What is the darkness and what is the light? Richard Rohr, OFM

“If the light inside you is, in fact, darkness, what darkness that will be” Matthew 6:23

I was taping a TV show in Budapest when the cameramen received the word of events in America. Everything stopped and just like here everything was refocused and redirected. For the rest of the European tour, all of my talks had to be related to this one event, especially since I was an American and a Franciscan. Suddenly, it was both very easy and also very hard to preach about things like non-violence, scapegoating, the shadow, and Biblical faith. In fact, nothing else sufficed or was of any interest to anybody.

The depth, the universality, and the “religious” nature of the responses to the September 11 events, tell me that we are dealing with something more than crisis as usual here. We are not just dealing with a few new startling events, but I think we are struggling with ancient and ruling images in the human psyche. C.G. Jung called them “archetypes”. They perhaps determine human history much more than we realized. The Greeks and most mythologies quite simply called them “gods”. When we are in the thralldom of an archetypal image, reason, logic, and normal measured responses tend to be lost. When Mars and Athena reign, there will be war. At that point we are dealing with monumental memories, and language quickly becomes awesome, absolute, and scary. Songs and movies become both heroic and sentimental. Hearts become both soft and very hard. When these gods are on stage, we have tremendous need for wisdom and perspective, because the shadow is not allowed to show itself. The drama is all or nothing.

Archetypal images force consciousness to utterly new questions and configurations. The realignments are in all directions. For a while, we are not sure what good is and what evil is, what matters, and what will last. Suddenly the big questions are askable, and peoples’ behavior becomes quite unpredictable and sometimes unexplainable. Both church attendance and depression have suddenly risen. Most folks understandably circle their wagons around old absolutes and old securities for some sense of control. Logically speaking, I am not sure why so many bumper stickers suddenly say “I am proud to be an American” or “United We Stand” just because we were attacked. The conclusion does not follow from the premise. Remember, unity is created by the Spirit, not by fear. Now we are united like never before without really doing anything. We are in a place of non-logic and archetypal possession. Almost all ancients would have called it being possessed by a bad spirit. It is real. Education, age, or religion has little to do with how we feel. People stopped driving, staying in motels, or attending the opera. Exactly why, no one is sure, not even the people refraining from these things.

Surely, we could start by saying that Americans have been in an extremely rare and secure situation for their 200 years compared to almost all of human history.. We are not used to living under any kind of threat. War and insecurity is always elsewhere for us. Yet, I know that the depth of the response was also in Europe and other continents, so we cannot just blame it on soft and spoiled Americans. My job, however, is to preach the prophetic word, what we call “the third way”, not to anybody else but to ourselves. It is we Americans who must somehow find our ground and center, “one God before us”, in the midst of this swirl of lesser gods. It is America that must find its Reference Point outside of itself, and not get blinded by the darkness of so many compelling and seductive images. It is America that most needs a very good pair of glasses. Why?, Because we not only play in the global card game, but we are dealing the cards as far as the rest of the world is concerned. It is we, therefore, who must be most cognizant, humble, and self-critical. Unfortunately, I heard these cautious voices much more in Europe than I have since I returned to the USA. So, let’s look at why these images are so enticing and perhaps so blinding to us in America today.

First of all, there was the question of an absolutely global and common drama that the whole world watched almost as it happened. This is big stuff and sweeps one into the ultimate Nielsen ratings. The feelings that it engenders are literally larger than life and larger than death. Grand theater at its best, with images right out of the best science fiction movies any of us have seen. And most of the world watched the images many times, because it was both incredible and utterly fascinating.

Secondly, it had all the character of David against Goliath, and David won! This was a repeat of the Titanic experience, a ship that could not be sunk was not just sunk but sunk by a minor player, a hidden iceberg, a new form of warfare that reframed the entire history of war in a few moments. Our two centers of power, market and military, were successfully attacked out of nowhere. Suddenly, for the first time, the great America is able to play the role of victim. We have no practice at doing this, but have suddenly seen its advantages in the political theater. We like being the oppressed underdog for a change. It gives us a new kind of power, a new kind of sympathy, and a new kind of unity that we have been longing for since the 1960’s. Actually, it feels good. All kinds of internal social squabbles have been resolved.

For those of us educated in Biblical images, they were all there: Tower of Babel, Fall of the Temple, Armageddon, the Scapegoat, martyrdom, the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, even the highest teaching of Jesus being used against us “No greater love hath any man than to lay down his life for his friends”. But now it is kamikaze pilots laying down their lives against us! No wonder our moral compass is still spinning. We quickly and rightfully recognized our own heroes who laid down their lives, like my Franciscan brother, Fr. Mychal Judge, who was the very first to be buried. I had only walked with him two months earlier for a late night stroll-and we stood looking at the great towers from the Brooklyn Bridge. Little did I-or he-imagine that he would die there at that very spot.

The emergence of genuine heroes and stories of bravery from New York only further added to the moral confusion. We must, indeed, be loyal to their memory and the lives that were so wrongly taken from them. Yet, logically speaking, more than 5000 people die every day of hunger and starvation. In the truly cosmic picture, this scenario of tragedy is a common event. It is just that now it struck us, here, unprepared, everybody watching, and of course, pushed all the buttons of war, terrorism, injustice, stealth, death, sadness, and tragedy. It was the daily cosmic event distilled and displayed for all of our emotions to feed upon. Truly sad, but also a part of the one sadness that God endures daily. The political sadness that most of the world has always known has now reached our shores. We have been drawn into the paschal mystery and it is already producing both darkness and light in each of us.

It is not just archetypal and Biblical images that are confronting us, but even popular movie images like War of the Worlds, King Kong, the Towering Inferno, and even Frankenstein where the monster one has created comes back to attack you. It is not easy for us Americans to admit that Manuel Noriega, Saddam Hussein, and now Ossama bin Laden were all terrorists of our own making. Is this historical truth something we are ready to look at? Is there any connection in this mysterious web of evil or is America totally above the evil that it says it hates?

Is America ready to examine its rather one sided policy toward Israel? Why do they receive more foreign aid than any other country, and are often treated as if they were a 51st state? Only Israel is allowed to disregard their promises to us, violate the human rights of the Palestinians on a massive scale, and snub their nose at America whenever they wish. It is really quite amazing to all the world. We must know that there are understandable reasons why much of the Islamic and Arab world hates and mistrusts America. They are not stupid people. They are not angry without some real provocation, and this anger will not go away soon.

And just one more piece of shadow self that we must look at-fundamentalist religion. The very form of religion which attacked us is the same form that is growing most quickly in America. It is a religion almost entirely based on the human need for certitude, order, and control. It looks real good from inside because it holds the group together in a moral and seemingly religious way, but it is often “belief for the sake of belief” and for the sake of a reassuring community. It is not enough to believe, but one must believe in a good thing! It is not enough to belong, but one must belong to a group that is also self-critical. But in fundamentalist religion, all one needs is sincerity, “morality”, and fervent devotion. Christian fundamentalists must recognize that these are the very qualities that they often teach and admire in our country, and yet hate in the Taliban– only the god figure is different. Just as the Taliban can corrupt Mohammad, so we have been able to corrupt and use Jesus for our own cultural needs.

How then do we become light and hope against such archetypal and irrational forms of evil? [See Richard’s timely book Hope Against Darkness, published by St. Anthony Messenger Press and available through Radical Grace] First of all, we must deny terrorists their victory by refusing to mirror them and do the same thing in reactionary and disguised form. This is the only true moral victory. We must not transmit and continue our human pain but must somehow transform it into a new kind of humanity, a new mind, a different society. “No problem can be solved by the same consciousness that caused it”, said Albert Einstein.

We must find a new consciousness. Here at the Center we call it the contemplative stance. At Folsom Prison, where I taught recently, they call it Centering Prayer, and it is the most effective rehabilitative program there to date! It is the mind that produces Third Way responses. It is the way that God gets into the psyche and the solution. Most ordinary believers just say, “God will do it” or “pray” and they are absolutely right. The Third Way emerges when our ways have been tried and found wanting, and we look elsewhere for guidance. The Third Way happens when we get out of the way.

Since we are dealing with such awesome images of good and evil, we must make sure that “the light within us is not darkness”, as Jesus said. We must make sure that our light is, in fact, light, and not just disguised forms of vengeance, fear, political expediency, or knee jerk political reaction. And by that, I mean both “knee jerk pacificism as much as knee jerk patriotism”, to quote Judy Bierbaum an activist involved at our Center. Neither of them are the unique and well honed Third Way of the Gospel. Neither of them are “from God”.

My deep trust and belief is that when you move from within that third place, when you move from a God given place of true light, from a Reference Point outside and beyond the private ego or the cultural mood, you will do the right and the wise thing. I do not expect governments to ever be able to operate with that kind of freedom or truth, but I do know that once we attain a critical mass among people things begin to change. It happens through us and yet is totally bigger than us at the same time.

All Jesus asked us to be was “leaven”, “salt”, and “light”. He never expected us to be the whole enchilada. It is a very modest proposition, not idealism or utopian at all. A realism that is just enough to keep the system from its inevitable and predictable dance toward death, violence, and vengeance. Jesus’ plan for social transformation is to free people from the system and thus unlock it inevitably from inside. I believe it is just such people who have always kept humanity and institutions from a history of total violence. They are indeed the light of the world without even knowing it.

Only a small quorum seems necessary. The bible called it a remnant, Jews called it a minion, physicists call it a stable core or critical mass. As God said to Abraham, “For the sake of the ten just people, I will spare the whole city” (Genesis 18:32). All it takes is for a small minority to stop believing the lie, and the lie will eventually die. All it takes is for a committed minority to believe in Love, and Love will use them as a channel into the whole world. God never seems to enter the scene uninvited. It appears that God wants us to get some of the credit for the redemption of the world. Remember, the Christ was first conceived in the flesh by the simple Yes of one woman.

More information about Richard’s book: Hope Against Darkness : The Transforming Vision of Saint Francis of Assisi in an Age of Anxiety

If you would like to purchase a copy through the CAC, the cost is $17 for a hardback copy. Please call the CAC, (505)242-9588, for shipping costs.

Book Description Richard Rohr offers hope to us in a confusing time. “Our age has been called the age of anxiety,” he writes in Chapter Two of Hope Against Darkness. “Yet,” he explains, “to be a good leader…you have to be able…to hold patiently a certain degree of anxiety…Leaders who cannot hold anxiety will never lead you to anyplace new.” Saint Francis, he says, can lead us to that new place.

>From the Publisher

Richard Rohr is a modern prophet calling us to change our ways. Rohr paints a critical picture of the prevailing thought, culture and attitudes of the present-day West-which he calls “The Postmodern Opportunity”-including our cultural biases, our embrace of victimhood, our often fearful attitudes toward one another and toward the Church and religion in general. Rohr offers hope in introducing the Franciscan path of transformation, the “new way of being that would change the face of history.”