The poem by Jamie Coats that inspired the Mary Manifesto.

First of the Trinity

Mary

God does not
Rape
Mary.

If God had raped Mary
Do you think we’d have her joy
So magnificently described?

God sends Gabriel.
He appears as the most
Gorgeous of men.

She hugs him saying,
“You are so beautiful.”
Places her head on his chest,

Looks up
And tentatively
They kiss on the lips.

He moves to kiss her again.
“No,” she says,
“My betrothal is arranged.

My father is making me marry.
I cannot defy him,
My blood-line, my tribe.”

Gabriel steps back.
“You get to decide.
God’s love is consensual.

Any other story
Is a lie made up
By man.”

Mary tremors at the idea.
A woman freed to choose
Love over tribe,

A woman no longer
Property of man
With the right to decide.

Knowing that this right is
The centre of God’s love
For all mankind.

She chooses love.
She defies her dad,
She faithfully betrays her blood.

“Be it unto me
According to
Thy word…”

Gabriel, Mary
As man
As woman

Fully alive
Feeling
Exploring

Adoring
Intertwining
Through each other

Combining
To be
Worship

To and from
Eternity
Now one

With God
Now spiraling
In a greater orbit

Knowing they are
Saying yes to life,
To Jesus.

She gives birth to a boy,
Who grows to be a man
Who in time understands,

But before,
His tribe raises him
As their man.

Like all of us
He learns the normal
Basis of hate:

Who’s in?
Who’s out?
How is my blood superior?

I am a boy,
I am this belief and religion,
I am of my tribe.

Second of the Trinity

The Syrophoenician Woman

He grows into a prophet,
Limited at first,
He prays to the Father,

And says he is just a man for
The lost sheep of his tribe.
One day he meets a woman,

A woman who says, “No,
That is not good enough.”
She prays as a Mother,

The Mother who is
Desperate
For her sick child.

She is foreign,
Annoying, cloying
And totally persistent.

She is not of his blood,
Gender, race, tribe
Caste, class or God.

He denies her,
He reviles her,
Finally calls her a dog.

She faithfully sees past
The hate he’s been taught
She knows his heart.

She stands her ground,
Tells him,
“Even dogs get scraps.”

Like flint
She strikes him,
Sparks his love.

She breaks the clasp that holds
His cultural coat of hate,
It falls away,

Revealing the loving heart
Given him
By his mother and God.

His mutual love flows,
He loves her daughter
As his own.

Free,
He heals
Into the Messiah.

Third of the Trinity

Mary Magdalene

He is now on the path
To be crucified
By those so superior.

Now he honours every woman,
Every foreigner,
Every other.

Now he’s got it,
Are you surprised
Why he is such a hit

With all the women
Of the Gospels
Described?

Are you surprised
That those of power,
Still dressed in hate,

Come after him
For such betrayal
With bloodshed in mind?

Betrayed by a kiss,
Led through the crowds,
They kill him on a tree.

Mary Magdalene
She watches him die.
His agony consumes her,

She struggles to stop
The terror
From petrifying her.

He dies. Is it over?
The light is fading fast
When his body is released.

She follows
As they take his body
To the tomb.

A new one carved into rock
With a circular stone
That rolls back into a slot.

They haul his body
Down into the antechamber
Onto the preparation table,

No time
To put him into
One of the burial slots.

It is Sabbath,
Darkness,
She’ll return when allowed.

On the third day
She comes early,
Still in darkness

With enough myrrh
To stop the retching
That celebrates

The victory of those
Who kill those who
Put love before blood.

The stone is sitting
In its slot
Rolled back.

No stench,
No body,
Another humiliating loss.

The rock-carved tomb,
The ultimate dead end,
Is emptiness.

Have the men of bloodshed
Desecrated his body
And hidden their evil deed?

“No!” she screams.
In the place of despair
She is faithful to love,

She feels it envelop her.
She turns, risen he is there,
Betraying death itself

Her love explodes,
It is that mutual love
It feels consensual

Beyond sexual,
Union with God.
No hatred to those who kill,

Compassion for all,
Resurrection love
From her pours forth.

Finally Holy Fire

Yes his act is sacred betrayal.
Yes his reward is death,
Yes he is going to ask you to

Stand with the poor,
Under the stars and
Light the candle of a little child.

You will light her candle
Regardless of who you are.
Free, you will not ask

Of gender
Of race
Of tribe

Of caste
Of class
Of God

You’ll faithfully betray
Your tribe if you answer
Yes to what Jesus and

The Trinity of women ask,
“Are you flint enough
To light Holy Fire?

Biblical References: Luke 1, 23:26-24:12, Mark 7:24-30, Matthew 15:21-28, & John 20:1-18

Faithful Betrayal – Holy Fire is third poem in the Candle Trilogy.

If you are inspired by this poem please read the Mary Manifesto.

To send this poem to friends forward the link jamiecoats.net/holyfire.