L'Engle writes:
"I seek for God that he may find me because I have learned, empirically, that this is how it works. I seek: he finds. The continual seeking is that expression for the hope for a creator great enough to care for every particular atom and sub-atom of his creation, from the greatest galaxy to the smallest frandolae. Because of my particular background, I see the coming together of macrocosm and microcosm in the Eucharist, and I call this Creator: God, Father; but no human being has ever called him by his real name, which is great and terrible and unknown, and not to be uttered by mortal man. If inadvertantly my lips framed the mighty syllables, entire galaxies might explode.
'As I read the Old and New Testaments, I am struck by the awareness therein of our lives being connected with cosmic powers, angels and archangels, heavenly principalities and powers, and the groaning of creation. It's too radical, too uncontrolled for many of us, so we build churches which are the safest possible places in which to escape God. We pin him down, far more painfully than he was nailed to the cross, so that he is rational and comprehensible and like us, and even more unreal.
'And that won't do. That will not get me through death and danger and pain, nor life and freedom and joy.
'There is little evidence for faith in God in the world around me. Centuries ago a man whose name is unknown to me cried out: "If God were one whit less than he is, he dare not put us in a world that carries so many arguments against him."
'And if I take the stories of the Bible seriously, when God's people turn from him for too long, he withdraws. He has not answered my knock for a long time, and this is beginning to make me angry. Why isn't he there when I need him so desperately? So I write him another
LOVE LETTER
I hate you, God.
Love, Madeleine.
I write my message on water
and at bedtime I tiptoe upstairs
and let it flow under your door.
When I am angry with you
I know that you are there
even if you do not answer my knock
even when your butler opens the door an inch
and flaps his thousand wings in annoyance
at such untoward interruption
and says the master is not at home.
I love you, Madeleine,
Hate, God.
(This is how I treat my friends, he said to one great saint.
No wonder you have so few, Lord, she replied.)
I cannot turn the other cheek
it takes all the strength I have
to keep from hitting back
the soldiers bayonet the baby
the little boys trample the old woman
the gutters are filled with groans
while pleasure-seekers knock each other down
to get their tickets stamped first.
I'm turning in my ticket
and my letter of introduction
you're supposed to do the knocking.
How can I write to you
to tell you that I'm angry
when I've been given the wrong address
and I don't even know your right name?
I take hammer and nails
and tack my message on two cross pieces of wood.
Dear God,
is it too much to ask you
to bother to be?
Just show your hindquarters
and let me hear you roar.
Love,
Madeleine
'I have often been told that when one first turns to God, one is greeting with brilliant Yes answers to prayers. For a long time, that was true for me. But then, when he has you hooked, he starts to say No. This has, indeed, been my experience. But it has been more a withdrawal, which is so devastating. The world is difficult enough with God; without him it is a hideous joke" (171-173).
There is nothing worse than feeling completely alone in the world, of feeling the absence of God where previously God seemed closely present. L'Engle goes on in the chapter to unpack the loneliness of God's absence, about the fallenness of the world, and our place in it, but by the chapter's end by writes that we participate with God by doing the things he has asked of us. Specifically, in the particularity of the people in front of us every day. To build one another up, to bear each other's burdens, to give of the work of our hands to help one another without complaint or second thought. God can turn our brokenness and failures toward his glory if we will let him.
'Thou also shall light my candle, sings the psalmist. The Lord my God shall make my darkness to be light.
'To sing this is already to choose sides.
'To look for community instead of cocktail-party relationship is part of choosing sides in this vast, strange battle. To say "I'm sorry"; to be silent; to say "I love you," "I care." It is these little things that are going to make the difference. For God chooses the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, the weak to overthrow the strong. Out of failure he brings triumph. Out of the grave he births life" (186-187).
Quotes:
Madeleine L'Engle, Irrational Season. NY: Seabury Press, 1977.
C.S. Lewis, The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. NY: HarperCollins, 2005 reprint.
The first time I knew I was experiencing the silence/absence of God was in 1999/2000. Aunt Elaine (camp director's wife) had died the year before. I felt this profound silence of God (when before I felt a stable presence, for years) and suddenly came across a lot of writing about this - of others who had gone through it also - from L'Engle, Lewis, Kathleen Norris, other places; so it was like God was not talking to me but yet was telling me about other's experiences of this/His absence. I am not sure of all the reasons why I went through that one - Looking back I was in a lot more spiritual danger than I knew (God protected me from a lot), was grieving a tremendous loss in my life, and was being prepared, slowly, it felt, for being given my first known (I had been once during that year of silence when my friend and I thought it was a Catholic church!) experiences of the Orthodox Church. I've gone through it again later, even harder, times of it. Long, barren, dry, weedy garden, dry in the desert with no water in sight. I've felt it on and off for what felt long periods in the 5.5 years I have been in NJ. I also see that physical fatigue, burnout, illness, injury all play into this experience. And I know it is really hard. Mother Teresa went through this in very profound ways. You are very much not alone in this. I love L'Engle's writings and are really enjoying your writing of them. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteIt does feel rather timely, her writing. While there is a lot of silence, there has been a lot brought to me about it, in various ways, so it feels somehow less lonely.
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