Behold, I am doing a new thing, now it springs forth. Do you not perceive it? (Is 43:19)

In today’s first reading we heard a brief passage from Isaiah, Chapter 43. Isaiah here speaks in the language of poetry. His words are evocative, musical, stirring: to be savoured and pondered slowly. Clearly they point beyond themselves. We take them very seriously, because we hold them also to be true, and from God.