In Ash-Wednesday, Eliot turns inward. The poem does not begin with reunion, but with renunciation. Its speaker stands at the threshold between the life he has known and the spiritual life he hopes to enter. He wants to change, but wanting change is not the same as being changed.

Published in 1930 as one of Eliot's Ariel Poems, it is perhaps his most intimate poem of recognition. Eliot himself said plainly that its theme was paternity. The poem draws upon Shakespeare's Pericles, in which Pericles is reunited with his daughter Marina, whom he had believed lost. But Eliot complicates Shakespeare's story by placing it beside another awakening: Seneca's Hercules, who comes out of madness and discovers that he has killed his own children.

As we continue our journey through the Christian poetry of T. S. Eliot, we come to one of his shortest—and most searching—poems. Animula is Latin for "little soul." The title comes from the dying words traditionally attributed to the Roman emperor Hadrian, who addressed his departing soul with tenderness and uncertainty. Eliot takes that ancient phrase and gives it a distinctly Christian direction. Rather than explaining the soul, Eliot lets it speak.

ourney of the Magi is one of Eliot's most beloved Christian poems. Written in 1927, shortly after his conversion to Anglican Christianity, it retells the visit of the wise men to Bethlehem—not through the eyes of a triumphant kingmaker, but through the weary reflections of an old man looking back on the journey that changed his life forever. The poem reminds us that encountering Christ is never merely an inspiring moment. It is the beginning of a new life, and the end of a

When readers first encounter Ash Wednesday, they are often surprised. It is not a triumphant hymn of certainty. It is the prayer of a soul learning to repent. That is precisely why it remains one of T. S. Eliot's greatest Christian poems. Having come to faith in Christ, Eliot discovered what every believer eventually learns: conversion is not the end of the journey. It is the beginning. The Christian life is a continual turning toward God.

After last week's meditation on the wise men in Journey of the Magi, Eliot now takes us into the Temple at Jerusalem, where another elderly believer waits for the fulfillment of God's promise. Simeon had spent a lifetime waiting. The Holy Spirit had revealed to him that he would not die until he had seen the Lord's Christ. Day after day he entered the Temple, watching and praying.