Welcoming Love Divine a Baptism Poem by Lou Campbell Ryan

Our hearts were broken, our dreams shattered by those plainspoken

Purporting to speak the holy words of God

- You’re worthy of death not worthy of the breath you breathe

They created an anchor to weigh down our hearts

as though WE were the disease.

What could there be for one just like me

and you

when all we knew was the brutal pain of hate, a campaign that did

not abate, our existence a mere dilemma to debate

Thereby any pretence of love did abdicate.

How is it now we find ourselves embraced

and cared for and dare I say it,

loved?

Love from where?

To coin a hackneyed Beatles line:

from someone here, there, everywhere?

Around? within?

Divine love did I now just feel?

or was it never lost but always within grasp?

But rather my heart had hidden,

was tired, beaten down,

because it was I who could not be

forgiven.

Or So I thought. But here's the Miracle

I was already forgiven,

My perceived Sins were only

in the eyes of those

who cannot feel Divine Love

which is to me a Revelation.

Yes Warren, and Laura, and Zoe,

who knew I HAD to mention that glorious mediaeval writer Julian,

who dared to write of this love,

even in a time of great unease,

disease and woe.

I can do no better than to let HER impart the words that

opened up my bruised heart,

that let me feel our Saviour’s Love -

for me this queer upstart.

‘Then our courteous Lord shows Himself to the soul with gladness and delight,

with welcoming friendship, as if the soul had been released from pain and

prison, saying tenderly: “My darling, I am glad you have come to me. I have

been with you always in all your sorrow, and now you see my love and we are

joined in joy.”’