As I sit down to write this, it’s late afternoon. But the sky is darkening as if night is falling. A storm is brewing. Nothing is stirring. It’s the literal calm before the storm.
The scene outside my window mirrors the churning in my soul whenever I try to make sense of the news these days.
In order to cope with the endless stream of unsettling events, I find myself seeking out inspirational and comforting words. And earlier this week I stumbled on just the thing – an ancient prayer.
“God of our life,” it began, “there are days when the burdens we carry chafe our shoulders and weigh us down;”
I was hooked! I read on:
When the road seems dreary and endless, the skies gray and threatening;
When our lives have no music in them, and our hearts are lonely, and our souls have lost their courage.
Flood the path with light, turn our eyes to where the skies are full of promise;
Tune our hearts to brave music;
Give us the sense of comradeship with heroes and saints of every age;
And so quicken our spirits that we may be able to encourage the souls of all who journey with us on the road of life, to your honor and glory.
Glorious words, I thought.
But my heart sank when I reached the end and was reminded that this prayer is attributed to Augustine of Hippo (354-430) – an early Christian theologian I’ve never particularly liked.
Augustine has always struck me as arrogant, self-serving, rigid, internally conflicted and obsessed, especially when it came to sexuality. He famously said, “Grant me chastity and continence, but not yet.” He’s always struck me as a bit of a mama’s boy who couldn’t make his own decision about whom to marry. The love of his life seemed to have been his concubine with whom he had a 17-year-long relationship and who gave birth to his son. But his mother deemed her unsuitable for marriage and sought other candidates to be his bride. In the end any marriage plans were thwarted when he became a priest.
I’ve never quite warmed to Augustine’s focus on original sin, though I know it’s a bedrock of much of western Christian theology. And then there’s his doctrine of predestination that eventually found a home in my branch of reformed theology. I’ve wasted countless hours trapped in mental gymnastics as I tried, and largely failed, to figure out how help people in my congregations make sense of this.
Even so, I reluctantly confess that some of his writings make me melt. For example, the second paragraph of Book 1 of his “Confessions” ends with “…our heart is restless until it rests in Thee.” That pretty much sums up my theology. Damn!
When I’m honest I recognize that Augustine was a complicated human being living in a complicated time – a time when the Western Roman empire was collapsing. Which meant that cultural and societal norms he counted on were changing, if not outright disintegrating. I wonder how disorienting that was for him and everyone he knew.
I can imagine him looking for guidance and strength to face his era’s turmoil, and with a flash of insight penning the line, “Give us the sense of comradeship with heroes and saints of every age;” That’s exactly what I’ve been seeking these days! I’ve been looking to people who have gone through troubled times before me, hoping to learn from them, to understand what sustained them.
For decades I’ve managed to avoid feeling any sort of kinship with Augustine. And yet, now there are days when I can feel those burdens that chafed his shoulders and wore him down. It’s like I’m right there with him.
Lightning has begun striking in earnest now. Thunder is rolling as I’ve never heard it before. So, I’m going to stop, and sit out tonight’s storm with the saint I would never have chosen as a traveling companion. And together we’ll look for the promise-filled skies that are sure to come sooner or later.
Then tomorrow I’ll get back to doing the work that’s mine to do as I once again join those souls with whom I share this life’s journey.