Kender du historien bag Valentins Dag, som nogle fejrer hvert år den 14. februar?
Det fortælles, at en præst ved navn Valentin viede nogle kærestepar i hemmelighed. Han kom derfor i fængsel. Her helbredte han fangevogterens datter for blindhedled. Inden han den 14 februar år 269 led martyrdøden ved halshugning, skulle han have efterladt hende en seddel, hvor der stod: “Din Valentin”.
Han blev begravet på en kirkegård på Via Flaminia tæt på Ponte Milvio nord for Rom.
Valentines Dag er de seneste år nået til Danmark. For nogle en kilde til glæde. For andre det modsatte.
Jeg har lyst til at dele en Valentin bøn af den nulevende jesuit Pete Greig (som du kan møde på LECTIO 365).
🕊 I pray today for those in love, those out of love, and those in between. I remember especially those who find themselves a little bit lonelier than normal.
I do not pray today for loved-up couples, exchanging overpriced flowers and foil-wrapped hearts, leaking pheromones like diesel fumes at candlelit dinners. I’m pretty sure, Lord, they will be OK (for now).
Instead, I hereby dedicate this happy-crappy day to all the brave teenagers who dared to send a card (hoping in vain with every fibre of their being for something back). Let them be a little bit more OK because I prayed.
I think of the mother, coping alone, who quietly bought herself flowers yesterday. Let her kids be kind today. Let her teenagers tidy their bedrooms. And if that’s a miracle too far (I realise You’ve got a lot on in the world right now), could they at least initiate a hug at bedtime. And, Lord, let those daffodils she bought herself last longer and shine brighter than those overpriced red roses that also caught her eye.
Finally, I ask You to look upon the elderly gentleman gazing today at a fading sepia photograph in a silver frame of a wedding in another time. Look at him and look with him and be with him in the remembering and the unremembering too. King of Love, on this day named after one of your unmarried saints, embrace the unlovely and the unloving parts of the world and of myself today.
Song of Songs (højsangen), inspire surprising turns of phrase and simple thoughtful acts, scatter sparks and rekindle the fires of romance wherever marriages are mired in the mundane. Melt our tiny, tinny expensive chocolate hearts. And forgive me today, I pray, for this cheap, gaudy, hysterical, isolating thing I have sometimes somehow tried to make of love and of You.
Amen ❤️
