What is God's Name: Reflections on the 'Faces' of God

God is a poet. The original sense of the word is the Greek word for maker. Poetry is beautiful truth. Sometimes straight prose can’t convey a deeply felt, inexpressible experience. Then you try poetry

In poetry, images and ideas that seem to have no connection are linked. When linked, they create in us an element of surprise and new, deeper insight. Listen to some of God’s poetic words:

The mercy of God is beautiful in the time of affliction
As a cloud of rain in the time of drought. — Sirach 35:26

What are the Beatitudes if not poetry? They are like a symphonic poem that rises and falls in a lovely pattern, easy to remember. These selections from Matthew 5 summarize the blessings for a life of following Christ:

Blessed are the poor…the kingdom of heaven is theirs ... Blessed are the merciful...they shall receive mercy...
Blessed are the peacemakers…they shall be called children of God...

In Chapter 5:14, the Book of Wisdom gives us lessons in poetic form as with the words:

The hope of the wicked is as dust blown in the wind; smoke scattered by the wind;
Or remembrance of a guest of one day who passed by; but the just will live forever.

The images of aging with its diminishments in chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes remind youth to remember the Creator before old age is upon them:

Before the sun and the light, the moon and the stars are darkened…
The keepers of the house shall tremble, the strong man shall stagger…

The psalms are poems expressing as only poetry can, all the hopes, despairs, joys and prayers of humankind. They, too, are the word of God. God is a poet.

By Mary Alban Bouchard CSJ
Photo by Betty Lou Knox CSJ