The Dark Night of the Soul

Reading:

To Love Life
By Ellen Bass
From "Prayers for a Thousand Years," Roberts & Amidon, eds.

The thing is
to love life
to love it even when you have no
stomach for it, when everything you've held
dear crumbles like burnt paper in your hands
and your throat is filled with the silt of it.
When grief sits with you so heavily
it's like heat, tropical, moist
thickening the air so it's heavy like water
more fit for gills than lungs.
When grief weights you like your own flesh
only more of it, an obesity of grief.
How long can a body withstand this? you think,
and yet you hold life like a face between your palms,
a plain face, with no charming smile
or twinkle in her eye,
and you say, yes, I will take you
I will love you again.

Sermon:

We were on top of the world. We were living in a pleasant apartment in Oviedo, Spain, the capital of the province of Asturias. I had been awarded a Fulbright fellowship and was teaching American history and literature at the University. My wife Phyllis had been hired to teach English as a foreign language at the university. Part way through the first semester the Fulbright office offered to extend my grant for a second year and, better yet, they offered to pay me through the summer. We were beginning to think about a long summer of exploration in Spain—Santiago de Compostela, Valencia, Barcelona, and maybe Salamanca. What an adventure!

Our four year old son Miguel was having some trouble adjusting to a new country where he understood no one, but we figured that would soon take care of itself.

Then it happened. Miguel reported after going to the bathroom that his urine was dark. He seemed fine, but we kept an eye on it. It cleared up and then turned dark again. We decided to take him to the doctor. Some initial tests were ambiguous. The doctor thought it might be a kidney condition known as nephritis. That would be consistent with blood in the urine.

Some days went by. Eventually a pediatric kidney specialist ordered new x-rays. I will never forget the scene in his office. At the time Phyllis did not speak Spanish. The doctor asked me to come into his office. His words still ring down the years: “Es algo grave” — “It is something serious.” Miguel had kidney cancer.

We were stunned, almost too numb to feel at first. My memory of the rest of that day and night are not clear. I vaguely recall getting a bit more information and arranging for a follow-up visit to look at treatment options. We went home. We forced ourselves to be brave parents and act normally. That night, after Miguel was asleep, we held each other and cried.

Our world was shattered. We had no idea what the future held, but we knew it was going to be horrible. And it was horrible. That dark night lasted a couple of years. Thirty years later the pain and fear are still there. And we were so lucky. Miguel was here at JUC two months ago giving a talk on astrophysics and the early universe. Others, some here today, have had to watch their child die from cancer.

We all face dark nights of the soul. Virtually every one of us has experienced a time of despair, of loss so painful we don’t think we can bear it, a sense of emptiness so vast we are certain that it can never be filled. In this morning’s poetry reading Ellen Bass describes a grief so heavy that “it’s like heat, tropical, moist, thickening the air.” Perhaps, if we are young and fortunate, we have yet to face life’s hardest losses. And yet none of us will escape. Loss and pain are part of the human condition.

We heard Mary Hamilton’s touching chalice lighting this morning about losing a child to suicide. What agony! I know several families right here in our congregation who have faced that same loss. Too often the soul’s dark night claims a victim. Too often in that dark night we sink so far into darkness that can see no light, cannot even imagine a dawn of hope, a new day filled with love and joy.

Life is not fair. It was not fair that our son developed cancer. It is not fair for someone to have a child that has bipolar disorder. It is outrageously unjust for anyone to have a child that is severely handicapped. It is even worse to be the person given to bouts of debilitating depression, to be the person who gets cancer, to be the one whose life is cut short in a stupid war.

In the Hebrew scriptures an entire book is given to the theme of unjust suffering. In the Book of Job we are given the story of a man who has horrible tragedy after horrible tragedy heaped upon him. Job is blameless. The story in the scripture describes Satan coming before the Lord. The Lord asks Satan where he has been. Satan replies that he has been on earth, walking up and down on it. The Lord says to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil.”

Satan, always the cynic, replies that of course Job loves God. Why shouldn’t he. Job has a wonderful life. He is rich. He was a wonderful family. Satan says, “Does Job fear God for nothing? Have you not put a fence around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out hour hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.” So God allows Satan to inflict all kinds of terrible things on Job.

Job loses all that he possesses. His beloved ten children, seven sons and three daughters, are all killed. Later Job is afflicted with hideous, painful sores. Job comes to curse the day that he was born. “Why did I not die at birth, come forth from the womb and expire?”

Friends come to Job’s side to offer comfort. But it is cold comfort. The first, Eliphaz, tells Job that he has sinned and deserves what is happening to him. A second, Bildad, suggests that Job should repent. These friends cling to the notion that life is fair and just. They insist that somehow Job is responsible for his own suffering, that some sin or character flaw is being punished. Job knows better. Job knows that he has done nothing to deserve this suffering. And the voice of God in the story rejects the foolish counsel of those who would blame the victim.

Life is not fair. Suffering comes to us. Like Job, we will suffer for no apparent reason. We find, as did Job, that we do not suffer or avoid suffering based on our merit. Ultimately Job concludes that his suffering is beyond his understanding. It had nothing to do with his being a good and religious man; it had nothing to do with any sins he might have committed. It was beyond his understanding and his control. It is interesting that after 41 chapters of the Book of Job, the vast majority of it a long poem, a happy ending is tacked on in prose at the final few verses. Alas, you and I know that life does not often reward undeserved suffering with new riches, a new family, and regained health — to say nothing of the ten children who were gone forever.

The American poet Archibald MacLeish wrote a play that is a modern retelling of the Job story. In the play, entitled J. B., he has a character say the following line: “If God is good, He is not great; If God is great, He is not good; take the even, take the odd.” In other words, if God is indeed good, God seems powerless to prevent unjust suffering. If God is all powerful, then he is not good, for he allows the innocent to suffer.

No, life is not fair. My wife and I did nothing to deserve our son’s illness. And he certainly did nothing to deserve the hell of surgery, radiation and chemotherapy he had to endure.

Think of the worst suffering you have endured. Think of the suffering of those closest to you. There is no reason for it. Looking for a reason is foolishness. Searching for what we did to bring suffering upon our selves only adds to our suffering. Whatever dark night you face, know this: it is not your fault. Please hear this and believe it. It is not your fault.

Our task is not to understand our suffering. Our task is not to repent of something we never did. No, our task is to make it through the night. Our task is not to let the darkness utterly swallow us. Our task is to hang on until dawn. How are we to do that? What will see us through our dark night of the soul?

I wish I could tell you that a strong, kind, nurturing deity is watching over us. I cannot. Yet, as we sang in one of our morningsong hymns today, there is more love somewhere. There is more hope, there is more peace, there is more joy. We’ve got to keep on ’til we find it.

How do we keep on? How shall face an indifferent and unjust universe?

I think we do what human beings have always done: I think we reach down and we reach out.

We reach down. When you and I face the soul’s dark night, this is when you and I most need to reconnect with the source of life deep within each of us. We need to remember what it is that we love and trust most. What we love most, is, after all, our true religion. Some call that God. Some feel no need to name it anything. It is alive deep within you and within me.

There are many ways to reach down. Religious traditions all recommend some form of deep, silent reflection. Meditate. Feel the life within you longing to go on. Feel your breath. Feel how good it is to let your lungs fill with air and to let it out. Pray. You need not believe in a traditional God to pray. Prayer, like meditation, is a way of getting in touch with the force of life, with what we treasure in being alive. In prayer we can put our broken selves together by re-membering. We can touch once again our memories of blessed times and our memories of our highest aspirations.

When I need to reach down I usually need to get out. I need to let the beauty of earth and cosmos touch my soul. The darker the night the easier it is to see the stars. Looking at the stars helps me see my worries in their proper perspective. To walk in the beauty that surrounds me and to know that I am part of that lifts and heals my spirit. Just now there are subtle signs of spring everywhere. Birds are returning. Crocus and daffodils are already in bloom here and there. The sap is running. Let the sun warm your face. Remember how good life has been. Remember how good life can be. All life and love of life is deep within us.

Reach down. Connect to life.

And reach out. Reach out.

We in this congregation are truly blessed. We are surrounded by loving friends, by people who are deeply compassionate. They are compassionate in the literal sense, for “compassion” means “to suffer with.” Unlike poor Job, the members of this community are not going to tell you that you deserve to suffer and brought it on yourself. Each of us here is loved. None of us is alone—not one of us. We are surrounded by a network of care and compassion. Our opening hymn has the line, “When I was sinking down, sinking down, when I was sinking down beneath my sorrows ground, friends to me gathered round, o my soul, o my soul.” Reach out. Talk to someone. Call me or another of our ministers. Talk to people in your chalice circle. Our circle of care can help to hold you when you are sinking down, but you need to reach out so we can take your hand.

And there is more help. It is a sad fact of life that many of us suffer from depression. There are at least a dozen people in here right now who have been clinically depressed. There is probably more than one person in here right now who is suffering from depression. More troubling to me, there are probably a few too depressed to get themselves to church this morning. Reach out! There is help. Call me. See your doctor. See a therapist. You do not have to suffer like this. Just as importantly, a number of us in here today live with or know someone who needs help. Help them to reach out. Assist them in finding help.

We should also remember that the dark night has much to teach us. I do not believe we should seek suffering, nor should we glorify it. Yet grief and suffering can teach us vital spiritual lessons. Suffering and sadness can make us more aware of what we truly love in life. A person who narrowly escapes death has an intense appreciation of life. Our times of suffering can help make us more alive, more aware, more grateful for the many blessings life brings. Someone who has suffered like Job will never again take health, family and prosperity for granted.

You and I can never avoid life’s tragedies. They are part of living. We have suffered. We will suffer again.

Yet our soul’s dark night will not last forever. Suffering is part of life, but there is so much more to life than suffering! There is love, and joy, and beauty. After winter comes spring. After the dark, long, cold night comes the dawn.

Reach down, way down. Touch the part of you that loves life. Connect to the life within and around you. Love it again. Embrace it with all your might.

Let us reach out during our night, knowing love and help are all around us. There is help all around us. There is hope. There is gentle compassion. And let us be there, extending our hand, when someone else is lost in the darkness.

When the dark night comes, as it surely will, let us always remember that life can be wonderful. As our reading this morning says, the thing is to love life.

Let us love life together. Let us be there for each other. Together, after enduring our soul’s dark night, let us take each other’s hand and watch the dawn light up the sky once more. Life beckons. Come. Take my hand. Together we will love all that is our life.

Amen.