Daily Reading for December 19
O Key of David and Scepter of the house of Israel, you open and no one can close; you close and no one can open: Come and bring captives out of the prison house, those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death.
Only those who have been incarcerated can know fully the isolation and dehumanization of being physically locked in prison—the humiliation of strip searches, the desolation of loneliness, the fear of physical and sexual abuse from officers and other inmates, the terror of nightmares, the often unabated guilt and anger over past mistakes. It is no wonder that the scriptural texts for today’s antiphon refer to prisons as an analogy for darkness and captivity, and then also echo a hope of future release and freedom.
It is only because Christ comes as the Key of David that prison can also be a place of transformation. In his book, Summons to Serve, Richard Atherton shared his vision of one redeeming influence of prison life. Atherton, for many years a prison chaplain in England, knew first hand of the harshness of prison life. “Using the imagery of Scripture, I like to think of prison as a desert; a place where the human spirit may be purified and ennobled but, alas, more easily twisted and damaged; a place that is often threatening and almost always unpredictable; a place where faith is put to the test—the faith of the inmates, but that of their pastor too; a place of loneliness and powerlessness and frustration, where [one] begins to feel . . . the truth of our Lord’s words: ‘Without me you can do nothing’ (John 15:5); and so ultimately a place of encounter with God.”
For those who have not experienced life in an actual prison, there are, nevertheless, other “prison” experiences—prisons that can be rigorously isolating and dehumanizing in their own way. There is a prison of fear and hate, a prison of anger, and a prison of resistance to openness and change; there is a prison of physical limitation and disability, of painful relationships, of difficult employment, and of unemployment. Most often we lock ourselves into these prisons; with Christ, however, even here we can encounter God. And it is this encounter that will begin the unlocking, opening process to freedom.
O Key of David,
come,
unlock my prison of self-distrust and fear,
of secrecy and doubt,
of injustice and unkindness.
Unlock my blindness
to the splendor and glory of your light.
Unlock my deafness
to the melody of the world
and the harmony of the universe.
Unlock my stumbling lameness
to the dance of your life.
Unlock my depression and gloom
to the majesty and gentleness of your love.
From Hasten the Kingdom: Praying the O Antiphons of Advent by Mary Winifred, C.A. (Liturgical Press, 1996).