“He touched my eyes, And my prophetic eyes opened
Like those of a frightened eagle.
He touched my ears, And they were filled with noise and ringing:
And I heard the shuttering of the heavens,
And the flight of the angels in the heights,
And the movement of the sea beasts under the waters,
And the sound of the vine growing in the valley….”
(The Prophet, by Alexander Pushkin)
The priest makes tiny crosses of sacred myrrh under the eyes and on the ears of the newly baptized Christian, chanting: “The seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit.” The same is repeated by the choir. The gift is a prayer—may the newborn see and hear with the eye and ear of Christ all the beauty and sounds of a world created by the heavenly Father, and may that ability come about by virtue of the cleansing water of baptism, never to be covered over by the sin inherited from Adam. The potential to do so is confirmed by the anointing seal of the Holy Spirit.
The eagle’s eyesight is many times stronger than that of the human being, especially when enhanced by fright. May the newborn discover and make use of that capacity that is an attribute of one who is freed from the film that comes later with the compromises one makes with a fallen sinful world. May he or she perceive with Elijah’s foresight when he saw the future of Israel polluted with pagan religion brought by Queen Jezebel and her clergy. May the one baptized into Christ have the same clarity of vision that demands truth to be proclaimed regardless of the rebuttal from those who compromise with the ways of the world and the intrigues of those who would explain away every violation of God’s commandments of justice, honesty and purity.
May the one who was baptized hear the wail of the whale and realize what is happening to all ocean creatures confused by the erratic noise made by humans through the waters, and strive to clean the water from sound pollution and debris, purify the atmosphere and cleanse the earth of the pollutants that are destroying the flora and fauna of the earth’s environment.
To hear “the sound of the vine growing in the valley” is to take responsibility for the living things—too many to ignore—the insects, worms, beetles and larger mammals fast becoming extinct due to the blindness of humankind to their existence and our ignorance of the delicate balance of nature, resulting in the annihilation of so many animals and plants. It is to listen to the living Word of God who called Himself the Vine reaching out to nourish the living fruit on the branches who nourish themselves from His precious Cup of the new covenant bought by His blood.
However, to see with eagle’s eyes and to hear the bleating, groaning, suffering sounds of nature, the person who is alive in Christ and anointed with the Holy Spirit must look within himself or herself and listen for the whispers of the soul. He or she must be ever in touch with God’s image stamped on the psyche. The whole person spends a lifetime shutting out the sights and sounds, tastes and feelings that numb the senses and sensations of the Spirit, those events that negate and nullify the sensitivities which were enhanced by holy Baptism and that suppress the invaluable grace of living to one’s fullest capacity, striving to become agents of the heavenly Father attuned to the inner promptings of the Holy Spirit alive in us through Jesus Christ so that we might be in all ways His partners for the renewal of the earth.