epiphany

Therefore, that divine element in you, whatever it may be – the element because of which you have always sought after what is fitting and worthwhile; because of which you have preferred to be generous rather than wealthy; as a result of which you have never wanted to be more powerful rather than to be more just; the reason you have never given in to adversities and improprieties – that element, I say, which has been lulled to sleep by the lethargy of this life, a hidden Providence has decided to awaken by the various hard reverses you have suffered.
-Augustine, in the dedication to Romanianus, Against the Academicians

In starting with a quote from Augustine, I’m trying to funnel my thoughts in a certain direction, though they will still meander. First, I freely admit that I am a bit of a pessimist and a cynic, though I enjoy neither of these things. But I hope that there’s some redemption possible in them.

A little while back I was wondering about the endemic cynicism that seems to pervade my generation. I came to a bit of a sloppy conclusion (which is a shameful thing for a philosophy major). Nevertheless, I can’t help but try it out. And I suppose the best way I can say it would be something along the lines of disillusionment: this generation is disillusioned over the state of the world and the human condition. In a sense, there’s little hope because we’re told there’s little to hope for. We see broken people all around us and we come to ignore them. We see broken relationships in our own lives and in the lives of those we care about and, subtly, we begin to think that this is just the way things are. We’re suspicious of any institution because we see that institutions fail on a personal level, the very place that where we live and interact. Idealism runs rampant, but is never pursued because of the fatalist notion that there’s nothing that can be done. The idea that the world is too complicated, and that change is too hard to effect, deadens our passions and restricts our actions. News reports inform us of corruption and murder and the declining state of our countries; they criticize competence and gossip about the celebrities that we’re told to admire. All the information that bombards our senses and all the responsibilities to which we must attend make us dizzy. Education rates us and determines our status in a “productive” society. We’re no longer taught about right and wrong, but immersed in a permissive culture that essentially lulls us to sleep.

And this is only the beginning, you see, because, after awhile, we start to think this way. We fall asleep to the good. We lose sight of what it means to buzz with life and to feel deeply, because, as we see all around us, feeling deeply opens us up not only to pleasure but also to pain. I suppose the thing that scares us is the vulnerability of it. Any hurting person aches because they feel deeply. We try to cover it up with activity and addictions and sex and superficial relationships and anything at all that we can grasp at, desperately trying to take the sting out of our pain and the possibility of feeling the pain of others. But I think we all, at some point, have a “hard reverse” and suddenly life seems to freeze and we realize that we do feel. Despite our best efforts, we’re still right where we were.

I read that quote from Augustine and I catch a little flash of all this. Strange as it seems, I find an enormous sense of hope in the “hard reverses” and difficult periods of life. Not when I’m in the middle of them necessarily, but inevitably afterwards. It is through the difficulties that the illusions of disillusionment are revealed, and an opportunity is created. I might call it a return to innocence, except that it comes (usually) in the midst of painful and sullied experience. Still, it is a refreshed perspective on life and a fresh chance to change things that you, suddenly, can see clearly again. Like a revelation, an unveiling of the mysteriously shrouded.

I’m never very comfortable with this revelation because it’s always a challenge, an affront to the way I conduct my life and relate to people. God whips the shroud away and shows us what we knew all along but forgot: you’re treating that person like an alien. It’s almost like a magic trick, a sleight-of-hand misdirection, and then we’re revealed, in all our cynical self-involvement. And even if I make the choice to drape the cloth back over the ugly, revealed wound, something is changed. It could be the choice to harden my heart, cover the wounds and pretend they’re just not there. Or it could be a fresh awareness, a soft spot that has been created in my soul that isn’t healed, but at least it knows it’s hurt. Either way, I come out changed. Hopefully, it’s for the better. And hopefully, I’m a little more awake... a little more willing to be vulnerable... a little further along the rambling journey of my soul...