(click on image to enlarge)
Going Forth
Photo meditation
By Joseph R. Veneroso, M.M.
Exiled from Eden eons ago
Sojourning with Abraham
Delivered from slavery
Wandering around the world’s wilderness
Taken into captivity in Babylon
Till we return from whence we came
Each of us is called to leave
Behind familiar faces and places
And go forth to foreign lands
To find our way back home
To God.
We follow in the footsteps
Of him who left heaven’s glory
To dwell among the poor
And oppressed of the earth
And set them free with the truth
That they as sons and daughters
Of God in whose image they were made
Are thus deserving of all help, hope
And dignity, for they too are called
To go forth from poverty and despair
To dwell in the Promised Land.
Till at length when this, our earthly exile,
Is at its end and we, weary but unbowed,
Prepare for one final going forth
To leave behind not homes or friends or family
But our bodies to return to the earth,
We are confident the One
Who calls us to breathe our last in time
Will lead us to eternity.
