The last few days have been pregnant with intimations of mortality. Once again those fundamental questions concerning the meaning and relevance of life and the daily round of activities, which seem so important and meaningful at the time, return and demand answers. None come easily. Abstract concepts, satisfying perhaps to a philosopher, dissipate like wisps of smoke when faced with the painful reality of lived experience. I sometimes think that the idea of life after death, where the good will be rewarded and all injustices put right, is a product of our ego-centric arrogance. We think we are, each of us, the centre of the cosmos, the centre of meaning and we cannot conceive of a reality where we would not be at the centre. If Heaven exists it will be Heaven for me. Such an ego-centric worldview cannot be a true depiction of reality. It is, perhaps, what is meant by maya, what someone called dis-knowledge rather than illusion, a perspective which distorts reality by allowing it to have relevance only in so far as it relates to me. One of the benefits of having an unreliable heart and failing vision is that everything takes on a sharpness, a clarity and, even the most ordinary things, an unassuming beauty. Nothing pushy, nothing brash, garish, or vulgar, simply a quiet presence. Each thing is itself independently of whether I am there or not and will continue to be itself long after I have gone.
Whatever answer we provide for those fundamental questions it cannot be an abstract one. Platitudes, philosophy, or consoling thoughts will not do. The fact that we have to pose these questions means that we have missed our way, that we do not understand. I remember reading Fritz Schumacher a long time ago, his little book, A Guide to the Perplexed. He said that the problem with being human is that we come to life without a manual, without any instructions on how life should be lived. OK, he was speaking in a light-hearted way. Given that we are what we are, nothing so defining and limiting as an instruction manual would be appropriate. But he had a point, and when I look at people wandering more or less aimlessly around shopping centres looking for something to occupy them for a few hours, or indulging in a hedonistic search for pleasure, or pandering to themselves ‘because they’re worth it’, I realise how empty life is for so many.
At this point I should go on to explain what life is, but this is not easy; partly because I have only discovered part of the answer so far, and partly because the answer has to be discovered by each person. It is not like the response to a catechism question. ‘Who made you? God made me.’ Such an answer may be true at one level but it is meaningless unless it comes from lived experience. The problem is how does one acquire the experience which gives rise to the answer? Behind this lies a deeper problem – how does one become aware of the question in the first place? Does this question arise for everyone, or only for the more thoughtful and reflective people? I would guess that it does arise at some time or other for most people. For many, perhaps, only in what Karl Jaspers called ‘limit situations’, but people respond to it in different ways. It is easier for those brought up in a religious and cultural environment where such questions, and the way they are answered, are part of the common consciousness. The answers might not satisfy everyone but at least the questions are taken seriously. And, within the mainstream religions, there are many who are genuinely holy, who have arrived at answers to these questions and who can guide others.
For those in materialist and secularist environments the questions will still arise but answers to them are not often apparent. Here, the great danger, that is for those for whom the questions pose themselves, is that people will either be attracted to the, often exotic, offerings of New Age, and other charlatans, gurus, yogis and messiahs, or dismiss all such questions as meaningless and delusory. There are still genuinely holy people in these environments, people like Etty Hillesum and Madeleine Delbrel who discover the answers for themselves and in the process rediscover their childhood religions, or Simone Weil, a mystic who refused to relinquish her solidarity and engagement with the poor and suffering, or Charles de Foucauld who simply wanted to be a presence among the Tuareg. What is interesting about all of these is that they did not try to evoke an intellectual conversion in others by preaching or argument but were simply a presence to them. They hoped that by some osmosis, in the ordinary interactions of day to day relationships, something of the light they had seen would become apparent to those they loved. That is what the Little Brothers and Sisters of Jesus, and others like them, still do today. These are those we know about. There are also the many, many thousands of unknown people, except to those they love, who offer their lives gratuitously as service to others. Unfortunately people such as these are rare, or unknown to most of us, and there remain so many people who never encounter holiness or an unconditional love which opens them to the transcendent. For these people the questions do not arise, or if they do they are questions with neither meaning nor answers.