abyss of absurdity

liturgy has kept me tethered to the faith in these times of uncertainty, it has been a lifeline to me. but today is a repeat of yesterday which was a repeat of the day before, and i'm just sick of it. so i will look to merton, this passage i found particularly encouraging:

In his [Staretz Sylvan] inner conflicts and sorrows he found a strange answer and a still stranger way of prayer. The Lord said to him "Keep thy soul in hell and despair not."

this is utterly refreshing to me. a man who hears and writes like i do. God says these kinds of crazy things to me, too. God is truly a wildMan. merton continues:

At first it sounds a bit dreadful, or perhaps at best eccentric. Yet to me it is in a strange way comforting, men still share deeply and silently the anguish of Christ being abandoned by His father (to be abandoned by God is to be "in hell") and they "despair not." How much better and saner is it to face despair and not give in than to work away at keeping up appearances and patching up our conviction that bogus spirituality is real!

i need a moment to collect myself. merton bodyslams me here. and takes my breath away.

That we are not really facing dread! [merton in previous writings has said we all must reckon with dread. it is the way of faith] That we are all triumphantly advancing "getting somewhere" (where?), accomplishing great things for Christ, and changing the face of the world! We can still choose between the way of job and the way of job's friends, and we have to have the sense (i say sense, not courage) to choose the way of job: it takes far more courage to start out on a way that obviously leads to the far end of nothing, and to walk over the abyss of our own absurdity in order to be found and saved by God, who has called us to walk that way.

me again. wow. merton lays out all the shams of faith so cleanly here. i've lacked courage in a major way, but he tells me it is not required. thank God. sense to walk in the way is. he continues:

It takes sense to see that if He calls us, it is the only way. As to courage, He will provide: and of course He will provide more in the form of hope than as plain fortitude. We must not expect to glance at ourselves and see "courage," and take comfort from this. Christ alone, on the cross and in darkness, but already victorious, is our comfort.

ah, this comforts me marvelous much. to string a few words together the way merton does. there is this passage on him reading poetry which he questions whether it is an affront to his vow of poverty to read words so rich. gorgeous. now THAT is a poet. that is a man in tune with poverty and all vows i would say.

the abyss of absurdity though makes so much sense to me as i've often felt these musings are more absurd than not. i've been called absurd by one professor. and i just have to remember always, it is not she who will judge me on the final day. it is not she. it is He. He alone.

he talks of walking to the far end of nothing. yes. it is a frightening thing to walk out on the sea, to step out in faith and trust. it is a tremulous ordeal. how these slicked back hairdo guys can make it all out to be light and happy a walk in the park is beyond me. this, what merton writes, is more truth to me than i have heard in a great many real time words from the church collective.

speaking of the collective. clarissa pinkola estes talks about some people who dream for the collective. some people, she says, are people of destiny. i believe God is saying that and has been for a while now. are you a person of destiny?