The Night I Realized Love Still Walks On the Blessed Feast of St. Nicholas
By the Rev. Allison Burns-LaGreca
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There are nights I cannot sleep,
nights when the world tilts too far
into sorrow and the news flickers like a broken psalm.
War crime.
Child lost.
Another mother screaming into the dust.
Another son who will never come home.
And my heart, this priest’s heart,
this mother’s heart,
this woman who still believes God speaks through the lowly,
whispers into the dark,
Where are you, Lord.
And then Nicholas shows up.
Not the velvet saint
made safe by centuries of soft retellings,
but the one who walked into danger
with mercy clenched in his fist
and the Gospel ringing in his ears
like a distant yet insistent bell.
The Nicholas who saved girls from men
who used poverty as license.
The Nicholas who threw gold through windows
like a rebel throwing stars against the night.
The Nicholas who understood
that God’s love is only real
when it breaks a chain.
He steps into my room like memory,
like vision,
like a companion in the long work of love.
And he says,
Come with me.
So I do.
We walk through the night of this world,
past Gaza’s broken walls,
past the streets of Detroit where children sleep hungry,
past Manila
where girls Nicholas saved
still have sisters who need saving,
past Damascus
where boys cradle shattered toys,
past bedrooms in quiet towns
where teenagers whisper
Does anyone see me
Does anyone care.
And Nicholas stands still in each place,
his cloak stirring in the wind of God’s grief.
He tells me,
Love begins here.
Not in comfort.
Not in sentiment.
Here, where innocence has been stolen
and hope is thin.
Here, where the Church must rise
or lose its soul.
He reminds me of the children Jesus gathered,
dusty feet and wide eyes,
resting against the chest
of the One who refuses to discard anyone.
The One who touches those the world forgets.
The One who says the kingdom is theirs.
We keep walking.
Nicholas looks at me
with eyes that carry both fury and tenderness
and asks the only question that matters.
What will you throw into the night, priest?
What will you risk for the children?
What gold will you let loose from your hands
to break the world open
for love?
And I feel it then.
The vow rising again in my chest,
the baptismal fire,
the voice of God whispering
Beloved, love one another
for I have loved you first.
So I gather my courage,
my grief,
my faith,
my joy that refuses to die,
and I say,
Show me the window.
He nods.
We stand before the night.
It is thick.
It pretends it cannot hear.
But we know better.
Where love walks, the darkness trembles.
Nicholas places a weight in my hands.
It is my life.
My calling.
My voice.
My strength.
My tenderness.
My refusal to look away.
Throw it, he says.
So I do.
The bag arcs through the night,
a streak of holy defiance,
and when it lands
I swear the world shifts
the way dawn shifts the sky
before anyone realizes morning has come.
That is the feast.
Not candy.
Not nostalgia.
But courage.
But mercy.
But the relentless love of God
moving through human hands
until every child is safe
and every darkness is pierced
and every window is filled
with the sound of hope landing.
Nicholas turns toward me.
Christ stands behind him.
The kingdom hums like something alive.
And I know the truth.
This is who I am.
This is who we are.
God’s own lanterns.
Walking into night after night
until the dawn finally rises
and the children of this world
can sleep in peace again.
Throw again, Nicholas whispers.
And I answer,
Always.
By the Rev. Allison Burns-LaGreca, Thoughts, Prayers & Art, Rector, St. Mary's Episcopal Church, Stone Harbor, New Jersey, used by permission.