Crisis of Faith/Crisis of
Love
by Fr. Thomas Keating
The Beginning of a New
Relationship with Christ
Pentecost is the feast of spiritual maturity. Few really relish this
feast or even have much idea of what it is all about. It presupposes a lot: some theology,
some knowledge of the liturgy, but mostly personal experience.
There is an analogy between growing up spiritually and the growing up
that takes place in the normal course of human life. In approaching adolescence and
adulthood, everyone seems to have to pass through a crisis. Extraordinary changes take
place around the time of puberty when a child is about to become an adolescent. Even
greater changes occur in adolescents as they approach maturity.
Jesus told us very clearly that, however mature we may be naturally, to
enter the Kingdom of God we have to become like little children. There is then a law of
growth in the life of grace.
Consider the picnic beside the Lake of
Tiberius. It is one of those
incidents, of which there are many in the period between Easter and Pentecost, in which we
are meant to see the disciples of the Lord coming of age. In their case, they had the
privilege of telescoping a lot of experience into a few days or weeks. They seem to pass
from infancy to spiritual maturity in fifty days. No doubt there was good reason in their
case for such an accelerated course. But experience seems to indicate that after the time
of the first Pentecost, it takes the best of Christians closer to fifty years.
In the scene we see Simon Peter gently repulsed. It was his custom to
treat Jesus in a rather free and easy manner. Here he leaps out of the boat, swims to the
shore, and comes running up to Jesus dripping wet. I do not know what he expected to hear
or receive, but he is told quietly to take it easy. There is no hurry. Breakfast is under
control. . . "Go and get a couple of the fish out of the big haul." And so he
goes to help the others who have brought the boat to shore and are counting up the
fish—one hundred fifty three in all. It must have taken quite a while to count them.
An aura of mystery fills this scene. No one dares ask the mysterious
person, "Who are you?" knowing that it is the Lord. They are overawed by his
presence. It begins to dawn on them that something is different. They have to keep in the
background and let the Lord do what he wants. It is up to him to take the initiative.
Their human way of dealing with him, the sensible relationship on which they had depended,
is coming to an end; and they do not know quite what to do. They have not learned as yet
any other way of communicating with him.
Finally he calls them: "Come and have breakfast."
They all sit down around the campfire he has prepared for them. He knew
how weary they were after the long night. There is every evidence of loving concern on his
part. And yet it is not the same. They cannot talk with him as freely as before. That is
the note which we are left with: a distinct change is taking place in the relationship of
the disciples with the Master.
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The same kind of experience happened to Mary Magdalene in the cemetery
when Jesus appeared to her after his resurrection. She threw herself at his feet—or
was it into his arms? When this had gone on for a while, Jesus said, "Well now, stop
clinging to me! Don’t you realize that I am risen from the dead? There is something
different abut our relationship now. I am about to ascend to my Father and your Father. Go
and tell this to the disciples."
The former warm human relationship, something she has been used to, is
over. Gently he brings her around to realize that there is something different. She must
forge a new relationship with him based on the new degree of spiritual growth which his
resurrection has bestowed upon her and which his ascension is about to complete.
Finally there is Thomas who questioned the fact of Jesus’
resurrection. After seeing the risen Jesus in the flesh, he heard these paradoxical words
addressed to him: "You would have been far better off not to have seen me and to have
believed! You would have been so much happier! You would have grown up so much if only you
had accepted my resurrection inwardly on faith rather than outwardly on the basis of a
presence you can see and touch."
What took place in the souls of the disciples during those fifty days
between Easter and Pentecost is taking place in us. At some point in our spiritual growth
Jesus asks us to adjust ourselves to a new relationship with himself. Since this happens
without much warning, almost no one has any awareness of what is taking place when it
actually happens. It comes on gradually, slowly but surely. However, we can so
successfully distract ourselves from our interior life that we actually never make the
adjustment and never forge the new relationship Jesus asks of us. The whole process can
sort of drop out of our attention. Some people who have received a distinct gift for
prayer lose it, because at the time of this transition they surrender to excessive
activity, get fed up, or stumble over some obstacle to forging the new relationship.
One has to forge new relationships not only with Jesus, but with other
people. Most of us form dependencies on the external side of the spiritual life. This
often involves a great dependency on some one. Such a person may be the religious
superior, or pastor, or a much appreciated and loved confessor, spiritual director or
friend. But along comes this inevitable transition from childhood to adolescence, the
moment described in the Gospel incidents just mentioned. We may fail to make the
transition successfully through our own blindness and inability to accept good direction,
through the lack of any guidance at all, or because of bad advice.
Sometimes persons in this painful and perplexing situation, feeling
great dryness and consequently under considerable strain, are urged to distract themselves
in order to ease the anguish of searching for Christ in the darkness of faith. A spiritual
director should distinguish between somebody who is really in a severe depression through
natural causes, and someone who is going through this crisis in his or her spiritual
development and whose false values the Divine action is pulverizing. If persons who are
experiencing the latter are urged to take things too easy, they may lack the courage to
face this transition. If only they would persevere in prayer, they would pass into a new
freedom and liberty. Such a victory can only be bought at a great price, the death of
something: the death in this case of a superficial and self -centered spiritual life and
its relationships.
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How often people who have wonderful relationships with superiors,
pastors or spiritual directors run into some misunderstanding or other. Perhaps these
persons are entrusted with positions where they are expected, and have to have, a judgment
of their own. They begin to see a situation differently from their former spiritual
confidants and they get into a row. All of a sudden their former confidants look
different. They appear in all their human rags and tatters. It almost seems as if they
were acting improperly—something is wrong with their moral theology or sense of
social justice. And there is a crash! And these persons think that the wonderful
relationship has come to a complete end.
What needs to be done here is simply to realize that the old
relationship has indeed come to an end; that God wants it to come to an end; and that He
wants us to climb up to a new relationship based on a new growth, on a new maturity. On
the basis of this new growth all the facets of one’s life must progress. This is a
great struggle. Sometimes it may seem impossible. God inspires us, if we are faithful to
grace, to work it out.
Unfortunately, quite a few people do not work it out, but
turn—there is no other word for it—sour. They get bitter about the whole thing.
It is the old problem of the umbilical cord on the psychological plane. They feel
something is wrong when they start growing up. It was so nice and warm in the old
relationship, be it sensible consolation from Christ, be it a wonderful understanding with
the superior, or be it that consolation and encouragement that we had from our spiritual
director.
God has great sympathy for those who are going through this crisis in
their spiritual life. They do not know what is happening to them and tend to concentrate
on the disintegration of what they love, rather than on the real spiritual growth of which
they are becoming capable.
There are tragic situations where some people instead of growing up,
make up their minds that everybody is wrong. They may become permanently bitter or sour at
the moment when this transition is suggested to them. This is what may have happened to
Judas. He refused to grow up; he refused to pass on to a new and deeper relationship with
Christ.
Growing up is a great opportunity in spite of its hazards. If we look on
the bright side and are firmly convinced that it is normal to have to forge new
relationships, our crisis of faith will appear as a great invitation to go deeper into the
heart of Christ. The very transition makes it impossible for the former people we counted
on to help us. Part of growing up is to become independent—not of everybody, but of
those on whom we are too dependent—so that we may depend completely on the Holy
Spirit. That is what spiritual maturity is.
More information can
be obtained by reading the book Crisis of Faith/Crisis of Love by Fr. Thomas Keating. It is offered in our
bookstore.
