I have just finished Barbara Brown Taylor’s Learning to Walk in the Dark, a
beautifully written book that at the
same time heals and scares the heck out of me.
I believe that it is meant to do that.
She reminds me that I can depend on nothing, not even God, for certainty
when I so long for it. After
all, what
is faith for if not to give us some sense that we are ‘right with God’ when
everything else in our lives is going haywire?
Taylor goes way beyond my comfort level inviting me into the ‘darkness’
[sic.]. What she really does is invite
me into my fears to examine them, become familiar with their terrifying hold
and allows me to relax in their tenuous hold on me so that their bonds begin to
fail. It is an amazing process but not
for the faint in heart.
I have not written much over the past 12 months. I have been embroiled in some up close and
personal events in my life. As those who
have followed this blog over the years know, I have had a life-long
acquaintance with depression. But if
there is one thing that I am sure of, this experience has not been depression. Like Taylor, I am knowledgeable enough to
know that John of the Cross’s Dark Night of the Soul is far too dramatic to
call this ride. But the gloom I have
lived the past 10 months has been an
alleyway that I don't wish on others. It
has been a walk with the Holy in ways that I would never have guessed or
wanted. I am not yet finished with this
path, but I am being moved to speak of this passage simply because the Gospel
cannot be kept within.
I have been told that if I value my priesthood, I should be
quiet. I have been told that ‘people are
not ready for the truth I speak’. I have
also heard that ‘the other side will use what I say against us’. But all of this is fear of others who will
not enter their own terror. It paralyzes
and heightens the anxiety rather than allows a passage through it to the
embrace of healing and the liberation of the soul.
Spoken journeys are the paths through the apprehension that
keeps frozen the heart that longs to deepen its relationship with God. Ask any therapist or spiritual director. Fear is the stuff that keep us imprisoned,
locked in the dungeons of our hearts and minds.
The Gospel is that which releases us from the constraints of social
conventionality and points us toward the Truth of the Universal Path of the
Holy One. I find in those who have
marked this journey the courage ‘to live lives worthy of their calling’.
As one who still appreciates the name ‘Christian’ and refuses
to allow the dogmatic fundamentalists to define the term, my Christianity
demands action. I cannot just be quiet
like the benign soul
who smiles at the preacher on Sunday and says ‘good
sermon’ even though they can’t remember what was said. My baptism demands a boldness in faith that
cannot be hidden.