How did St. James come to possess such a window? My understanding is that on one of Heyward's guided trips to the Holy Land, a parish family was so taken by the view from Dominus Flevit that it offered to donate a window inspired by it.

There's a detail about that chapel that I find just as striking, but which wasn't copied in our Meditation Chapel. I learned of it while doing research from an article by Barbara Brown Taylor. She tells us that below that window, on the front of the altar itself, "is a mosaic medallion of a white hen with a golden halo around her head. Her red comb resembles a crown, and her wings are spread wide to shelter the pale yellow chicks that crowd around her feet. There are seven of them, with black dots for eyes and orange dots for beaks. They look happy to be there. The hen looks ready to spit fire if anyone comes near her babies…The medallion is rimmed with red words in Latin. Translated into English they read, 'Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!' The last phrase is set outside the circle, in a pool of red underneath the chicks' feet: you were not willing." ¹

Stupid chicks. Don't they know what's good for them?

I was reminded of an experience I had when I was about eight years old. My father had built a chicken coop in our back yard, against a fence that served as the backstop for our school's softball field, in fact. Someone had given us a couple of white hens and a beautiful-and mean-rooster. We were so excited when first one, and then the other, of the hens started roosting. We would go out every day to see whether their eggs had hatched yet. After several weeks, they did. The chicks came out of their shells, and after a couple of hours were all dry and fluffy and running around making their little peeping noises.

But then we discovered a problem. The chicken wire my father had used to build the coop was too big-so big, in fact, that the chicks could easily squeeze through the wire octagons and escape onto the softball diamond. We were horrified! As we watched, they began to do just that. Soon, all the little chicks were running this way and that on the field, like some sort of cartoon baseball team, and the hens were clucking frantically and flapping their wings and sticking their beaks in the wire octagons, completely helpless to run after their broods. If we hadn't been there, the coyotes we heard at night would surely have had a lovely little snack to look forward to; as it was, our own housecats took off like lightning after them.

The first thing my brother and sister and I did was run into the chicken coop to try to catch the chicks before they all escaped, but they were too fast for us. So we ran along the fence and into the softball field and chased those little chicks down. And all this time the hens were making their helpless racket and the cats were cornering chicks and the dogs started barking and the rooster got mad…and as soon as we'd catch a chick, the little guys would do their best to wiggle out of our clutches, so that we'd have to catch the fastest ones two or three times before we got them. And, oh, I was so afraid that in my eagerness to get a firm hold on them, and save the chicks from the cats and the coyotes, I'd crush the poor baby birds to death.

Stupid chicks, I thought. Didn't they know what was good for them? Obviously not.

We got a smaller gauge of chicken wire, and after some quick renovations, returned the chicks to the chicken coop, where the hens swept down upon them and gathered them up under their wings. The mothers were not angry that the newborns had run off on their misadventure. They were just relieved to have their babies back.

While my attitude was one of frustration at the chicks' stupidity, their mothers' was one of care and compassion. And that's how Jesus feels about the people for whom he is ready to give his own life. Jesus responds with sadness and compassion; he does not blame his chicks, as I blamed mine, because that's just what baby chicks do-they scatter. They have no understanding of the consequences. The chicks are not willing to be gathered, simply because they do not know that they need a mother hen to gather them.

"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!"

Reflecting on this passage, Barbara Brown Taylor writes, "If you have ever loved someone you could not protect, then you understand the depth of Jesus' lament. All you can do is open your arms. You cannot make anyone walk into them. Meanwhile, this is the most vulnerable posture in the world-wings spread, breast exposed-but if you mean what you say, then this is how you stand." ²

It is a particularly vulnerable stance when there are cats or coyotes, or foxes about and you're the mother hen. When told that Herod wants to kill him, Jesus replies, "Go and tell that fox for me, 'Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work. Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.'" For my part, I am struck by how composed Jesus the mother hen is in the face of that menacing fox, Herod. In my own childish childhood attempts at gathering my brood, I ran around like a chicken with my head cut off. I was in no danger from cats or coyotes, but Jesus was in a very clear and present danger as he faced Jerusalem.

So, in the face of Herod the Fox, we meet Jesus the Chicken. A chicken is a strange animal to identify oneself with, particularly a mother hen. Isn't Jesus the Lion of Judah? That would take care of a fox, nicely. If Jesus has to be a bird, why can't he pick something dangerous, like an eagle or some other bird of prey that could just swoop down on that nasty old fox and dig its talons into its mangy red hide? I mean, who wants to follow a chicken? It's not a very inspiring image; it's about as dignified as Ben Franklin suggesting the turkey as our national symbol.

But that would be missing the point altogether. Jesus is a chicken, but he's no coward. He intends to go on to Jerusalem and certain death, and he'll do it on God's timetable, not Herod's. Jesus will be that mother hen who shields her chicks with her own body. If that fox wants them, he will have to kill the hen first.

Isn't this what all good mothers-all parents-are willing to do for their children? The best parents I know would think nothing of sacrificing themselves for the life of their children. And even if most parents are not called upon to give up their own lives in their children's stead, they give up their time, talent, and treasure in feeding, clothing, and educating their children.

Then, there is that special time in every parent's life when he or she becomes the mother or father of a teenager-when their chicks run off and rebel. These parents don't just throw in the towel…much as they might want to at times. Parenting is one long process of welcoming back with open arms those whom we love but can no longer protect.

This is no abstract theory but the most concrete expression of love known to humanity. Jesus is our own mother hen, whose wings were spread not in flight but in gathering. When Jesus stretched out his arms upon the hard wood of the cross, he did what every parent here is willing to do for their children. We are God's beloved children, and Jesus has done it for us.