by Jo Doyle                                 Ireland                                          13.05.2024

Recently a friend of mine from Kenya strikingly said to me,
“Is the world trying to eliminate Christ?”
My thoughts about that where, how can we eliminate Light?

During this time from the Easter Resurrection to Pentecost, we really should be asking such vital questions of ourselves. Saying that, I was left wondering more than I was able to answer. I’ve scratched my head and said to myself,
“What is the Way of Resurrection?”

I was stuck, maybe I could look up some theological answer, but would that change my heart?
I tended to constantly go back again and again to looking at,
“The way of the wound.” Surely that path directs us to Resurrection?

Today’s vocabulary tells us of how we are wounded, but we need a vocabulary to tell us how we are healed. PTSD. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. PTS Post Traumatic Stress. PTSR Post Traumatic Stress Reaction. CPTSD Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression and addictions. Healing from all these initials and titles is in spiritual terms an invitation to,

Die with Him and also an invite to be Resurrected with Him.

Our wounds either make us or break us and the deeper our wounds pierce us, the harder we have to work to find healing. Our healing journey cannot be grounded in platitudes but in the search for love and finding those who know how to do just that. There may simply be a living flame of love that heals. The Spirit joins us both in our suffering, our encounter, and our healing. Plainly put, love is the answer.
What gives me hope in looking for Resurrection is firstly that we are all wounded. We all have a touch of something.

What gives me hope is the slow acceptance of our vulnerability and in our owned fracturedness we transform to become compassion. Life is rarely the same after a wounding, we all know that, and after being broken open I have to stop and ponder who am I now, what is my identity, what has been my identity from the very beginning.

The Book of Revelation is not the last book in the Bible for nothing, but we do need to have the courage to walk through this revelation door. This is where God will show us our new name, identity and calling.
Is this Resurrection?

What happens if Resurrection comes from our woundedness and weakness?
How scary is that!
Where will this take us?

Surely our woundedness calls us into a greater participation in life and living.
I believe that this is the call of the wound.
So what happens if we ignore this way.
Will we miss it? Our own Resurrection that is?

Is that why the apostles were so frightened because they knew the depth of transformation and spiritual growth inherent in every wound. Is it because they knew the depth of transformation which is needed to let love burn within them.
In Resurrection I find my name. I find Christ, the Light, within me and outside of me. Is my heart not burning?
Maybe I need to pray,

Come Holy Spirit fill the hearts of your faithful and enkindle in me the fire of your love.

Jo Wardhaugh Doyle is farming in Kildare with her husband Matt. She has worked in Uganda, Ethiopia and Kenya, but more recently has worked with Sr Rita Kelly MMM doing the REAP programme in the Irish Missionary Union (IMU).