Waiting

Holy Saturday.

A day of suspension, and of waiting. Merton writes that on this day "the confusion of sorrow and joy is so complex that you never know where you are."

Yesterday we thought about ourselves individually, and ourselves as a species: our legacy of wars, hatred, waste, greed, senselessness and impatience, our selfishness, our lack of care for the future. The mind revolts: "But I try, I'm not a bad person!" And yet it's all around us, the evidence, the history, the news of today. And yet, in spite of all that -- Easter, a new beginning, is tomorrow. If there is one thing common to all human beings it's this capacity to hope, and to love.

It's hard though: hard to know where to begin, and hard to find the strength to act. If all we can feel is helpless, overwhelmed, and sad, then we can't be of much help to ourselves, let alone anyone else.

I've been touched this week by some of your comments and some letters I received from readers who wanted to say something privately. It means a lot to me that these posts haven't been rejected. It frustrates me to know that every one of us is, at our core, a spirtual being who longs for beauty, truth, hope, joy, and love -- but so many have been shut out by (or have deliberately left) religious institutions with their dogmas and creeds, their expectations of blind obedience, their cruel exclusions, their hierarchies and patriarchies, their wealth, and even their abuse of the most vulnerable. Some of us have turned to other paths. But more and more people today simply deny their own spirituality, and spend their entire lives in this sort of Saturday limbo, suspended between sorrow and a joyful serenity we want, but that -- except for the occasional transcendent moment -- always feels just out of reach.

Why do we find this so difficult to talk about? It's almost the last taboo at the dinnertable, worse than sex or money, for sure. Maybe writing more openly about these subjects can help open a window into a spaciousness where questions are allowed, where the fullness of each of us -- as we are, not as we feel we "ought" to be -- is allowed. I'm talking about a private space, a permission we give to ourselves, even more than a blog as a place of discussion. I think we all need a place where we can bring our doubts and hopes and faults and sorrows and the things that make us happy -- and just breathe out and in.

And then maybe say, tentatively, "If you are there, I am here."

That's all it takes, to begin, but it was one of the largest leaps I ever made. I still remember where I was and when it happened, many many years ago, when I finally gave up trying to do it all on my own. It's difficult to make that move in our hearts when we're adults, especially intellectual adults. Even terrifying. But on the other side of that movement -- on the other side of Saturday -- lies a different world which is, and has always been, waiting for us.

 

Comments

[Jean]

Beth, I've been moved and also challenged, engaged and also deeply ambivalent, while reading this series you've been posting. Some of these feelings are uncomfortable, but not less welcome for that. I don't suppose it's comfortable, either, to write with such detail and honesty. I started writing a blog post, this morning, in response to something else I'd read, and found myself responding also to you - not saying anything very startling, but I'm startled to find myself saying it at all, disaffected Anglican that I am, and stalwart in my disaffection by the age of, oh, about 10...

[Beth]

Oh, yes, Jean, that's when I started to be disaffected too. When the thinking mind took over. (Although I also refused to go to Sunday School, so I guess it started even before.) I have to admit though that the Cranmer's language, and the King James Bible, had a good deal to do with my love of language, even though I didn't know it at the time.

I'll go and read what you wrote, and hope you'll continue thinking and talking about these things. And yes, it's hard for me to write about too.

[Natalie]

Beth, in assuming that you already know I appreciate your outlook on matters spiritual, I've neglected to comment on these posts. This is lazy and I apologise, I should have reiterated my appreciation, there is never enough appreciation. So here I am. Thank you for being brave - because it does take bravery to express such things in our secular society. I cannot honestly call myself a 'practicing' Catholic anymore even if I do attend services on the main holy days.
I've just posted (in a Foreword) what I feel about the life of Jesus. But what all the Christian churches have made out of his simple teachings is something I just can't swallow and even the physical spaces of most churches - their opulence, their pomp, their ornateness - goes against the grain. There's a tiny ancient chapel I visited somewhere in Rome, very simple but imbued with holiness, which I could attend often if it was nearby.

[arachnomaria]

I've been moved by this post too, Beth. I need this spiritual space, but no religion, church, or community has ever made me feel safe enough to let go and openly celebrate my spirituality. (You mentioned some of the reasons why yourself.) This has only happened with single human beings when sharing deep truths and love.

Today, I do think about our hope though, our hope that we won't give up on hope itself when facing sadness, hatred, and cruelty.

Καλή Ανάσταση, Beth.

[Vivien]

Thanks so much for these posts, Beth - very moving, and I'll read them again.

Rather wish I belonged to a church or faith group, for the involvement in a community. But I can't follow a lot of the beliefs - I'm not against them at all - I just haven't got that cast of mind. I tend to the belief not in God, but in an awareness of existence, with its various positive and negative forces. I find that Christianity and Islam put too much stress on the ultimate power of the good, whereas we have to accept destruction and the negative - there'd be no life at all without these opposing forces of construction and destruction. But of course it's best if humans, many of whom strangely have a moral sense, unlike other animals (more complex brain?), try to aim towards love and altruism. (Sometimes difficult, though!)

In spite of all this, I love religious music and high church services. Heard someone on the radio once describe himself as a "high church atheist" - I know what he meant! (though I'm not really an atheist). The Russian Easter service in a cathedral is a great aesthetic experience. But one of the most moving services I went to was in medium-sized church in Romania (Orthodox), very unwestern - women seated on one side, men on the other, and the music sung by just two men, with a microphone. After it I had to go and wander rather blindly round nearby streets till I'd recovered! Can't even analyse what I felt.

I expect you know the Couperin "Trois Lecons de Tenebres" (no accents on this system!), based on the Lamentations of Jeremiah, with the long musical phrases singing the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Also Charpentier's "Le Reniement de Saint-Pierre" - a universal story, outside conventional religion, of a simple, good man who was caught up in something political which he couldn't understand.

[Ivy]

Beth, I have started praying, but not in a church, just by myself, for others, for comfort, for reaching out to this benevolence I believe is out there. It makes me so uncomfortable! I have rejected it for so long. But I'm trying to learn to do it so that it feels sincere and true.

Thanks for writing this and allowing this space for contemplation.

[Nic Sebastian]

Love this, Beth.

[Uma Gowrishankar]

What you have been writing in these posts speaks so much to me personally. Thank you Beth.