that blends ambient natural sounds with the sound of matchsticks dropping onto the floor. At the video’s end, we watch the ants descend into the darkness of their nest, intent, perhaps, on furnishing a celebration of their own.

You can watch a one-minute clip from the nearly six-minute video on Guimarães’s website: https://www.caoguimaraes.com/en/obra/quarta-feira-de-cinzas/.

Originating in the Middle Ages, Carnival—from the Latin carve vale, meaning “flesh, farewell!” (flesh = meat)—is a period of merrymaking before the solemn restraints of Lent. It’s primarily a secular folk custom, celebrated by many with hedonistic parties involving excessive drinking. But Carnival need not be debauched, and some Christians celebrate it with social gatherings, games, parades, and/or food traditions. A Polish Catholic coworker of mine would always bring pączki (jelly donuts) to the office on Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras in French), the day before Ash Wednesday. Some churches host a pancake supper on that evening, using up eggs, milk, and sugar, ingredients that were historically forbidden during Lent, along with bacon and sausage. At The Liturgical Home, Ashley Tumlin Wallace describes Fat Tuesday as a transition day moving God’s people out of Epiphanytide.

Neuenschwander and Guimarães’s Ash Wednesday / Epilogue is, first and foremost, fun and playful. We don’t tend to think of insects having parties! I wonder what the ants are doing with those vibrant little metallized discs. But the video also, for me, captures something of the tone of the first day of Lent—a quiet sweeping up after the previous day’s festivities, the humans of this place having left their revelries to go to church, where they enter a time of penitence.

+++

BLOG POST: “Ash Wednesday” by Libby John: I really appreciated these four guided journal prompts that Libby John, founder of the Vivid Artistry creative collective, gave last Lent:

What is something in my life I am seeking for God to renew and restore?
What rhythms in my life need to be interrupted and reoriented to God’s heart for me?
What are some ways I can surrender my schedule to help attune my senses to more of God’s presence?
Am I bringing my whole self to God or do I divide and keep parts of my life from him?

+++

ARTICLE: “Anya Gallaccio’s Organic Mementos Mori” by Eliza Goodpasture, Hyperallergic: Rotting apples threaded with hanging twine, shriveling red daisies pressed between plexiglass, burning candles creating waxen landscapes on aluminum foil, a hundred-plus-year-old ash tree stricken with ash dieback disease—these were among the memento mori (reminders of death) installed at artist Anya Gallaccio’s exhibition preserve at Turner Contemporary in Margate, England, in fall 2024. “The potency of the transient works is so magnetic,” writes reviewer Eliza Goodpasture. “The Christian motif of dust to dust undergirds it all. . . . The artist reminds us that decay is full of energy—not just an ending, but part of an endless circle of life.”

Gallaccio, Anya_Falling from grace — Anya Gallaccio (Scottish, 1963–), *Falling from grace*, 2000. 2,700 Gala apples, hop twine. Installation view at Turner Contemporary, Margate, 2024. Photo: Jo Underhill, courtesy of the artist.

+++

SONGS:

>> “Turning” by Deanna Witkowski: Deanna Witkowski is a jazz composer and pianist living in Chicago. She wrote this choral piece for Lent, a season in which the liturgies call us to turn away from sin and toward God. That’s what repentance means: changing direction. The first verse is taken from Psalm 119:36–40. “Turn our hearts, O Lord, from selfish gain to your commandments . . .”

For a 2023 performance by the Hendricks Chapel Choir at Syracuse University, see here. Purchase the score here.

>> “Miraculous Salvation” by Tenielle Neda: This song by the Australian singer-songwriter Tenielle Neda praises God for the grace he lavishes on us and for his great love. Backing vocals are provided by Chris Cho.

+++

CAROL TEXT: “Revert, revert” by James Ryman, ca. 1492: Medievalist Eleanor Parker shares this Lenten carol text by the fifteenth-century Franciscan friar James Ryman, from Cambridge University Library MS Ee 1.12. The burden (repeated stanza) is “Revert, revert, revert, revert; / O sinful man, give me thine heart”—an echo of Isaiah 44:22, “Return to me, for I have redeemed you.” Written in Christ’s voice, it calls us to remember how he took on our flesh, was baptized, and was flogged and crucified for our sakes. I think the shield in stanza 3 refers to the cross; the Via Dolorosa was a battlefield on which Christ fought the devil, and paradoxically, the instrument of his execution was the means of victory.

Fast from X, Feast on Y

February 9, 2026February 10, 2026 Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

Holi celebration — One of thirteen wall-mounted display panels (with opening doors) designed by Kossmanndejong for the ambulatory of the Church of St. Lawrence in Rotterdam, portraying the city’s diverse religious festivals. This one portrays Holi, a Hindu festival in March celebrating the victory of light over darkness and involving the throwing of colored powder and water. I took this photo when visiting during Lent 2019.

The following text has been floating around the internet for some time. It’s often attributed to the American motivational writer and Methodist lay leader William Arthur Ward (1921–1994), but it is not in his compilation of maxims, Fountains of Faith (Droke House, 1970), and it doesn’t sound like his other writings.

Fast from judging others; feast on the Christ within them.
Fast from emphasis on difference; feast on the unity of life.
Fast from apparent darkness; feast on the reality of light.
Fast from thoughts of illness; feast on the healing power of God.

Fast from words that pollute; feast on phrases that purify.
Fast from discontent; feast on gratitude.
Fast from anger; feast on patience.
Fast from pessimism; feast on optimism.

Fast from complaining; feast on appreciation.
Fast from worry; feast on trust in God’s care.
Fast from unrelenting pressure; feast on unceasing prayer.
Fast from facts that depress; feast on verities that uplift.

Fast from lethargy; feast on enthusiasm.
Fast from thoughts that weaken; feast on promises that inspire.
Fast from shadows of sorrow; feast on the sunlight of serenity.
Fast from problems that overwhelm; feast on prayer that undergirds.

Fast from bitterness; feast on forgiveness.
Fast from self-concern; feast on compassion for others.
Fast from personal anxiety; feast on eternal truth.
Fast from discouragements; feast on hope.

(Related post: “John Chrysostom on holistic fasting”)

It’s a stirring exhortation, and it always gets special traction during Lent, a penitential season in which many Christians practice the spiritual discipline of fasting (in the traditional sense of limiting food intake) and/or abstinence (refraining from eating a certain type of food). The language of “fasting” can be confusing, because traditionally, you’re to fast from good things for a set period of time, and then enjoy them all the more fully during a period of feasting; but people sometimes use the word “fast” to describe the act of giving up something that’s bad for them or that’s unholy and that, truth be told, would best be given up year-round. This text uses the latter meaning: reducing or abstaining from attitudes and behaviors that drag you or others down. It also acknowledges, as did the church fathers, that when you cut something unwholesome out of your life, it’s often wise to replace it with something wholesome.

Lent is an annual prompt for self-examination, a spiritual wellness check in which we’re invited to identify the ways we’ve veered off course from the way of Christ (or where we’re stumbling) and to let Christ’s grace draw us back (or help us surmount the obstacles). It’s a chance to tend to our disordered manners of being and develop healthy new habits as we seek to live more faithfully as people of God.

In February 2010, Msgr. Kerry Beaulieu adapted the above text for Our Lady Queen of Angels Catholic Church in Newport Beach, California, which he pastored from 2004 to 2018:

Fast from a gloomy outlook on life;
Feast on what is bright and cheerful.

Fast from always being right;
Feast on seeing another’s point of view.

Fast from always pointing out differences;
Feast on what unites us all.

Fast from words that pollute;
Feast on those that purify.

Fast from complaining;
Feast on appreciation.

Fast from self-pity;
Feast on goodness in others and self.

Fast from self-concern;
Feast on going out to others.

Fast from overdoing;
Feast on time for prayer.

Fast from worry;
Feast on God’s love.

It was also adapted into the song “Fast from, Feast On” in 2014 by Latifah Alattas and Dave Wilton and is performed by Alattas (under the artist name Page CXVI) on the album Lent to Maundy Thursday.

Fast from the swelling darkness
Feast on the power of his light
Fast from discontentment
Feast on the joy that he brings

Refrain:
Sustainer, protector, the well of life
My helper, my comfort, the bread of life
Is you
Is you

Fast from the fear that haunts us
Feast on the power of his might
Fast from the trap of judgment
Feast on all that’s been redeemed [Refrain]

Bridge:
From the sorrow’s shadow to perfect light
From the darkness of our doubt to a cleansing white
From the sorrow’s shadow to perfect light
From the blindness of our sin to healing sight [Refrain]

I recommend choosing one or more of these fast-feast pairings to partake of during Lent. Or you could write your own aspirational list, tailored to the areas where you struggle and want to see growth. Rephrase it as a vow: “I will fast from . . . I will feast on . . .” If you are comfortable sharing for the edification of other readers, feel free to do so in the Comments section below.

Roundup: Stained glass by Kerry James Marshall, “Still I Rise” choreography, Black Liturgies, and more

February 5, 2026February 5, 2026 Victoria Emily JonesLeave a comment

February is Black History Month, and while I endeavor to showcase Black art year-round, today’s post gives it dedicated attention.

VIDEO: “Kerry James Marshall, Now and Forever; Elizabeth Alexander, ‘American Song,’ Washington National Cathedral,” Smarthistory, January 22, 2024: Art historian Beth Harris and Kevin Eckstrom, former chief public affairs officer of Washington National Cathedral, explore the latest artwork to be permanently installed in the US capital’s “house of prayer for all people”: two Now and Forever stained glass windows by Kerry James Marshall, depicting a march for racial justice. Unveiled on September 23, 2023, these replace windows that memorialized Confederate generals Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, which had been donated by the United Daughters of the Confederacy and installed in 1953. (For my international readers: The Confederacy was a group of eleven Southern US states that seceded from the Union in 1860 and 1861 to preserve the institution of race-based chattel slavery on which their plantation economies relied; its government was dissolved in 1865 following the end of the Civil War, but its legacy continued.)

In 2015, when a white supremacist, who touted the Confederate flag as symbolic of his ideology, murdered nine Black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, Washington National Cathedral’s dean at the time, the Very Rev. Gary Hall, called for the removal of the Lee-Jackson windows, which initiated a two-year discernment process involving ample community discussions. The cathedral finally took down the windows in 2017 following a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that claimed yet another life. The Very Rev. Randolph Hollerith, then the dean, said the windows “were a barrier to our mission, and an impediment to worship in this place.” Their removal and the installation of the Now and Forever windows in their place were funded by private foundations.

Marshall, Kerry James_Now and Forever — Kerry James Marshall (American, 1955–), *Now and Forever*, 2023. Fabricated by Andrew Goldkuhle. Stained glass windows, south outer aisle, bay 7, Washington National Cathedral, Washington, DC. Photo: Steven Zucker.

“American Song” by Elizabeth Alexander, commissioned by Washington National Cathedral and inscribed below Kerry James Marshall’s Now and Forever windows in bay 7. Photo: Victoria Emily Jones.

In addition to commissioning Marshall to design new windows, the cathedral commissioned the Pulitzer-nominated poet Elizabeth Alexander, who wrote and read “Praise Song for the Day” for President Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration, to write a poem for this occasion. Titled “American Song,” it is inscribed on two limestone tablets beneath Marshall’s windows. The Windows Replacement Committee gave both artists this assignment:

We seek to tell a story of resilience, endurance, and courage that gives meaning and expression to the long and arduous plight of the African American, from slavery to freedom, from alienation to the hope of reconciliation, through physical and spiritual regeneration, as we move from the past to present day. The artist will capture both darkness and light, both the pain of yesterday and the promise of tomorrow, as well as the quiet and exemplary dignity of the African American struggle for justice and equality and the indelible and progressive impact it has had on American society. Each artist should respond in his or her own creative way to these ideals and aspirations, framing both the earthly and the divine, within the sacred space of the Washington National Cathedral.

When I was there last year, I asked the guide why the signs the figures hold don’t bear any of the more familiar slogans of our historical moment, such as “Black Lives Matter.” She said the artist deliberately did not want to tether the protest to a particular time period, in order to emphasize that the struggle for racial equality is ongoing. “Fairness,” “No Foul Play,” “No,” “Not”—these are expressions of demand and defiance that could apply to a number of justice-related issues and that encompass people of all races.

Learn more at https://cathedral.org/college/windows/.

+++

DANCE: “Still I Rise,” choreographed by Sean Cheesman: I really miss the TV show So You Think You Can Dance, which had aspiring dancers train across genres—contemporary, hip-hop, ballroom, jazz, etc.—with renowned choreographers, performing to compete for the title of “America’s favorite dancer.” It was entertaining, impressive (the athleticism!), and often moving. Here’s a contemporary routine choreographed by Sean Cheesman to spoken word artist Alexis Henry’s reading of a classic poem by Maya Angelou about Black strength and defiance. It’s danced by Koine “Koko” Iwasaki, Kiki Nyemchek, Taylor Sieve, and Mark Villaver. It’s from season 14, episode 12, which aired September 4, 2017.

(Another memorable Cheesman-choreographed dance from season 14 is an African jazz duet to Sheila Chandra’s “Speaking in Tongues II,” which unfortunately, I cannot find online.)

+++

ARTICLE: “Stephen Towns’ Quilted Works Emphasize Black Joy as Resistance in ‘Safer Waters’” by Kate Mothes: Through June 14, the Wichita Art Museum in Kansas is hosting the exhibition Safer Waters: Picturing Black Recreation at Midcentury, featuring eleven quilts and six paintings by the Baltimore-based artist Stephen Towns [previously]. Black history has always been an important aspect of Towns’s work, and in this series he was inspired by historic photographs (by Bruce Mozert) of Paradise Park, a segregated attraction in Silver Springs, Florida, that operated from 1949 to 1969 and that was popular among Black vacationers, providing a space for leisure and togetherness away from Jim Crow.

Towns, Stephen_All We Knew Was Joy — Stephen Towns (American, 1980–), *All We Knew Was Joy*, 2025. Natural and synthetic fabric, polyester and cotton thread, cubic zirconia, glass beads, and shell, 55 × 65 1/2 in.

Towns began his Paradise Park series in 2022 after reading Remembering Paradise Park by Cynthia Wilson-Graham and Lu Vickers, and this show is a continuation of it, for which he made seven new quilts (pictured in Mothes’s article). His art is displayed alongside some of Mozert’s photographs and related objects from Florida archives and collectors. See an exhibition walk-through on the artist’s Instagram page; see also photos from the opening on January 16–17.

Here is a short 2024 interview with Towns about this body of work, as presented at the earlier exhibition Private Paradise: A Figurative Exploration of Black Rest and Recreation at the Rockwell Museum in Corning, New York:

+++

SONGS:

Gospel music is one of the many gifts the Black church has given the world. Here are two songs from that distinctive choral tradition.

>> “Perfect Praise (How Excellent)” by Brenda Joyce Moore, performed by the Sunday Service Choir: Written in 1989 based on Psalm 8, this song gained recognition through its performance on the 1990 album This Is the Day by Walt Whitman and the Soul Children of Chicago, featuring Lecresia Campbell. It has since become a gospel choir standard, though often with the lead vocals eliminated (and that part taken by the full choir). It’s performed in this video by Sunday Service at the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord in Paris on March 1, 2020.

>> “He’s a Wonder” by Jamel Garner, performed by the Chicago Mass Choir, feat. Cornelius Owens: This song about Jesus’s miracles is from the Chicago Mass Choir’s 2024 album Greater Is Coming.

+++

PODCAST EPISODES:

>> “Artist Archetypes with Jakari Sherman,” Be. Make. Do., January 21, 2025: I really enjoyed this conversation with Jakari Sherman on the soul|makers podcast hosted by Rev. Lisa Cole Smith, where he describes his journey as an artist and a believer. Sherman is a choreographer within the tradition of stepping, a percussive dance practice in which dancers use primarily their hands and feet to create music. Stepping comes from the African American Greek letter organizations and has roots, Sherman explains, in the antebellum South, where enslaved people had their drums taken away and thus had to find ways to express the rhythms they felt using just the floor and their own bodies. (Tap evolved largely for the same reason.)

Sherman is the creative director of [Jk]creativ, a multidisciplinary company developing purpose-driven and truth-seeking cultural works. From 2007 to 2014 he served as the artistic director of Step Afrika! and has continued to develop and direct works for them, such as Drumfolk and The Migration (which I saw in 2024 and was excellent). To establish a foundation for his scholarly research on the history of stepping, he completed a master of arts program in ethnochoreology at the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance in 2015. Below is a trailer for one of Sherman’s latest works, Our Road Home, an interactive rhythmic production that meditates “on what is means to find freedom—and to live it fully in body, soul, and spirit”; it premiered last June as part of a year-long collaboration with the Houston Freedmen’s Town Conservancy.

>> “Cole Arthur Riley – Black Liturgies,” Nomad, February 9, 2024: Tim Nash interviews Cole Arthur Riley, the best-selling author of Black Liturgies: Prayers, Poems, and Meditations for Staying Human (which grew out of her popular Instagram account @blackliturgies) and This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories That Make Us. She is a wise, feeling, richly spiritual and embodied writer and speaker whose work I’ve appreciated. In this conversation she discusses her hang-ups with the Book of Common Prayer; battling chronic illness; balancing the active and contemplative lives; the revival of lament; self-sacrifice versus self-care; her experience of white people engaging with her work (“I like to think that there’s something mysterious that’s healed in us when we encounter each other’s interior worlds; when we hear words written by a Black woman toward God, that that could somehow move someone in some way, and move us closer to each other”); and what hope means to her and where she sees signs of it.

Even though I, as a white person, am not the intended audience for the book Black Liturgies, in reading it, I found it meaningful to listen to the cries of Riley’s heart. While many of the prayers are particular to the experience of being Black, still many others are general enough that they could be prayed by anyone. Part 1, organized thematically, consists of chapters such as “Dignity,” “Wonder,” “Doubt,” “Lament,” “Rage,” and “Rest,” whereas part 2 contains prayers for dawn, day, and dusk as well as for the liturgical year, secular holidays, and life occasions. I like the names for God with which she opens each prayer—e.g., “God of the shadows,” “God who expands,” “Divine Labyrinth,” “God aware,” “God of locked doors,” “God who reclaims,” “God our home,” “God of delight,” “God of the art that will never be seen,” “God who whispers”; it has prompted me to consider the names and descriptions I use for God and how they influence how I pray.

To give you a flavor of Black Liturgies, here are two prayers from the book (and note that prayers are only one component; also included are letters, quotes, questions for contemplation, confessions and assurances of pardon, and benedictions):

For Marveling at Your Own Face

God of the flesh,
When we consider what is worthy of our wonder, it is easy to forget our own faces, our bodies. The world is relentless in indoctrinating us into self-hatred—into anti-Blackness, into transphobia, into misogyny in all forms. We are slowly and steadily brainwashed to despise our own faces from the time we’re tall enough to stare up at ourselves in the mirror. How can we resist this? Let the tyranny of the mirror be no more. May it instead become a portal—to delight, to pleasure, and to love. These noses, these hips, the way our hair rises and falls. The memories etched into our hands and faces. Remind us of the miracle of flesh that grows back, of blood that pulses warm beneath the skin that holds us. Of bodies, these holy beautiful bodies, that are working a thousand unseen miracles just so that we can read these lines, breathe this air, cry or not cry. As we peer into the face before us, remind us that we are something to behold. We believe; forgive our unbelief. Ase.

For Those Who Doomscroll

Still God,
We confess that we are addicted to pessimism. Although we rarely name it as such, so much of our attention is devoted to negativity. Show us how we use technology to soothe and stir the aches in us. Keep us from turning control over to our anxiety, that it would no longer feed itself with news of tragedy and impending disaster. It is easy to become lost, buried in the quicksand of digital catastrophe. Draw our attention upward. Guide us to look away habitually; and not just away, but up at the sky, the grass, the table. Guide us inward as well. Acquaint us with goodness again. In the world, and in ourselves. Let us follow the children, freed from the grip of seriousness. Renew our playfulness. Lead us into wise rhythms of engagement, retreating to rest and breathe. Remind us that there is much the world needs, including our attention to atrocity—but if we watch the world burn for long enough, the fire will become our only reality. Amen.

“Unfinished” by Nellie deVries (poem)

February 2, 2026February 3, 2026 Victoria Emily JonesLeave a comment

Rembrandt_Simeon in the Temple — Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (Dutch, 1606–1669), *Simeon in the Temple*, 1669. Oil on canvas, 98.5 × 79.5 cm. Nationalmuseum Stockholm, Sweden. Photo: Erik Cornelius.

after Simeon in the Temple, 
Rembrandt, 1669

Fingers stretch
as if supplicating hands
are interrupted—
the answer placed
in his waiting arms.

Light glistens on his temple—
the mind consoled
by consolation’s burden.

Death takes the prophet;
takes the artist
before his painting is complete;
takes the one
already bearing sin’s stripes.

So certain are the words
“It is finished.”

Originally published in the anthology Adam, Eve, and the Riders of the Apocalypse: 39 Contemporary Poets on the Characters of the Bible, edited by D. S. Martin (Cascade, 2017). Used by permission of the poet.

Nellie deVries is a retired nurse and a poet from Michigan. Her debut book of poetry is forthcoming from Wipf & Stock in 2026.

Roundup: Lament songs, Inkwell poetry booklet, and more

January 30, 2026January 30, 2026 Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

SPOTIFY PLAYLIST: February 2026 (Art & Theology): An assortment of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, old and new.

+++

CONFERENCE: The Breath and the Clay: Exploring the Intersections of Art, Faith, and Culture, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, March 20–22, 2026: “Before the first word is spoken, before the brush touches the canvas or the note strikes the air, there is silence. Creation begins with a clearing, making space for new worlds to exist. An empty chair waits in welcome, an empty forest beckons us to come aside. Even absence itself becomes an opening for presence.

“At The Breath & The Clay 2026, we are exploring what it means to make space—for rest, for renewal, for art, for one another, and for the Presence that meets us in the emptiness. Together, we will practice making room: for the unfinished, and the unfurnished, for the overlooked, for voices not our own. In this space, we will make art—our response to the silence that precedes creation, our offering to the mystery and miracle that ever calls us onward.”

This annual gathering features presenters from across the disciplines of poetry, music, visual art, theater, film, dance, creativity coaching, and real estate development. General admission is $299.

+++

PRAYER: “Prayers in a Time of Tyranny, Injustice, and Violence”: From Christ Our Advocate, a C4SO Anglican church plant in Wheaton, Illinois, led by Rev. Dr. Emily McGowin, Rev. Ron McGowin, and Rev. Aaron Harrison. Lord, have mercy. [HT: Global Christian Worship]

+++

SONGS:

>> “How Long (A Christian Lament)” by IAMSON: This week the Richmond, Virginia–based singer-songwriter IAMSON (the artist name of Orlando Palmer) wrote his pain into a song and shared it on social media. “I challenge all Christian artists to write about what’s really going on,” he says, likely referring to the two murders committed this month by US federal agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and, more broadly, the agencies’ hypermilitarized tactics, indiscriminate raids, illegal detainments, and terrorizing of communities in deference to President Trump’s mass deportation initiative.

>> “Psalm 10” by Poor Bishop Hooper: Poor Bishop Hooper (Leah and Jesse Roberts) have set all 150 psalms of the Bible to music. Psalm 10 is one I had not ever heard a musical interpretation of. Belonging to the genre of lament, it opens:

Why, O LORD, do you stand far off?
Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?
In arrogance the wicked persecute the poor—
let them be caught in the schemes they have devised.

>> “Micah 6:8” by Monroe Crossing: Monroe Crossing [previously] is a Minnesota bluegrass band whose members are Lisa Fuglie (fiddle), David Robinson (banjo), Derek Johnson (guitar), Matt Thompson (mandolin), and Mark Anderson (bass). This is a song Fuglie and Anderson wrote in 2011 inspired by Micah 6:8, one of this coming Sunday’s lectionary readings: “He has told you, O mortal, what is good, and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God?” Many Christians hold on to this as a “life verse,” a summation of God’s values that serves as a guiding principle.

You can preview the score here, and purchase it here.

+++

FREE DIGITAL POETRY BOOKLET: Inkwell Poetry for the New Year (2026): Last week Inkwell (formerly Ekstasis), a publication of Christianity Today, released a collection of twenty poems curated by guest editor J. C. Scharl, and it’s excellent! “A storytelling community seeking transcendence,” Inkwell is in a period of refining their identity, and this offering is a sort of stopgap until they reintroduce poetry features into their editorial flow. (Right now they’re focusing on creative nonfiction.)