clasp my open hand

Painting by Lorraine Rigby. 2017

He stood at the threshold, breath sharp and furious, while inside they laughed and drank without a care.

A hand reached out… palm open to the heavens… hungry for bread, hungry for love.

An old widow, clutching her last two coins, passed through the doorway with tears shining in her eyes.

He tightened his grip on the tool every empire loves, and under his breath he murmured the truth he could not ignore:

“My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made it a robber’s den.”

Then he crossed the line.

He walked into the shrine of gold and greed, a place meant to shelter all souls, now stained by ambition and quiet corruption.

He spoke again, steady and unmistakable: “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made it a robber’s den.”

They spun around. Who is this man? Who dares disturb the order we have built? But he overturned the tables, drove out the ones who had stopped caring, and cried once more, “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made it a robber’s den!” 

And still, across the ages, the champion of the marginalised lives on within us. So take my open hand, my friend, and rise with me.