Description
Imagining the Lectionary: the sacrificial shape of Good Friday Reflection
Accompanying images: “Trimmed for the future”, “Helen Huntington Jennings Christ Crucified”, “Crown of Thorns Coventry Cathedral” and “Christ Crucified in Coventry Cathedral”
Recovering from depression is proving to be a long drawn out journey. I took the photograph of the newly trimmed hedge earlier in the year just as I was coming to the end of eight weeks of counselling. That process of re-visiting my early childhood was as gruelling, as fundamental and as necessary as what I saw before me in the brutal remodelling of the hedgerow for fresh growth and long term flourishing. Yet strangely enough, my first impression when I saw this was of recognising both sacrifice and praise; it seemed as though the entirety of this living thing had been sacrificially shaped for praise, with uplifted arms raised high to the light. And then I saw the repeated shape of crucifixion too, right there dead centre, crown of thorns and arms outstretched, snapping into view time after time.
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