John Predmore, S.J., is a USA East Province Jesuit and was the pastor of Jordan's English language parish. He teaches art and directs BC High's adult spiritual formation programs. Formerly a retreat director in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Ignatian Spirituality is given through guided meditations, weekend-, 8-day, and 30-day Retreats based on The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Ignatian Spirituality serves the contemporary world as people strive to develop a friendship with God.
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Friday, October 26, 2012
Prayer: And Where in the World Are You?
Why then endure,
why thirst for justice?
Your kingdom come -
a mirage which never comes.
I sweat like a beast,
my nightmare is long,
and where in the world
are You?
I have had this kind of prayer, particularly strongly once, when after having prayed and prayed for a homeless drug addict, I found out he was in jail. But then, seven months later, I found out that he had kicked the habit (temporarily unfortunately) while in jail... Of course, there are some cases where one wonders what Godde is doing... Maybe just waiting for us to do something...
All we can do is to give our best effort. We pray for others' well-being and we put it in the hands of God. And we celebrate when someone is able to overcome adversity. Yes, we have to try always.
This is such an honest prayer. What Claire says is so true. I volunteer with people impacted by the justice system and many of them tell me that they began to get their lives together while in prison. Sometimes we just don't see God at work but God is always there.
Prison, ironically, can be a safe place for a person and gives them to structure to get parts of their lives back in order. I wish the prison system focused on rehabilitation as its main concern. If society wants to integrate a person back into the community, it will need to provide needed supports to assist those who are on the road. Aren't we call on the road?
It's not such an "Uncommon Prayer." I think a lot of us feel like that much of the time. God's first question recorded in Genesis was "Where are you?" Those who know Hebrew tell me the tone of the question is not just geographic but somewhat existential. Ever since Eden, we've been asking the same question of God.
Apropos of jail being a blessing in disguise, one of only 3 people to survive the volcanic eruption of Mt. Pelee that obliterated the city of St. Pierre on the island of Martinique in 1902 was a prisoner whose jail cell was somewhat sheltered from the blast, though he was severely burned. "Bad news, good news, who knows?" as the saying goes.
There are several songs on the contemporary Christian radio station lately with a similar theme, the best (IMH0) being "Even If the Healing Doesn't Come" by Kutless, "Never Alone" by Barlow Girl, and "Held" by Natalie Grant. All of them relate that feeling of having been abandoned just when we needed help the most. They all end by what seems to me like "whistling in the dark," reassuring themselves that God is still there even when He seems to be hiding or even non-existent. Sometimes that is the best we can do--if we can even manage that much--and perhaps attempting to foster that will-to-believe despite all appearances and all experiences is what the prompting of grace looks like in this "best of all possible worlds." Faith is belief in the unseen, as St. Paul reminded us, and when God is unseen, unheard, unfelt, unexperienced, unintelligble, that is when we have to exercise that misunderstood virtue. Even Christ may have experienced such a moment when He wailed out in His torment, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?" yet moments later He managed to commend His spirit into the Hands that He still believed would be there to receive it.That final act of faith was His last conscious act in this life, and possibly His last gift to us---the knowledge that even God is not exempt from feeling forsaken as part of the human experience, so we should not be too surprised if it happens to us, and we have His example of how to handle it.
St. Paul was able to find his imprisonments as a source of grace where he could be happy the the Gospel was being proclaimed. Paul's imprisonment wasn't because of a crime as we imagine it to be, so the prison stays take on a different purpose.
Right on with Jesus in Mark's Gospel and his forsaken cry. I'm not sure if too many Christians allow Jesus to believe that he felt God was not present to him. I'm glad you have pondered it.
I'm sure it is one of those tricky things that we simply cannot imagine. We cannot truly, truly know what even another human being with whom we are close is thinking and feeling, so certainly trying to get inside the human mind of Christ is a bit presumptuous, but certainly He seemed to have moments when His human mind didn't have full access to whatever His divine mind must have known, such as when He said only the Father knew the time of the Second Coming (Matt 24:36). And we are told He was tested in every way that we are, but did not sin (Hebrews 4:15), so since that temptation to feel that God is absent and may never have been there at all is probably one of the most common and worst temptations we face, it would seem at least arguable that He could have been allowed to taste at least momentarily what that felt like. The mystery of how "God was abandoned of God" as Frederick Faber put it in "The Foot of the Cross, or the Sorrows of Mary" p. 307 of the Google online book, is beyond me, but I don't think it is wrong to at least wonder about it. Even if you have to postulate a purely human model, such as the application of Michael Gazzaniga's "social brain" hypothesis to dissociative personality disorder, in which people under severe stress can lose access to parts of the contents of their own minds and personalities, even to the point of having an "alter" personality emerge in order to cope with the situation, perhaps under the undoubted stress of being crucified after being beaten and tormented, His human mind lost touch with whatever brain modules let Him appreciate the fact that "I and the Father are One" and so He experienced for that awful moment what the rest of us suffer all the time. If that is true to even a small degree, it must have been the worst moment of His life since He wasn't used to feeling like that. It would have been a new and horrible shock for Him, and may even have precipitated His death which apparently followed soon after and surprised the Roman guards (who presumably had plenty of experience in estimating how long a crucified person would last) because they thought He would have lasted longer. But even so, He managed to place His spirit into the Hands that He no longer felt supporting Him. "Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble" to even imagine what it would have been like, not only for anyone but most especially for someone like Him. It would be nice to hope that it wasn't like that at all, as those good Christians must suppose, if they are not allowed to suspect otherwise. Many of the dear nuns who educated me believed (contrary to Isaiah's description) that Christ was the handsomest man who ever lived, was always calmly joyful (despite the moments in the Gospels when He was obviously angry, frustrated and upset), knew everything about everything even when He was in the womb and had only a rudimentary embryonic brain with which to know anything, etc. But if we are to believe that He was truly, fully human, then I'm afraid we have to ponder unpleasant possibilities like the scenario I've suggested. Personally, it makes me respect and admire Him the more, since it would take more faith and courage to believe in a benevolent God while being tortured if one did not have the consolation of the Beatific Vision at the time.
Some of the great saints and holy people who were martyred have been blessed with that kind of consolation--St. Stephen seeing the heavens open while he was being stoned, and Rabbi Hananiah ben Teryadon seeing the letters rising up to heaven from the Torah scrolls in which he was wrapped and burnt alive. But just as He refused the drugged mixture commonly given to crucified prisoners to at least partly anesthetize them, He may have opted to forego any softening of the torment and accepted even that unimaginable extinguishing of the awareness of His Father's Presence which had accompanied Him throughout His life. No greater Love.....
All that we have to the life of Jesus and the early saints are eyewitness descriptions of what happened to them. We have very little in their own words. Keep reflecting!
I have had this kind of prayer, particularly strongly once, when after having prayed and prayed for a homeless drug addict, I found out he was in jail. But then, seven months later, I found out that he had kicked the habit (temporarily unfortunately) while in jail...
ReplyDeleteOf course, there are some cases where one wonders what Godde is doing... Maybe just waiting for us to do something...
All we can do is to give our best effort. We pray for others' well-being and we put it in the hands of God. And we celebrate when someone is able to overcome adversity. Yes, we have to try always.
DeleteThis is such an honest prayer. What Claire says is so true. I volunteer with people impacted by the justice system and many of them tell me that they began to get their lives together while in prison. Sometimes we just don't see God at work but God is always there.
ReplyDeletePrison, ironically, can be a safe place for a person and gives them to structure to get parts of their lives back in order. I wish the prison system focused on rehabilitation as its main concern. If society wants to integrate a person back into the community, it will need to provide needed supports to assist those who are on the road. Aren't we call on the road?
DeleteIt's not such an "Uncommon Prayer." I think a lot of us feel like that much of the time. God's first question recorded in Genesis was "Where are you?" Those who know Hebrew tell me the tone of the question is not just geographic but somewhat existential. Ever since Eden, we've been asking the same question of God.
ReplyDeleteApropos of jail being a blessing in disguise, one of only 3 people to survive the volcanic eruption of Mt. Pelee that obliterated the city of St. Pierre on the island of Martinique in 1902 was a prisoner whose jail cell was somewhat sheltered from the blast, though he was severely burned. "Bad news, good news, who knows?" as the saying goes.
There are several songs on the contemporary Christian radio station lately with a similar theme, the best (IMH0) being "Even If the Healing Doesn't Come" by Kutless, "Never Alone" by Barlow Girl, and "Held" by Natalie Grant. All of them relate that feeling of having been abandoned just when we needed help the most. They all end by what seems to me like "whistling in the dark," reassuring themselves that God is still there even when He seems to be hiding or even non-existent. Sometimes that is the best we can do--if we can even manage that much--and perhaps attempting to foster that will-to-believe despite all appearances and all experiences is what the prompting of grace looks like in this "best of all possible worlds." Faith is belief in the unseen, as St. Paul reminded us, and when God is unseen, unheard, unfelt, unexperienced, unintelligble, that is when we have to exercise that misunderstood virtue. Even Christ may have experienced such a moment when He wailed out in His torment, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?" yet moments later He managed to commend His spirit into the Hands that He still believed would be there to receive it.That final act of faith was His last conscious act in this life, and possibly His last gift to us---the knowledge that even God is not exempt from feeling forsaken as part of the human experience, so we should not be too surprised if it happens to us, and we have His example of how to handle it.
St. Paul was able to find his imprisonments as a source of grace where he could be happy the the Gospel was being proclaimed. Paul's imprisonment wasn't because of a crime as we imagine it to be, so the prison stays take on a different purpose.
DeleteRight on with Jesus in Mark's Gospel and his forsaken cry. I'm not sure if too many Christians allow Jesus to believe that he felt God was not present to him. I'm glad you have pondered it.
I'm sure it is one of those tricky things that we simply cannot imagine. We cannot truly, truly know what even another human being with whom we are close is thinking and feeling, so certainly trying to get inside the human mind of Christ is a bit presumptuous, but certainly He seemed to have moments when His human mind didn't have full access to whatever His divine mind must have known, such as when He said only the Father knew the time of the Second Coming (Matt 24:36). And we are told He was tested in every way that we are, but did not sin (Hebrews 4:15), so since that temptation to feel that God is absent and may never have been there at all is probably one of the most common and worst temptations we face, it would seem at least arguable that He could have been allowed to taste at least momentarily what that felt like. The mystery of how "God was abandoned of God" as Frederick Faber put it in "The Foot of the Cross, or the Sorrows of Mary" p. 307 of the Google online book, is beyond me, but I don't think it is wrong to at least wonder about it. Even if you have to postulate a purely human model, such as the application of Michael Gazzaniga's "social brain" hypothesis to dissociative personality disorder, in which people under severe stress can lose access to parts of the contents of their own minds and personalities, even to the point of having an "alter" personality emerge in order to cope with the situation, perhaps under the undoubted stress of being crucified after being beaten and tormented, His human mind lost touch with whatever brain modules let Him appreciate the fact that "I and the Father are One" and so He experienced for that awful moment what the rest of us suffer all the time. If that is true to even a small degree, it must have been the worst moment of His life since He wasn't used to feeling like that. It would have been a new and horrible shock for Him, and may even have precipitated His death which apparently followed soon after and surprised the Roman guards (who presumably had plenty of experience in estimating how long a crucified person would last) because they thought He would have lasted longer. But even so, He managed to place His spirit into the Hands that He no longer felt supporting Him. "Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble" to even imagine what it would have been like, not only for anyone but most especially for someone like Him. It would be nice to hope that it wasn't like that at all, as those good Christians must suppose, if they are not allowed to suspect otherwise. Many of the dear nuns who educated me believed (contrary to Isaiah's description) that Christ was the handsomest man who ever lived, was always calmly joyful (despite the moments in the Gospels when He was obviously angry, frustrated and upset), knew everything about everything even when He was in the womb and had only a rudimentary embryonic brain with which to know anything, etc. But if we are to believe that He was truly, fully human, then I'm afraid we have to ponder unpleasant possibilities like the scenario I've suggested. Personally, it makes me respect and admire Him the more, since it would take more faith and courage to believe in a benevolent God while being tortured if one did not have the consolation of the Beatific Vision at the time.
DeleteSome of the great saints and holy people who were martyred have been blessed with that kind of consolation--St. Stephen seeing the heavens open while he was being stoned, and Rabbi Hananiah ben Teryadon seeing the letters rising up to heaven from the Torah scrolls in which he was wrapped and burnt alive. But just as He refused the drugged mixture commonly given to crucified prisoners to at least partly anesthetize them, He may have opted to forego any softening of the torment and accepted even that unimaginable extinguishing of the awareness of His Father's Presence which had accompanied Him throughout His life. No greater Love.....
All that we have to the life of Jesus and the early saints are eyewitness descriptions of what happened to them. We have very little in their own words. Keep reflecting!
Delete