A while ago I
walked down to the building where my brother and sister-in-law live. It
was to my mind, just about the most perfect day I could imagine. The sky
was brilliantly clear, the air was crisp and not too cold, the remaining autumn colors
were radiant: yellows, oranges, reds in trees and flowers even and green
grass. Wonderful.
What
went through my mind as I walked was a sense that this almost perfect
beauty was like a gift to hold on to before the grey and bleakness of winter
set in. It is a bit like the hope and lift of the heart you feel when
you see the first signs of Spring's very different beauty.
Then,
I suppose, because it is what some people my age think about, I found
myself contrasting this prelude of glorious if fading beauty
before the grey of winter, with middle and old age. Middle age is, or
can be, a beautiful time. One is, if well, still fit
enough to do what one wants physically and mentally. There is,
hopefully, a certain wisdom that makes life a bit more peaceful. Sometimes, as a gift, there can be deep understanding
and appreciation of the beauty of life. All of this of course, is subject
to the qualifications of life experience , what kind of life each of us has had. Possibly,it is a bit like the
difference between a tree that is quite beautiful but whose colours are
modified by blotches of some sort and a tree that has remained
relatively unscathed.
Then,
slowly we move into old age - the wintery season of our lives as Karl
Rahner would put it - when we are losing our leaves and feeling less
full of the energy that propelled us earlier. We become - many of us -
increasingly less agile and more dependent and sometimes distressed by
all this. And yet, and yet... isn't there a magnificent, stark beauty in
the winter trees? You can see their shapes and the strength of their
trunks and guess the depths of their roots. So perhaps, however badly we
may feel, we may also see beauty in age which is after all, its own
part of the journey. We tend sometimes to see the
frailty, possibly the crankiness, the wrinkles. But why can't these be
beautiful? They are after all, the fruit of a life lived and every
single one of us, if we do not die young, will arrive there in the end.
Maybe we lose a lot of the enjoyment of life when we too narrowly define
beauty.
I wanted to show this photo again because I love this tree. It speaks to me of many things but most of all how beautiful something gnarled and old can be. This tree is all knotted and misshapen but it is strong and has its own loveliness. It is useful too for, among other values, it provides shade and cool in the heat of the day. That is all I wanted to say about it but you will have your own thoughts I'm sure.
My second pondering is on the subject of keys. You may think this strange but the importance of keys struck me particularly the other day when I saw a man on the street who looked like some of the homeless men one sees far too often on city streets. But then I saw that this man had a bunch of keys on his belt. I felt quite startled by this. As I thought about why I felt that way, I realized that keys, for most of us, symbolize that one has access to one or more places that are private and in some sense privileged: do you expect a homeless person to have keys? For keys are for your home or place of work or at least, some place where you have access that others do not. Many of us carry keys - sometimes quite a few. So does having keys give a certain status? Even if it isn't to a mansion..?
Do we ever think about what our own set of keys means about our own lives?
The photo here is of some of my oldest and closest friends at the L'Arche community in Burnaby, B.C. My gratitude for their friendship and for all that I have learned from them is huge.
Though I no longer live in this community I am part of it. I helped found it and I am what is called a 'spiritual member' which is something I am also so very grateful for. It means that my vocation of prayer includes the commitment to pray for them; to ask God to help them through the hard times, to fill them with joy for all times and to let them be a little light in our world.
Here is something that Jean Vanier who is the founder of L'Arche, has written:
[In L'Arche] there are all the ups and downs of life, the disappointments, misunderstandings, disagreements and even conflicts. But that is very human and natural. We come from different backgrounds , cultures and faith traditions and have different temperaments. But we are seeking to love one another and to create in this broken world of ours a tiny place that radiates love and forgiveness and a desire for unity...My experience is that the God of love and the love of God are hidden in those who are weak and vulnerable, in our own weakness and vulnerability; God is hidden in our communities...I take rest and joy from that. *
Most of us don't see any gift in our weakness and vulnerability. In fact, we do all we can to be strong and in control. But the reality remains that we are in fact not in control. I think L'Arche teaches us that it is when we are willing to let go of the effort to control, to embrace our own and other people's weakness (and strength) and to be willing to be vulnerable and to share our gifts as we journey along the road together, then we move forward in joy.
*
Jean Vanier: Our Life Together, A Memoir in Letters, Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd., London, 2007
