While I have needed large effort in believing in some sort of “God”, I have never needed help to believe in a devil. The weight of his presence crushes my shoulders and burns in my chest. Days like today appear all too hopeless when I consider his work. It takes little imagination to prove the seemingly sweeping victory of evil in this life and the next.
The anniversary of Sandy Hook is today. While there are many tragedies one could somberly recall, this particular one is so hopelessly evil that one needs not but say its name. The question lingers in my head: what sort of God would allow this? No matter the amount of theological training or philosophical back-and-forth, I am found without an adequate answer to this. So I go on. Believing beyond reason. Hoping it is not all for naught.
It is said that when Jesus knew He would be arrested, He retreated to a garden to offer tear soaked prayers. The extent of these resulted in the first of many drops of blood. Perhaps He was horrified and apprehensive for the manner of death which laid before Him, but I hope differently. Maybe He cried for the coldness of His creation in which the innocent are born to suffer absurdly and without reason while those deemed innocent wander along blind. If there is some remnant of Jesus in which I cling to on nights like these, it is this one.
As far as I can remember I have wanted to die. Within me lay a ghost who wishes to draw me back to wherever it is I came from. It stays as close as any organ, nearly strangling me with doubt and despair. Without constant resolve, I fear its final word. No time is joyful enough to mute the echo. It isolates me. For far too long I have kept its presence hidden. This feeling is more a existential sigh of life magnified throughout my bones. This is as close to that feeling in the garden – the weight of evil in tired heart.
On nights like this, I remember the school and the garden.. These thoughts keep me in an balance between the known and the unknown. On most days, the known is crushingly defeated. I remember names like Bonhoeffer and Tubman. They loom high above my own fits of mental illness. These figures battled. They saw the worst in the world and believed defiantly in something greater and more noble. I fear I don’t possess the same level of intellect or wherewithal to come to their legendary faith. And so I sigh and cast my gaze between heaven and the earth.
Tonight, I am tired.
Overwhelmed by the unknown.
When my mind enters these dark corridors, I remember that while darkness is a default, goodness is a battle of will. The caves of life are dark by nature and it is only through burning that we see any remnant of light. It would be easy, perhaps even soothing, for me to let go of the light. But in this weary present, we must all choose to carry on toward the darkness choosing to add to the scraps of good left here. To do otherwise would be feeding the void, allowing the ghost of tragedy to suffocate whatever remnant remains. We have little control, but whatever meager offerings found within us, will either add to predictable tragedy or to the warmth found in an exhausted good. Maybe our flickering lives work best when they are not of our possession but spent for someone/something else entirely.
“‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’ – Matthew 11:17
Jesus, come.
Matt simon blog 