There have been more gatherings lately. In this part of the world (BC, Canada) there have been some concerts, some sporting events, some church services and other community happenings.
Perhaps you have voiced those words I have heard at a few events, “It just feels so good to see people again, IN PERSON!” Yet, I have sensed a cautiousness, a kind of uncertainty in the air. Is it a kind of fragility? Perhaps people are nervous about the virus. Maybe it is difficult to get back to something that was taken for granted a year a half ago.
I’ve had a saying of the Desert Fathers (early Christian monastics) in my mind a fair bit during the pandemic: “Stay in your cell. Your cell will teach you everything.”
The spiritual leaders who said those words said them to novices looking to grow spiritually. The words were spoken as a directive to spiritual growth, not as a public health directive. These monastics had moved mostly to the desert and lived often in small structures or caves. These were what they were referring to as “cells”. From these places they sought to discover the highest spiritual truths and to know Christ more fully. The “stay in your cell” idea seemed to present the argument that most of our movement and activity can be a type of avoidance. We neglect to truly examine ourselves. We neglect to see God’s presence in the world. Instead, we just keep moving. The idea was that if you can’t find peace in your cell, you are unlikely to find it anywhere else.
We are on this precarious edge of COVID once again. Things seem to be moving to an end and yet, somehow, we are still in the thick of it. Perhaps this is the time to ask and pray if being confined to our cells has taught us anything. I suppose that the prerequisite for growth is a willingness, a desire even, to learn. I am enlivened by the feeling that simply asking what we may have learned can bring benefits of growth.
Dear Jesus;
You barely went anywhere, yet you showed the world abiding hope. Would you give me eyes to see?
Dear Jesus;
I am restless. I find ways to move, even in my cell. I move through web pages and distractions and news stories and sports on tv, and social media. How can I stay in my cell? Have I filled my cell with all the noise of the world? When I accept the quiet I can sometimes hear your voice, the voice of rushing waters?
Dear Jesus;
I am restless to get moving, to get out again. At the same time I am tentative. I feel like I could break into pieces just by going to some of the very same places and gatherings which used to be just everyday places and gatherings. Help me to see the tentativeness in others as well. Teach me patience and compassion.
Dear Jesus;
Is it too late to learn what you would teach me in this time that we are living? I want to carry with me some kind of spiritual lesson and growth. I want to be bolstered by an awareness of what matters. Would you grant me the patience to know your love and presence, even in activity that feels more useless than it used to feel?
Dear Jesus;
Thank you. We have lost much, but we have been brought through. We can see better days ahead, even as we enter this uncertain fall and winter. Bless us in our tiredness, our pandemic induced weariness. Help us to be good to one another.
In 1790, a twenty-seven-year-old Frenchman named Xavier de Maistre determined to take a journey and recount the tale. He would write a travel book. The telling that he wrote was called, “Journey Around My Bedroom”. De Maistre valued and engaged in actual travel. With his homebound journey he was simply trying to make the point that the pleasure we derive from a journey may be dependent more on the mind-set we travel with than on the destination we travel to. (From Alain de Botton’s The Art of Travel, 2002).
Maybe this staying in our cells will give us a proper traveler’s mindset. When we are travelling we so often keep our eyes open. Maybe the places in which we live are no less interesting than (in Botton’s words) high mountain passes and butterfly-filled jungles. There are people in your life, and in mine. There is beauty here. I just heard the chirp of a bird on this grey, between seasons day. There is so much where you are.
Before you head out, hear the words, “Stay in your cell. Your cell will teach you everything.”
What is our “cell”? I would suggest that it is not necessarily physical.
Maybe our cell is our invisible boundary that we carry with us.
Does our cell have a door and, if so, do we keep it locked?
When I was a teen I had a wonderful cell, my bedroom, my tiny space.
My “cell” was my private haven, my happy place, rarely did I allow anyone inside.
In my “cell” I was happily alone with my thoughts, alone, but never lonely.
The “cell” that we choose is very different from the “cell” that mandates our presence.
We have learned what it is to be mandated. That cell has taken our freedom and in return has made us fearful.
I do not wish to remain in a mandated cell.