A CONTEMPORARY SPIRITUALITY

I’m a big fan of the American novelist Elizabeth Strout, and her latest book ‘The Things we never say’ does not disappoint. Before the story begins there is a quotation from Jung:

“Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or for holding certain views which others find inadmissible.”

Many years ago I wrote blog number 77 ‘Our Constant Companion’. I had been surprised when a friend told me that his ‘constant companion’ was sadness, and I at once intuitively knew that my ‘constant companion’ was loneliness.

Jung’s quotation has clarified this for me. When I have felt lonely it has not been because of a lack of people around me, but because I have not been able to communicate what has been most important for me: namely the questions of the meaning of life and the existence of God. In my teens I pondered on those questions as I walked in nearby Epping Forest. But they had not been talked about at school, none of my friends seemed interested in them & thought I was a bit odd to be worrying about them. So I felt lonely.

Luckily I was saved by a young priest whom I knew, who invited me to talk about these questions, took me seriously, and encouraged me to keep on asking questions. He thought that I should consider becoming a priest. My early naive assumption about priesthood was that it would give me paid time to walk in the woods and ponder, and that I would find myself having conversations like the ones that he and I had.

There have been times in the institutional church when I have not felt lonely, at theological college, and some moments in parish ministry, but it was not until I discovered the ministry of spiritual direction that my loneliness eased, and it didnt really go away until I left the paid employ of the Church. 

In the terms of Jung’s quote I reckon that most people have a sense of loneliness, some no doubt more aware of it than others. Very few people, in my experience, have someone who will simply listen to them and take them seriously, without interjecting their own story, or telling them what to do. Wise good listeners are very hard to find.

In the words of Rich Carson:

“It is a gift, a rare and precious blessing

To craft a sacred space in which to share

The honesty of wisdom, forged and tested,

A place where words are weighed and wrought with care,

Where sentences are drawn from deepest waters,

Carrying the weight of all that is,

Holding on to hope amidst the darkness,

Trusting in the fruitfulness of fears

Yet in this fractured world such fragile spaces

Whose making – and whose keeping – is an art,

Must be carved out, defended, lest their traces

Fade from memory, from mind, from heart

In holding nothing back we are revealing

Our truest self, and all the world finds healing.”

There are several aspects to the question of loneliness.

It can sometimes be difficult to put into words what is most important to us, and it may be difficult to rationally justify.

It’s not easy to find a good listener [although Strout’s story does give examples of it].

The ultimate listener, encourager, and constant companion, is God, but most people have not been taught to understand that prayer is primarily about exploring and deepening that relationship. 

And of course most of life is not lived at this deeper level. We would be exhausted if it did.