At first glance this is one of the least profound of Jesus’ “words from the cross." After losing a large quantity of blood through his flogging and crucifixion, Jesus was bound to have experienced extraordinary thirst. So it is not surprising that Matthew and Mark record, along with John, that somebody offered Jesus some sour wine in a sponge (see Matthew 27:48; Mark 15:34). But its only John that notes Jesus’ simple statement of need (John 19: 28). We on this island have so much water to spare (especially given the downpours of the past few days) that few of us have ever felt REAL thirst… perhaps coming round from an anaesthetic or after a tough sporting event… But few of us will have experienced the same level of physical thirst as Jesus has… However, around the world, then and now, real life-threatening thirst is a daily human experience. We barely noticed the loss of millions of gallons of water from a leak in the Mourne reservoirs last week, yet across the world 1 billion peo
Dialogues, monologues, sketches, poems, rants, theological and liturgical bits and bobs and miscellaneous other verbal doodles...