When You Walk Through The Fire

This is the main aisle of our chapel on campus taken from the altar looking out

Last week, I had to write something to send to my students who have all vacated the campus to return to their homes and will now be attending class and completing assignments online.  Quite suddenly, I am at a loss for words.  We had so much left to discuss.  The class was not over, yet now I had to figure out a way to continue without seeing them each week.  And the question keeps haunting me:  what is important in the face of this virus?  Class assignments now seem meaningless when we are all trying to stave off illness and death.

For a long while now, writing has not been the refuge it once was for me.  I am lost at sea, floating aimlessly in the doldrums of middle age, scribbling frantically in a notebook/journal to try to figure all of this out.  I want to stay in my darkened rooms and read book after book hoping to find the inspiration to create, the wisdom to know the path forward.  I feel I have lost my anchor of “literature, culture and the life of the mind.”  The mind is too unsettled, the everyday too frightening and panicked.  The wisdom bank has been overdrawn.  Survival dominates everything, and since we are living through this new paradigm, how can I have any insight or wisdom to offer in my work that will help people and avoid sounding simply trivial and flat?  This is living with uncertainty, but I have only one tool in my arsenal to fight back:  words.  I do words for a living.  I do words as I breathe, the pneuma of my existence.

This is us and this is who we are and this is how we live now.  There is no turning back, there is no future yet.  All we have is the now.  I can only hold up a mirror to show what we could be, what the future might hold, what better days may lie ahead.  This is what I wrote to my students:

I hear from students all the time, even when we are not experiencing biblical fires, floods and plague, that they are anxious and stressed.  More and more, students express how this anxiety cripples them and keeps them from reaching their goals, from achieving their dreams.

Other generations experienced wars of a global magnitude, famine, financial collapse, natural disasters.  We are not the first generation to be challenged.  We are continually reminded throughout history that human existence is a journey through space and time, and the threats and assaults we experience along the way are the things that make us stronger and our persistence and perseverance teach those who will come after us how to be warriors of wisdom and faith.

In life, the test never ends, and danger and uncertainty are the given conditions when sailing off into the unknown each morning.  The wisdom we seek to deal with the troubles in our lives comes from our predecessors on this earth.

“If you are going through hell, keep going…” (Winston Churchill)

“Never, never, never give up.”  (Prime Minister Churchill again)

“…grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”  (Reinhold Niebuhr)

In life, there is very little we can control.  Mostly, we control our actions and reactions in the face of adversity.  We cannot stop the pain from coming; we cannot avoid what is our destiny to endure.  We must live, and as Churchill says, “keep going.”

What does this mean, exactly?  Well, we control the things we can control and let what we have no control over go.  Right now, we are at home in quarantine.  The city is shut down.  All non-essential services are shuttered.  Our normal is now abnormal.  So we must focus on our classes and finishing the semester strong.  We must keep informed and listen to the news and our governor and mayor.  We must take care of our loved ones and help keep them safe.  We must find a way to live, laugh, comfort and love each other.  And as we encounter challenges, we must use our intellect and courage to meet the situation with clear thinking and perseverance.  This is what it means to be resolute, resourceful, resilient and yes, unstoppable.

We must also look at the larger picture.  It is a beautiful spring with mild days, a fresh breeze, no traffic, less pollution, and even a hint of summer to come.  This reminds us that “this, too, shall pass.”  We will survive.  We just have to seize this moment and really live in it, really embrace it.  The day-to-day grind has been altered, and people are awakening to what family and community really mean.  People are finding creative ways to spend time together and bridge distances through social media so family members living elsewhere are not alone.  Teachers and parents are taking shared responsibility for educating children.  Across the nation, people are finding inspiration to create and express themselves artistically in ways never imagined in our pre-COVID-19 lives.

We must continue to be unselfish and look out for one another.  We must maintain our social distancing but never lose our humanity.  We must, as the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, tell us, love our dear neighbor and be the light in the world, even when darkness and difficult circumstance threaten.  It is our mission to stand tall in this difficult time; this is our moment in history to make a difference.

I look forward to helping you finish the semester strong as we anticipate the changing seasons, the rebirth and resurrection of our lives, and the coming of a better day.

And so, here comes spring.