I turned to literature like a maniac. I mean, I was – I just was reading, you know, five hours a day and memorizing all these things and convinced that nothing mattered but being a great poet, and, yeah, that’s what filled the void for 20 years. I mean, I – well, it never did it, but it certainly – I certainly tried to make it fill that void. […]
I have this hunger in me that is endless, and I think everyone probably has it. Maybe they find different ways of dealing with it, whether it’s booze or excessive exercise or excessive art or whatever. I tried to answer it with poetry for years and hit a wall with that. And finally, I decided, or rather – I didn’t decide. That’s not right. I discovered that the only answer to that hunger was God. Answer is wrong, I guess. The only solution to me was to live toward God without an answer. […]
GROSS: So – but what was your understanding of God then?
WIMAN: Well, I probably did have an understanding of God as a person in the sky, you know, or a vision of God as simply the answer to all questions, and also just a being a, like a father figure. And I suffered a real loss of that concept at some point, and to what I have now, which is God is really not an object at all, but a verb.
(GROSS: Why turn to religion and not, say, for instance, philosophy? What did religion – what did faith give you that you felt nothing else could?) […]
Oh, a living God. I mean, as philosophy, there’s nothing that loves you back. I mean, I am moved by my deepest settled belief is in the unity of existence, that there is some fundamental unity in all things. And we are part of that. And in our deepest experiences of joy or of love or suffering, there is a sense sometimes that reality is looking back at us. And it can happen to people who are not religious at all. It happens to poets all the time. They can have an experience in nature in which they’re not blending with nature. It’s as if there’s some kind of reciprocal seeing. And I think that is God. And that’s the leap that I made in my life. I think a lot of people don’t make that leap and perhaps don’t feel the need to make that leap.
— Christian Wiman, excerpts from ‘After 18 years living with cancer, a poet offers ‘Fifty Entries Against Despair‘ (NPR Interview with Terry Gross, December 13, 2023) Christian Wiman’s new book is called “Zero At The Bone: 50 Entries Against Despair.” He teaches at Yale Divinity School and the Yale School of Sacred Music.
Notes: Post Title & Inspiration: Aldous Huxley: “It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them.
I find this hard to interpret, which is totally understandable as many of us are trying to understand what life is all about.
The only thing I could “personally understand” was the phrase:
“the unity of existence, that there is some fundamental unity in all things.”
I guess I pull that phrase out because it sounds like a concept that I have heard before in my “beginner level reading” about Buddhism.
Anyway, maybe it’s better to say that when I read this I see someone searching for meaning in life, like many of us are.
Life… Such a mystery…
My mother had an amazingly strong Christian faith that God exists, and has a plan. I don’t know anyone personally who had a stronger faith. And that faith sustains her through her darkest hours… Her entire life. It was what she was taught as a small child, and she never strayed from it, which I admire.
Cute story about my mom as a child: someone was explaining to her that “God is everywhere”. Her response was: “well he better get out of my shoes because I want to put them on!”
Laden life during her struggle with Alzheimer’s she was taking medication that had a side effect of horrible nightmares, and my brother still has a note that she wrote to her self something like: “why can’t I get off this medication and just let God care for me in my old age?” I have a photograph of that note (scrap of paper) on the iPhone that I am currently using to write this.
Her ability to (as far as I know) have complete faith that there is a God never ceases to amaze me. Honestly. I wish I had a face like that, because with that strong faith, one can let go of most of the confusion in life and simply except that “it is God’s plan”.
My mom left us three years ago is coming December 23. She was my best friend. I miss her so much (tears in my eyes as I write this).
Awwwww. What a moving closing thought. Thank for sharing Paul.
Unfortunately this reply was “sent” before I proofread it (not sure what I did wrong) so there are some typos.
Corrections:
Sustains = sustained
Laden = later In
Have = to have
Face = faith
Except = accept
Is = this
Apologies for all the typos.
Paul, just so u know, typos are surely as endearing as freckles — it only means one is telling the truth of the heart.🌷
That’s a sweet analogy 🙂
Thank you for the kind words.
I write most of my emails and comments using dictation to Siri, and then I go back and correct “her” errors. In this case somehow my comment got sent before I got to the “error correction” process.
Thank you for sharing. Recently, Corey’s Digs, an investigative journalist, sent out an invitation seeking written submissions of short stories sharing miracles – a profound event that changed your life and/or perspective. These stories should be about an experience you had that involved an angel, spirit, or perhaps Jesus himself, that moved your soul in a powerful way.
Corey Lynn will select a few and publish them on my site, plus mail a copy of my book to those selected.
I submitted my short story.
Many responded and she selected seven. Modesty aside, my story was selected.
https://perpetuasiglos.wordpress.com/2023/11/03/one-story-many-lives/
while I’m not a traditionally religious person, he strikes at the heart of it, more of a feeling in life and what’s beyond
Yes. Same here Beth. And wow, this man has been through a lot with cancer.
Thank you, Dave. This resonates so deeply. ❤️
‘… a sense sometimes that reality is looking back at us’ – brought to mind one of my favourite R S Thomas poems:
The Kingdom
It’s a long way off but inside it
There are quite different things going on:
Festivals at which the poor man
Is king and the consumptive is
Healed; mirrors in which the blind look
At themselves and love looks at them
Back; and industry is for mending
The bent bones and the minds fractured
By life. It’s a long way off, but to get
There takes no time and admission
Is free, if you purge yourself
Of desire, and present yourself with
Your need only and the simple offering
Of your faith, green as a leaf.
Thanks, Dave, as ever 🙂
Simon, so love this. Esp the finish: “our need only and the simple offering Of your faith, green as a leaf.” Thank you for sharing!
Your relationship with your mom sounds incredible…and when I cry with memories of my parents, I think it’s just an acknowledgment of how much I loved them – and love them I did. I read an article by an author who didn’t have much faith in what happened at the end of life; her mom was immersed in her Christian faith. As she watched her mom pass away, with a calm and confident visage, she wondered which was better off – to believe in something one doesn’t really know or like the author, have no belief at all because of an absence of clinical date. Sort of rhetorical – in embracing the unknown with confidence and calm vs fearing the end of the story…I think her mom had the edge.
Thanks Mimi 💕
I did indeed have an amazing relationship with my mom. She was very very special. Generous to a fault almost… She was always giving to others. She was basically a “one person charity organization”. Her love for her husband and her three sons seemed to be infinite.
I agree with you about the idea that “having faith has an edge/advantage”. I marvel at my mother’s faith, and I wish I was just like her in that regard. It gave her incredible comfort during the many difficult times that we all face.
This is a nice interview, and not easy to make a comment. But I can understand and I do agree with most points, but in here, something nothing comes right to me, why we do comparison between philosophy and God! Made my mind busy! Maybe I read wrong….
Thank you dear David, Love, nia
” Why turn to religion and not, say, for instance, philosophy? What did religion – what did faith give you that you felt nothing else could?) […]
Oh, a living God. I mean, as philosophy, there’s nothing that loves you back.”
That’s it Nia. Same line for me too. Thank you and Happy Holidays.