Now, as you know (or maybe not) I’m currently a novice in the Third Order of Franciscans and am just entering my fourth year in the novitiate. I’m not rushing it. I have this sort of inbuilt barometer if you like that tells me (sometimes) when I’m on the right track. The posh word is discernment I guess, tho,’ to be honest, I would never attest to having any sort of hotline to the divine. The everyday word is intuition.
It’s about what feels right.
I should have been professed this year but it didn’t feel right. What with my mum being so ill and everything, I didn’t want to switch my attention and energy away from her and focus it on myself instead. Not right. Also, a teeny weeny niggly bit of me wanted a bit more from my discernment process. Like a gut ‘Yep!!’ inside when I think about being professed rather than, well, I’ve completed all ten of my novitiate notes, so let’s go for it.
Whenever I’ve wanted to know about anything, I’ve read a book. This is maybe a bit counter intuitive to Francis who wasn’t much of a reader and generally was cautious around too many priests having too much learning, I think. Although they did join him in droves. But I figured he wouldn’t mind if part of my gut-process was to do more reading and so I embarked on a short course by Richard Rohr to try and bring my deliberations from my head to my heart.
And it’s working.
One of the things which has spoken to me loudly in the last couple of weeks is this concept of ‘the scandal of the particular.’ Trust me, I’m no theologian, but I’ll attempt a brief rundown. Basically, that the love of God is showing itself all the time in something specific such as loving one person or part of creation – this leaf, this tree, this stone, this dog. And people too – the bloke up the road who revs his motor bike at 6 am every morning, the embarrassing uncle who shows off at family parties, your neighbour in church who talks through the prayers.
An early follower of Francis, John Duns Scotus called this idea of the particular ‘this-ness’ which I think sums it up nicely. The gateway to God is through this-ness – the specific rather than the universal which is preoccupied with big theories and dogmatic theologies.
That’s Theology 101. You’re welcome.
And we’re thinking now as we enter Advent about how God shows this universal love in the specific of the Incarnation and we see God in Jesus as a helpless baby, willing to give everything in his powerlessness. That's the 'scandal of the particular' as explained by Duns Scotus, that this inauspicious entry to the world lead ultimately to the final humiliation of the Cross.
You know, I see the ‘scandal of the particular’ played out most forcefully and eloquently in my dear mum’s care home. The carers – saints every one of them are constantly soothing, feeding, cleaning, with never a word of complaint or irritation. My mum was wondering to me today about who helped her when she woke in the still watches of the night. I told her that the carers came to her and helped her back to bed. ‘Oh,’ she said wonderingly. ‘I thought they were angels.’
She wasn’t far wrong. They are angels. As St Teresa of Avila said, ‘Christ has no body but yours, no hands, no feet on earth but yours.’ The particular. No great treatise on the state of the NHS or the clinical diagnosis of dementia. Just one person there for another.
Sometimes my mum is upset when she’s with me. She already lives in eternity as she has no real sense of place or time. She wants to go to bed even though it’s 11 am in the morning. Her world can be a bewildering and frightening place. But the one thing guaranteed to calm and sooth her is the name of Jesus. That particular name. I say the name of Jesus to her and I see her face break into relief as she sinks back in the chair and relaxes.
And I recall that when I was a kid, she would sing choruses. One of her favourites was, ‘O how I love the Saviour’s name. O how I love the Saviour’s name. O how I love the Saviour’s name. The sweetest name on earth.’
Jesus. The particular. The sweetest name on earth.
That is beautiful Eirene, thank you for sharing your heart.