Faith in the Dark

We are somewhere between darkness and light.

The days grow short and the night is long.

We’ve been enjoying clear, blue skies and lovely days,
but when there’s rain, fog, and grey without end,
I long for the sun, for the light.

But, imagine a world that had only light —
blazing, blinding, unrelenting brightness
beating us down.

The dark can be soothing, nourishing, beautiful.
The dark can be restful, a time to come home, stay inside,
a time for stories, a time to turn inward,
to listen to the still small voice within.

Even when the dark means facing fears, confronting evil and the unknown,
the darkness can be healing, connecting, generating growth.

We are somewhere between darkness and light,
not just at this time of year, but always.

What do we do when we aren’t sure what direction to go,
when we know disappointment,
feel despair?

What do you do when you’re sick,
when you’ve lost your last friend?

Where do we go when we’ve lost our way,
done something wrong?

What if we call out, “Help me!” and there’s no answer - only silence?

Throughout our lives, we know places of darkness.
The basement fruit cellar of my childhood was spooky with spider webs.
It was down under the stairs where big bugs lurked.

Out in the backyard in the sunlight and the green grass,
were rocks, whose undersides crawled with squirmy, squishy, icky insects.

I heard the adults talk of a window peeker
and I slept with the blankets over my head.

When playing out in the neighborhood too late,
I ran in the dark through the empty lot I had to pass through
to make my way home.

As I got older and walked the streets at night,
I’d take notice of which houses were lit up,
the ones I could run to if someone jumped out of the bushes.

As I walked alone at night, I have been afraid of my own footsteps.

Older still, I wake in the night questioning my life,
things I’ve said I wished I hadn’t,
what I wish I would have said.

I’ve seen my jealousy and pettiness.
I’ve seen myself frustrated, short tempered, angry.

We see the shadowy sides of ourselves and of our world.

All of us witness, some up closer than others, suffering and death,
emotional deprivation, rape, war, torture.

We all deal with our need for perfection, for approval.
We deal with disillusion, failure, loneliness, emptiness,
with letting go of images of ourselves.

We do just about anything we can to cover up our struggles-
shopping, taking workshops, being busy-busy,
eating, drinking, drugs, relationships,
television, email, computer games, cell phones, text messaging.

We project our problems, our pain on to someone else.

When we ignore the pain,
we cut ourselves off from pleasure and joy as well.

Over the Thanksgiving weekend on a cool clear crisp day,
a family friend and I went for a walk in Tilden Park.
She is uncertain of what is next in her life.
Where should she be? What should she be doing?

You might get direction to who you are and where you’re headed
by walking in nature and reviewing your life.

I asked her what she was like at ages 7, 14, 21, 28, and 35, her age now.
What was she wondering about at each age?
Where was she? What was she doing?
What were her hopes and struggles? What did she want for her life?

I chose the ages I did because I recently had seen the film 49 Up.
The director Michael Apted has been interviewing the same individuals
every seven years since they were seven.
Each was a documentary film 7 Up, 14 Up, 21Up, 28 Up,
35 Up, 42 Up, and now 49 Up.
I have been watching these films since 28 Up
and I feel like I know these people.
Each film includes clips from and builds from the others.
You see the child, watch the person’s life unfold and witness them now at 49.

When the project began, the interviews were made with British children,
from upper class and lower class families,
children in privileged private schools, in working class neighborhoods,
and in orphanages.

At seven years old, John, Andrew and Charles
in their private school uniforms sit on a couch together.
When asked what they will do when they grow up,
each says, “I will go on to Oxford and then to Cambridge.”
Each of them does.

Nick, even at age 7, wants to keep some privacy.
When asked if he has a girlfriend, he says,
“I don’t want to answer those sorts of questions.”
Now at 49 Nick says, “I think this film is extremely important,"
but goes on to describe how "emotionally draining and wrenching" it is to be interviewed.

You see lives unfolding, successes, failures, struggles, disappointments, promise.
Most of all you see authenticity.

We follow Neil through his struggles with darkness.
Neil is a bright, giggling, funny seven year old, full of life and hope.
When he grows up he says, “I want to be an astronaut
or a tour bus guide, telling people what to look at.”

At 14, he’s doing well in school, but he’s more cautious and subdued.
At 21, he’s agitated. He still has an impulse to lead and instruct,
but it hasn't worked out.
He’s dropped out of school and become a loner,
finding work where he can.
At 28, he’s homeless.
At 35, you see him standing next to a lake in Scotland,
in front of his shabby mobile home, no one else in sight.
At 35, when Neil is asked if he’s ever afraid he is losing his mental health,
he says, “Yes.”

Many viewers of his story must have felt like film critic Roger Ebbert,
who wrote after 35 Up,
“I thought, ‘Neil will be dead by the next film.’”

But, at 42 Neil reconnects with people.
Sometimes you become so alone in your pain you have to reach out.

In Neil’s case, having these films roll around every seven years is good.
Telling his story, the attention and interest the film brings seems to help.

Now at 49 he is living alone, but rooted,
involved in a town’s local politics, serving as an elected official
and working for the public good.

Neil’s story touches my heart.
A couple of steps in another direction, and I feel I could be Neil.
Maybe we all could be.
How many of us are a couple of paychecks away from being homeless,
a few people away from loneliness,
a fevered night away from uncertainty?
We’re all vulnerable. We all go to the edge.

All of us have struggles that take us into the dark,
and its good when we can reach out and talk with one another about them.

I respect Neil’s honesty.
He has grappled with his demons and knows himself.
There’s a wholeness about Neil.

Neil’s searched his soul, faced hardships, entered darkness.

“In a dark time, the eye begins to see,” says the poet Theodore Roethke.

In a time of uncertainty, one begins to find oneself.

To be the person you want to be,
you have to walk some lonesome valleys.

You turn from all the confusing outer din
and intently listen for the voice within.

I feel the way film reviewer Tim Knight does about these documentaries.
“It is Neil, stumbling towards grace…
who touches your heart…He's endured…suffering-isolation, mental illness, homelessness-but [at 49]he seems to have found the serenity that's long eluded him.”

Neil says his faith has carried him
What is that faith?
"I see that life comes once, and it's quite short,” he says,
“and you have to appreciate what's good in it."

These seven-year documentaries are of ordinary people,
exemplary because they are ordinary.
Many of us might think our lives aren’t interesting enough to document.

Each of your stories would touch people’s hearts.
If documentaries were made of my life, of your lives
they would be poetry, parables of what it means to be human.

Each of our stories has peaks and valleys,
plateaus, deserts to wander, places of wilderness and oasis.

We’ve each known twists and turns, detours,
smooth stretches, winding paths.

We’ve had road blocks, helpful signs,
rivers to cross and stepping stones.

We’ve stumbled, been lost.
And through grace, we are here today.

We tell stories so we can live with our fears,
even grow from our fears.

We don’t always have to be bright and shining.
We can be who we are.

We learn about life, still there is so much for us that is in the dark,
so much is mysterious…so much is beyond words.

Much growth happens in the dark, underground, in the womb,
in the deep recesses of the heart, in the desert of the soul.

After my mother died, I returned immediately to work
and to the fullness of my life.

A couple of years later, I had sabbatical leave.
I went to the desert to a monastery
and spent the next eighteen days grieving.

I entered a time of darkness.

Mother, who loomed large in my life,
seemed to have gone from everything to nothing.
Mother had given up her home,
her belongings, her recipes, her dressy clothes and dances shoes.
Slowly her body gave out and her memory failed her
and then she was gone.
I was like a scared kid.

Who would remember me as little girl?
Who would remember the marking events of my life?
Who would cheer me on?
Who would tell me what they truly thought?
Now I was all alone.

I wandered the desert, remembering Mother.

I know that in literature and scripture the desert
is a metaphor for not knowing, for darkness,
and there I was.

I wrote stories of Mother and tried to make sense of her life
and of our relationship.

Mother was my biggest critic and best fan.

I wanted her approval, her blessing-
and it seemed to come always with some reservation.
There was always something more I needed to do.

In the desert, in the dark, in the quiet, I asked,
Can I no longer internalize all those outer demands and critiques?
Can I turn away from all that need for approval?
Can I be okay with myself, bless myself?
Can I make my peace with Mother and let go?

At the monastery, I read in the book of Wisdom,
a book in the Catholic Bible and the Jewish scriptures,
though left out of Protestant Bibles.

I read,
“Our body will be ashes…
Even our names will be forgotten in time, and no one will recall our deeds.
So our life will pass away like the traces of a cloud,
and will be dispersed like a mist…
Come, therefore, let us enjoy [now] the good things that are real.”

I could hear my mother’s voice that resides in me saying,
“Barb, get over it; get on with it.”

I was ready to come home.

When you aren’t sure what direction to go,
when you feel despair,
when you’re sick,
lost your last friend,
done something wrong,
when you’re in the dark,
you have to walk more slowly.

You have to feel your way.

If you can’t see, you rely more on other senses.

You wait and listen.

You become one with the wind.

You pray.

You remember where you’ve been.

You keep going because what else can you do.

You notice what is good right where you are.

You reach out and often there is someone there-
to ask you questions, hear your stories,
offer a hand.

If you call out, “Help me!” and there’s only silence,
I pray that in the quiet, your soul may hear a voice,
a still, small voice of love eternal.
An inner wisdom resides in you and can lead you.

At the ordination of a colleague Darcy Laine,
The Rev. Charles Yelbonzie Johnson charged her to get lost.

Get lost.
Waiting, watching, wondering, wandering,
you will find your way.

Open to the unexpected.
When people saw Neil at 35, we thought he would be dead in seven years.
Now he’s at home in himself.

May this season of short days and long nights
be a time of slowing down, of patience,
dreams, candlelight, quiet, silent listening.

Grow your faith in the darkness.
If you’re stumbling, you could be stumbling towards grace.

The reading is “IN A DARK TIME”

In a dark time, the eye begins to see,
I meet my shadow in the deepening shade
I hear my echo in the echoing wood
A lord of nature weeping to a tree.
I live between the heron and the wren,
Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.

What's madness but nobility of soul
At odds with circumstance? The day's on fire!
I know the purity of pure despair,
My shadow pinned against a sweating wall.
That place among the rocks-is it a cave,
Or winding path? The edge is what I have.

A steady storm of correspondences!
A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,
And in broad day the midnight come again!
A man goes far to find out what he is
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.

Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.
My soul, like some heat-maddened. summer fly,
Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I
A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
And one is One, free in the tearing wind.
   Theodore Roethke