大象传媒

Good morning. Beside my desk at home I have a small wooden cross. It hangs on a thin cord, attached to a drawing pin on the wall. It is made of dark wood, and as an object of art or even a carpenter鈥檚 skill, it is of little note. But I hope I never lose it. Its importance is that it was the parting gift to me from a priest of the Armenian Apostolic church during one of several visits I made to his country after the ending of Soviet rule. Its distinctive feature is the design of little buds which appear to grow from the ends of the branches of the cross - as if the branches themselves are alive and about to bear fruit. My friend and I had been talking of our personal and national stories - me of the Irish famine in the 1840s; of its effect on our history ever since and of how we have really never recovered. He of the Armenian genocide perpetrated in the closing years of the First World War and beyond - and of the national wound it created which refuses to heal, even today. As we parted and he pressed the cross into my hand as a keepsake, he said 鈥淣ever forget the cross, but also its fruit. Perhaps, in God鈥檚 good grace鈥�, he continued, 鈥渢here might better days for us Armenians, as for you Irish.鈥�
Lord God, we thank you that your desire is that good should grow, like fruit - and that this is true of us whether we are individuals or nations. Like fruit which on many-a-tree at this time of year is appearing, we pray for your blessing to be upon us today. Amen.