“If I walk in into the darkness I’ll be lost/if I try to stay the light will show my false.”

H,

We seem to keep going back to the same place. I know this sounds like a lack of progress but I do not think it is. For one, all our ideas of progress are material. They do not add up in the light. They are hallmarks and milestones made out of the need to see movement rather than advancement. It is much easier to move around than to actually walk in a straight light.

 Two, there is nothing more useless than the human conscience when it comes to making real spiritual progress. God is larger than the conscience and the conscience is not larger than our small thoughts.

The cycle is sure: when we feel up then we listen to nothing from beneath and when we are under our flaws we shy away from everything from above. We are trying to be perfect creatures of grace instead of imperfect patients of Grace. As the poet says, we have to reconcile.

We have to give in to the idea that we are today the best version of ourselves and it is not up to scratch. That our shifts to the left or right and the up and down are as much a part of our spiritual path as breathing is to our physical life. Once we get out of the fragile fantasy we have of ourselves we can come alive to the reality of who we truly are: creatures made for light, used to the dark and running between them as we experience finite life. We need to reconcile.

We reconcile by accepting this imperfect picture of ourselves. Not that we give up. Not that we say it is all no good. That is just more weakness and death. We instead give in. We let the whole story of love and God in: if we walk into the darkness we’ll be lost and if we stay the light will show our false. Lord, please, show our false. 

“There is no place like the home to come.”

H,

There is no place like the home to come, I feel. We have been told this over and over again. We keep trying to make of this lost world a garden in the desert but all we can do is speak of that other place and how it means this place may sparkle with light but never truly fix its problem with darkness.

I hope that does not sound too morbid. I am not trying to be. I am not even saying that we fold our hands and let the tide take us anywhere because nothing matters. The brevity of present human life makes everything matter.

The thing to take from the great idea that this is not our home is to be fearless in our pursuit of those values that are not transient but permanent. We have a world of injustice and wrong in front of us. We are called to confront these things with the light we know and the light we are learning to bask in. We cannot be afraid of what will happen to us if we fall flat on our faces or lie still on our backs. The former means we will be wrong and ashamed but that is the cure for human hubris. The latter means we will be dead and buried but that is just our body giving out. It is just the start of a long train ride home.

There is no place like the home to come. So, we speak of that place in all we do. We speak for justice over exploitation, we speak of kindness over hate, we speak of love over indifference and we speak of unity over the differences that emphasise tribe over humanity. We speak where we should and we act where we can and we move forward toward the day where home is not a dream but a place where we all eat at the same table and with the same heart.