Am I the only one who has had this experience?  I wondered: Do my glasses need changing?  No. Was the sharpness set too high on the television?  I don’t think so.

I think the problem is that real life just doesn’t happen in high definition.

Part of the beauty of the world around us is that human faces do not reveal every flaw to the casual glance, and objects are not always distinct from each other.

Outside my window right now I see live oak branches covered with resurrection ferns and draped with Spanish moss.  The whole effect is one of graceful softness, highlighted and sharpened here and there by splotches of sunlight that make leaves, fronds, and moss glow.  In spots, the details are completely overwhelmed by the brilliance of light.

If every green frond were distinct from the other and from the branch, if each gray strand of moss in shadow appeared just as clearly defined as the ones in gentle sunlight, much of the beauty would be lost.

In our own lives as well, we move from day to day in a state of blessed blurriness, though we may often long for a higher resolution monitor, so to speak.

• The future is unknown in its details – though we know, through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, that there is a happy ending to the human story.
• In many cases, it is not even clear to us what our next step should be – we have to trust in the guidance and good will of God as we navigate the ambiguities of life.
• The deepest truths of human existence are in the form of paradox and mystery – and when we try to codify them in high-definition propositions, we may take pride in our certainty and forget the mystery inherent in what we were attempting to clarify.

I find this quotation from Gerald May helpful:

When we were children, most of us were good friends with mystery.  The world was full of it and we loved it.  Then as we grew older, we slowly accepted the indoctrination that mystery exists only to be solved.  For many of us, mystery became an adversary; unknowing became a weakness.  The contemplative spiritual life is an ongoing reversal of this adjustment.  It is a slow and sometimes painful process of becoming “as little children” again, in which we first make friends with mystery and finally fall in love again with it.  And in that love we find an ever increasing freedom to be who we really are in an identity that is continually emerging and never defined.  We are freed to join the dance of life in fullness without having a clue about what the steps are.

Gerald G. May, M.D., The Dark Night of the Soul (New York: Harper, 2003), 132-3.

The obscurity is blessed, because we are indeed dwelling in divine Mystery, and that is where we are meant to be.  It is there that we find goodness, love, mercy, and peace.  It is there that we “join the dance of life in fullness without having a clue about what the steps are.”

Two years ago, with the help of Sister Elizabeth, the county housing authority, and a number of generous people, Carol — the mentally ill homeless woman about whom I have written before — finally moved into her own apartment.  One day shortly before Christmas we drove her to sign forms and take care of assorted bits of red tape.  The real estate agent is a compassionate woman who treated Carol with the same courtesy that she would have shown a millionaire.  She took obvious delight in handing over to her the key to the apartment.

Stopping for lunch

After leaving the real estate office, we stopped for lunch at a fast-food restaurant. Carol was too excited to sit still and eat.  She half-danced among the tables, raising her hands and praising Jesus for all to hear.

A woman working there asked if we were from a church group.  I told her that we were Catholic Sisters, and she asked if we were from Saint Augustine parish.  I replied that we do indeed attend Saint Augustine .

“I’m Lulu,” she told me. “I’m on work release.”

“Good for you!” I replied, not knowing what the proper response would be, as being on work-release meant that her place of residence at the moment was prison.  (Should I have said, “Oh, I’m so sorry”?  Or simply, “Oh…”?  On second thought I decided that “Good for you” was appropriate after all, because she is working hard to prove herself a responsible citizen and to take her place in the community.)

“I’d like to be going to Saint Augustine’s,” she added.

“I’ll hope to see you there one day,” I said. And we agreed to pray for each other.

After lunch, Sister Elizabeth, Carol (key in hand), and I headed for Carol’s new home.  In the car she was singing,

O holy night, the stars are brightly shining,
it is the night of the dear Savior’s birth.

Moving in was uncomplicated, as she had few belongings.  Though devoid of furniture, the apartment was warm and clean, with a real bathroom, and a kitchen to prepare the food that she buys with food stamps.

However, while Carol is streetwise, she is not house-wise.  She does not know some of the simplest things most of us take for granted.  She has to be taught the necessity of putting the garbage can out at the curb on the designated day.  Or that you don’t turn the thermostat up as high as it will go to warm the apartment, then turn on the air conditioning when it heats up too much — unless you want to run up a bill impossible to pay and have your electricity turned off.

Getting there in spite of ourselves

Those of us who have been more fortunate than Carol and Lulu — in our parents, in our economic situation, in our mental or physical health — are not for all that closer to the reign of God.  Neither are we more worthy of the Christ who comes, just because we have never been in jail or in need of food and shelter.  All is gift for each of us, including what we imagine we have merited.  We have not earned the good things in our lives any more than Lulu, who is for the moment not even free to come and go as she pleases – or than Carol, who must be approved for SSI if she is to stay in her new lodging.

This is how the British poet U. A. Fanthorpe describes the events surrounding Jesus’ birth:

… a few farm workers and three
Members of an obscure Persian sect
Walked haphazard by starlight straight
Into the kingdom of heaven.

“BC:AD,” Christmas Poems
(Enitharmon Press, 2003)

Are we not walking haphazard into the kingdom of heaven along with Carol, Lulu, shepherds, Magi, and the kind real estate agent?  Or, to borrow the words of Paul Simon, are we not all more or less “bouncing into Graceland”? There is no AAA TripTik to show us ahead of time each step of the journey, and most of us do meander, sometimes on track and sometimes off.

If we are really paying attention, we will be struck with wonder at finding ourselves there in spite of ourselves.

We may be walking beneath a starlight that seems no different from yesterday’s light, in a world where war still rages, where the hand of oppression lies heavy on the poor, and where earthquakes and hurricanes and mental illness leave ordinary people homeless.  What has changed, we say?  The grip of evil is still unbearably strong.

Nevertheless, through all the sorrows and joys and anxieties and tedium of our lives, we are bouncing into graceland.  Held by a hand stronger than sorrow and evil, we stumble into the kingdom of God.

And unlike the shepherds and the three wise men, we know how the story ends.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

(Matthew 5:3)

This was the moment when Before
Turned into After, and the future’s
Uninvented timekeepers presented arms.

This was the moment when nothing
Happened. Only dull peace
Sprawled boringly over the earth.

This was the moment when even energetic Romans
Could find nothing better to do
Than counting heads in remote provinces.

And this was the moment
When a few farm workers and three
Members of an obscure Persian sect
Walked haphazard by starlight straight
Into the kingdom of heaven.

U. A. Fanthorpe, “BC:AD”

I am convinced that most of us stumble into the reign of God, not because of our sterling virtue or our skill in prayer, but in spite of ourselves,

Sandro Botticelli, "The Mystical Nativity" (detail showing an angel pointing out the Christ child to the shepherds), National Gallery, London

thanks to a loving guidance of which we may be totally unaware. And sometimes where we find ourselves – what turns out to be filled with grace and glory – is not at all what we would have expected.

You might enjoy listening to Paul Simon’s song “Graceland,” which is ostensibly about a trip to Elvis Presley’s house in Memphis.  As the song goes on, however, one realizes that it is really about something far bigger and infinitely deeper. Here is one verse:

There is a girl in New York City,
Who calls herself the human trampoline,
And sometimes when I’m falling flying
Or tumbling in turmoil I say
Whoa, so this is what she means,
She means we’re bouncing into Graceland…

The shepherds and the Magi “walked haphazard” or bounced into Graceland. And so do we bounce — usually awkwardly — into the glory of God where we are expected, longed for, and welcomed.
In the words of Paul Simon:

Maybe I’ve a reason to believe
We all will be received
In Graceland