Although today is Saint Patrick’s Day and I have a special interest in him, (and I hope he has one in me!) today’s reflection will not be on either the Irish or on snakes. Instead, I have a question for you: When was the last time you experienced total darkness, total physical darkness? Some never have. It’s hard to do. Around here, there’s usually enough glow from Houston’s lights even the night sky is not completely dark.
If you’re a spelunker, you may have come close to experiencing absolute darkness. If you’ve gone into caves in west-central Texas or in other parts of the country, maybe the guide gave you the chance to really be in the dark by turning out the lights for a few moments. For some, this experience of total darkness can be very shattering. Most of us fear being in the dark. We want to escape into the light.
It seems appropriate, then, to begin our reflection on today’s gospel reading by focusing on a sense of physical darkness, of being surrounded or overtaken by darkness. Today’s reading is John’s record of Jesus’ response to Nicodemus. You’ll recall Nicodemus was a Pharisee who came to Jesus in the dark of night to question him about the signs Jesus was performing and to verify God was with Jesus.
Jesus gives him a response about the need to be begotten of water and spirit. But, like us, Nicodemus was puzzled by the answer. So Jesus goes on. We heard his second answer in today’s gospel, a reading that focuses on the light which comes into the world.
It seems to me each of us is somewhat like Nicodemus. We approach Jesus and ask for an explanation of the signs he gives us in our life. We seem to recognize we are in a spiritual darkness and want to know how we can get ourselves out of it. What can we do to make the darkness go away? We are held captive by that darkness. Our captivity is much like that of the Israelites of the first reading for today. In this reading from Second Chronicles, there’s a summary of all of the actions which led to their captivity in Babylon for seventy years.
We also heard about how they were released. Their freedom came about, not by anything they did, but rather because of God’s gift to them. God inspired King Cyrus, who was a pagan, to release them. The Israelites were freed through God’s mercy and his intervention. Their freedom came through their cooperation with God’s gift of release and not through what they did to deserve his gift of freedom.
In his letter to the Ephesians, Saint Paul, in the second reading, reminds the Ephesians (and us) of the same thing. He says: “God is rich in mercy; because of his great love for us he brought us to life with Christ when we were dead in sin. … It is owing to (God’s) favor that salvation is yours through faith. This is not your doing; it is God’s gift; neither is it a reward for anything you have accomplished.”
And this brings us back to John’s gospel for today. John reminds us: “God did not send the son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.” At this point, we might well ask: Well, what happened then? If Jesus came to save us and not condemn us, why are things in such a mess? Why am I still trapped in the dark? If I fear the darkness, why can I not escape into the light?
Jesus seems to have a puzzling answer to this question. He seems to suggest that, while I may fear physical darkness, I do not fear spiritual darkness! He says people “ … loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were wicked. Everyone who practices evil hates the light, he does not come near it for fear his deeds will be exposed.” In other words, this darkness seems to be of my own doing, my own creation, if you will. Just as the actions of the Israelites led to their captivity in Babylon, my own actions lead to my captivity by a spirit of darkness.
Yes, it would seem we each, unwittingly perhaps, make our own darkness, our own spiritual darkness. Our darkness does not come from God but rather it comes from our own actions. God has created the light. He wants us to share in that light. This light is his gift to us. But we reject this gift. We continue to hide in the darkness of our own making.
When you were a child, did you ever play hide-and-seek? Did you ever hide in a dark corner, hoping not to be found, yet wanting to be found? Do we still play hide-and seek with God, hiding in a dark corner? Wanting him to find us, and yet scrunching back, afraid for some reason we will be found. Somehow, we seem to believe that, if God really finds us, we will no longer be loved. We have a problem loving ourselves and think God has the same problem.
We want God to find us, but we are reluctant to find either ourselves or God. We all have this confusing push and pull. How many times when I’m feeling blue, down and out, I seem to revel in it. I want to stay there. I want someone to feel sorry for me and to try to pull me out of my moodiness. And yet, deep inside, I recognize it is my own action, my own choice which is imprisoning me in my foul mood. To get out of it, I need to do nothing but let go.
But letting go is often the hardest action of all. We believe we must do something. We want to free ourselves by fighting back rather than by accepting the freedom God gives us freely. Jesus, however, reminds us: flesh begets flesh, the actions of this world result in the things of this world. At the same time, spirit begets spirit. Our attitude of being free results in the actuality of our freedom.
What does this mean, personally? It means I must focus on those attitudes which bind me, which keep me a captive, which lead me to remain in the dark. First of all, there is the action where I try to hide the errors I’ve committed. I hide them away in a dark corner of my mind: my recollections of what sins I’ve committed against others and against myself. I am reluctant to admit they ever existed. Part of it is my fear God won’t forgive me if he finds out about them, if I bring them into the light. Yet I need to recognize God is the light. He not only sees my errors, my sins, but has already forgiven them. I need to forgive myself. I need to examine the attitudes which keep me in the dark, afraid to admit my errors and accept God’s forgiveness.
There are other attitudes we also may need to look at in order to free ourselves from the dark corners of our game of hide-and-seek with God. It can be an attitude of the “poor-me,” an attitude that no one loves me, that I am unlovable. Or it can be an attitude that I need more things of this world in order to make me happy, that others have things I don’t have, either skills or talents I lack, or even material things, like a new car or a winter trip to Bermuda. Or it might be an attitude that I must continue to dislike someone near to me, because that’s the only way I can protect myself from further hurt. I must continue to hide in the dark, hide from others, from myself, and from God.
This season of Lent is my opportunity to let go. To let go of the attitudes that hold me a captive: a captive within the darkness I, myself, have created. Lent is like a long tunnel. Here we are at the Fourth Sunday in Lent. We are half-way through the tunnel which leads from Ash Wednesday to Easter. For some of us, we see the light at the end of the tunnel and want to hurry towards it. For others, we have stopped moving, the corner has not been turned, we have not yet seen the glow at the end of the tunnel. But there is still time. We can move on. We can turn the corner and continue our “journey to joy,” the joy of the Easter sunrise. Today’s word of God reassures us: The light is here; the time is now.
Fourth Sunday in Lent; March 17, 1985
2 Chron 36:14-16, 19-23; Eph 2:4-10; Jn 3:14-21