“Be still and know that I am God!” (Psalm 46:10, NRSV)
Over an 8 day period, I journeyed with a parish family as they kept vigil by the side of their beloved, Paul. Paul had been battling cancer for four years, and had reached the point when the best option was to let go of this life and enter eternal life. So Emily, his wife, and their children lovingly walked those last hard steps with him and entrusted him to God on September 8th.
Over the last 8 days of his life, I was there almost daily with the family. After he died, we prayed together the Prayers for the Dead. And later, planned his funeral Mass. I wrote Emily, “This past week has been a very sacred week for me as I have journeyed with you, Paul, and your children. It is a hard journey, but it is filled with such great love. In my 41 years of church ministry accompanying people through many joys and struggles, I have found it important to enter into the joys and the suffering of those to whom I minister. I will never feel the incredible impact that Paul’s love and his death has had on you and your children. You have shared an intimacy with Paul I will never have. Yet, I have had the grace of you and your family inviting me into what you are experiencing and it is from there that I share a little bit of the grief you are now experiencing.
It has been a tremendous honor, a sacred one at that, for me. … I have attached above a simple song for piano that I composed just yesterday, dedicated to you, Paul, Zach, Teagan, and Evy. I call these piano songs, “Psalm Offerings.” Unlike the psalms there are no words to these songs. There is usually a scriptural inspiration behind them. What I experienced this past week is a line from one of the psalms, “Be still and know that I am God.” I think of these songs as similar to the Catholic custom of lighting a candle when one offers up a prayer for someone. The only difference is that a song is being played. Being a classically trained musician, I compose in that genre. For whatever it is worth, I give this to you and the family.”
As the psalm verse suggests, this is a meditation on the mystery and love of God. It is composed in the key of F major and is in simple 3 part, ABA form.
Psalm Offering 10 Opus 10: Mysterium Caelesti (for Paul, Emily, Zach, Teagan, and Evy) (c) 2018, Robert Charles Wagner. All rights reserved.
