The Cry of the Poor
We will all be familiar with the expression ‘context is everything’… that notion that the deep meaning of an action, word, song or music becomes apparent because of what is happening at the time… meaning is amplified, perception is sharpened and there is a sudden congruence of the moment and the word. There is that explosive moment when our heart surges and we know a deep truth.
Such a moment occurred when the Liturgical choir sang at this public liturgy of Re-Membering during the first anniversary of the great Churchill Fires
The following passage from St Paul’s letter to the Romans had just been read:
For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
And in the silence that followed… a silence heavy with loss and doubt, a single voice, with the clarity of a silver bell dropped like the dewfall into our midst: The Lord hears the cry of the Poor.
That voice was the pure voice of cantor Amy Wilson. The choir was to the side of the auditorium… not a performance… like a hidden presence confirming the words of Paul… as if heaven had answered with the voice of an angel.
