Psalm 102

The Lord looked down from his sanctuary on high, from heaven he viewed the earth/to hear the groans of the prisoners and release those condemned to death...

I am reading Psalm 102 this morning & this catches my attention.

I spent Wednesday afternoon touring Alcatraz, the infamous prison in the San Francisco Bay. We took a boat over to the island, disembarked, and were instructed a bit in the history of this island. It was many things, including a military compound, before it became a prison. After after it was closed down by the city of SF because it was too expensive to run, Native Americans came in and took over the land. They were soon kicked out, and the island was taken under the city or state's national park program.

The rock was a prison for roughly 30 years, which is far shorter than I had realized. We toured everything from the warden's house to the social hall to the cell blocks to the recreation areas. The cell blocks were the most haunting. Al Capone was housed in Cell Block D, which was for the worst of these misled souls. There were cells in this block that were a decent size, but they weren't allowed out at all, unlike the other cell blocks. And then, there was solitary. Confinement without light for days on end.

Walter has written, or at least spoken to me, of the way that the prisoners were so isolated from society. If the wind blew just right, they might be lucky/unlucky enough to hear trailing sounds from the shore. It seems like these sounds would be both wonderful - connecting them to something from which they came, which they could remember - and horrible - reminding them of their extreme isolation.

This recent venture is why this verse from Psalm 102 called out to me as I was reading through it.

Our cries from the rock - the earth - are haunting, desperate, loud, frequent, and frustrated. God heard those cries and came after us, saving us from our own isolation. Our souls heard the soft, stealthy music coming from the other dimension in which we truly belong, and we consider ourselves lucky and unlucky to hear them. For they make us long for our true destiny, for our true nature and for our true God. But they also remind us how we have fallen and are not yet able to get to that other dimension.

Longing. Beauty and Hope in isolation. This is the difference between Alcatraz and Christianity. There was very little, if any, hope in Alcatraz. Even an escape to the exterior of the prison, which was near impossible, meant you were faced with about a mile swim in shark infested waters. If you were lucky. And if you weren't - and you were caught - you were punished with a ball and chain upon your return. Good luck swimming with that, the guards would say, smirking.

This has all been said before; I think that the reason I wanted to write about it was simply a better understanding of the desperation and separation of the Rock as compared to the Savior of Humanity.

Nobody hears the cries from the Rock.
The creator of the Universe hears the cries from this rock.

Meaningless humanity made ever important through Christ.

Paradox.