Love is possible in the middle of this

Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1)

God is the infinite, unmanageable, unconditioned context of all that we are and we do, and so it’s not entirely surprising if we can’t boil that down into something we can manage. That’s why, of course, in Hebrew Scripture, when the people of Israel gather at Mount Sinai, the mountain is covered with cloud and fire, and God says to Moses: Keep your distance. I’m sorry. This is how I am. You’re not going to boil me down to something that’s manageable. Rowan Williams

Today’s New York Times has Peter Wehner interviewing Rowan Williams, the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury. The New Atheists ‘Attack a God I Don’t Believe In, Either’: A Q&A With Rowan Williams

I hope you’ll read it. I suggest approaching it as a form of Lectio Divina. Slowly, lingering over phrases and words. If you're up for a challenge, after you've read about half of the interview, go to the comments. What you'll find is people proclaiming their atheism with energy and in many cases rage. It's as though the commenters were all in collaboration with the Archbishop to prove his point. The God they reject is the same God he rejects. Except they can't quite bring themselves to look at the God that Williams proclaims. They know all about God and religion.

My invisible friend is better than your invisible friend. Religion has killed more people and torn apart more lives than anything. Such a terrible, terrible concept. A comment in NYT from “The Truth” who apparently lives in Florida.

The God who is not going away

There is a section of the interview that felt familiar. Every parish priest knows the experience of sitting with people in agony and feeling as though you have nothing to offer. Every baptized Christian knows the experience of being challenged by the church’s failures.

Peter Wehner: … “you’ve pastored people in the midst of grief — a terminal diagnosis, the death of a dream, the death of a child — what have you found is most helpful for them to receive from you? Is it something you say? Some perspective you can offer? Or perhaps it’s mainly your presence, listening to them, weeping with them, reassuring them, even giving them the space to rage at God.”

Rowan Williams: “The main thing is always accompaniment. You’re not there to answer questions at the theoretical level. You are there to try to embody the God who is not going away. … What the church does is not to point to itself as an example of impeccable behavior and triumph and success but to point to the faithfulness of God who won’t let go of even this very unpromising human material.”

I’ll end with the passage that Rowan Williams mentions to illustrate the unmanageable but eternally present God he worships.

On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, as well as a thick cloud on the mountain, and a blast of a trumpet so loud that all the people who were in the camp trembled. Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God. They took their stand at the foot of the mountain. Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke, because the Lord had descended upon it in fire; the smoke went up like the smoke of a kiln, while the whole mountain shook violently. As the blast of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses would speak and God would answer him in thunder. When the Lord descended upon Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain, the Lord summoned Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up. - From Exodus 19

This abides,

Brother Robert, OA

​At 24:45 Sister Michelle, OA on the uncontrollable God, Blessed Evelyn Underhill, and the Holy Trinity

The Feast of Ephrem of Nisibis, Deacon, 373