Jeremy Driscoll OSB
Jeremy Driscoll OSB
DARTON - LONGMAN + TODD, 2006
For Paul Murray, OP who helped so much with this alphabet and who helps so much in general
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Unbearable Sizes Undone |
Unique United |
Unknowing Unused | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
Unbearable Sizes
I am asking and I am troubled in these days: Why all the
universe, why all its beauty and its ageless aeons? Is it perhaps material image
of divine infinity, being almost infinite but not quite, being almost eternal
but not quite? The "not quite" would be the very definition of the difference
between all the universe and God as its maker. I feel the tremendous tension of
this difference: on the one hand, the "it was good" of Genesis; on the other,
the emptiness and futility of all that is made unless it remain connected in
every instant to its divine source.
In previous centuries, before the Copernican Revolution and
the Enlightenment busted the coordinates and expanded the proportions to
virtually unbearable sizes, the Christian mind could contemplate Nature,
standing in awe mostly of the earth, not suspecting even then how much more of
the earth there was for further marveling. The planets and the stars were
backdrop and ornament to the center, central earth. In such a context it was
wonderful to ponder Christ as brilliant, gracious, almighty Artificer. And
though the idea seemed extravagant, it was still possible to think that all this
had been created for the pleasure of human beings, as the more than sufficient
context and stage for the human drama.
In my times something else intrudes on human consciousness
and renders a contemplation like that extremely difficult if not impossible. I
do not have to be a scientist engaged in astronomy to feel
all the stars and the impossible distances between them wedging their way into
my imagination and causing an old order to crumble. And since distance is also
eventually time, this new length for time presses into my mind and forces a loss
of all former bearings, a rhythm pulsing there that seems to say, "From so long
ago, so long ago, you have no idea how long ago."
What my project wants to be, when confronted with all this
internal devastation of my imaginative coordinates, is the creation of some new
interior space, a space that can contemplate Christ as the Word through whom all
this was created and is sustained, the Word become flesh and dwelling among us
in these last days, a Word intimate to me and dwelling in my heart. That is a lot
to hold together. I wonder if it is possible.
What would need to happen is new imaginative space. One could postulate that in our times, in this new imaginative
possibility, Christ lends a new tone, brings fresh insight to what he originally
revealed. This even larger immensity of the universe which stands behind the
Undone
I am undone by the mystery of it all: the mystery of our human living, of our living in the monastery, of our time in the world and in the Church. Through it all the face and voice of Jesus are somehow present to me but often only as the "faith" with which I meet what appears to be his absence.
Unique
Oh, the astonishing uniqueness with which God makes his approach to every soul! That there are features in common, such that we can talk about different people's stories, comparing and learning from them,
reflects the one nature of God. But the absolute and irreducible uniqueness of each story reflects the distinction of persons within God Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The majesty and wonder of unity in distinction!United
I've been thinking and wondering how deeply,
really, am I
united to the rest of the human race? Then this carne to me: that the deepest
ground of union is not intention, even if the intention to be united or the lack
thereof certainly plays a critical role at some point. Yet more basically,
whether I intend it or not and whether I know it or not, I am profoundly united
to the rest of my race by the nature and the history we share. When I
consciously know this union and intend it, then it seems to me a new and more
complete level of union is achieved, unleashing a powerful energy for love and
for good. When my knowing and intending is in Christ and with a view toward the
divine plan to recapitulate all things in him, then an immense force is
unleashed, divine in its achievable proportion and strength.
In the end, for me, this intention must express itself in my
monastic and priestly vocation. In virtue of my baptism I wish to be for
my race a priest of creation and history, bringing it to the hands of Christ. As
a monk, united to a race ever prey to lust, avarice, and pride, I wish to
practice the chastity that would bend lust toward love, the poverty that breaks
avarice with sharing, the obedience that uses freedom to choose God. As an
ordained priest, I wish to let Christ work through me for the
transformation of what our race creates and does into a living sacrifice of
praise and thanksgiving to God the Father.
Whatever by God's grace I may do in my life in these
vocations, I would wish that my contribution would not be a small one but rather
that it would reach upward toward the nobility which God intends for us all and
toward which, indeed, some progress has been made through the centuries.
Unknowing
I am in an impossible situation, and I feel put there by God.
On the one hand, I feel the wonder: we are all of us marvelous creatures. How
amazing our mind is, and our spirit, and the freedom of our inner life! How
amazing the force of any individual personality! And yet we have to remember
that all this is given us. We exist gratuitously through and through. And so
gratitude, praise and awe are due the Creator. It is here that I feel the bind,
for either I cannot seem to contact him or, if I do, I feel myself absurd and
helpless before his majesty.
As far as such things go, it could be said that I spend a
fair amount of time with God. I have the monastic round of prayer, my own work
as a theologian, and a good deal of longing which I carry around with me all day,
every day. It occurs to me that I have grown rather used to God, and then fast
on the heels of that thought, I realize, well, then it cannot be God. There really
could not be any growing used to the true and living God. Used to God! Good
Lord, what a fool I must be!
Only a little reflection awakens within me a sense of God's
majesty and grandeur, the impossibility that God should be and also, as a
consequence, the impossibility that we should be. This is my bind. What am I to
do? Surely I have somehow misconceived possible ways of relating. There is
always the choice of ignoring God for a while, which God ever graciously
allows us to do. This approach seems to come the most naturally to
us. Another approach is to enter into some sort of relation, where we at least "receive credit" for
using our free will in this direction. But what sort of relation? God is not
just one more thing or one more person among the world of things and persons. It
doesn't seem appropriate to relate to God like that. But what other ways do we
have of relating? What even can we imagine? Here there probably enters the
famous way of unknowing: God just the other side of every way I fail to match
and reach him.
Of course, we are meant to, or can choose to "confront" all
this reality of God in and through Jesus. This changes everything and makes a
meeting possible. But the fact that Jesus is himself God renders the whole thing
vertiginous. Given that he is God, it is incredible what he has done, dying on the cross and all that.
What am I to do with this? Is such love really possible? Can this really be who and what God is?
If all that Christian faith holds is true, well it's just too much. I should be
paying attention to this all the time. I should think only about this. Oh, I know
that salvation in Christ turns us back toward the everyday, toward life in this
world, but I am not in the everyday after having met Christ; I am in it
before really knowing him, and I can't seem to get to him in a way that
matches where he stands.
Unused
"Unused joy" - that's the phrase I would use to describe what
Christ has done and how we respond to it. AH that we need to live a heaven on
earth is already here and available to us. What more can God do? With what more
could he equip us? And if earth were all but heaven in this way, would that not
be the final preparation for the Lord's coming again in glory? The new heavens
and new earth being earth in heaven and heaven in earth.
My Lord Jesus, take me completely, and if you can find in me
something useful for advancing this joy - for it is you who have
given us everything and know what is useful in what to us appears paltry and
meager - then use it till there is nothing left of me. If and when I am so
spent, then I will have my joy in you, in who you are, in the marvels you have
done on the earth.