Loneliness
"So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to pleae God." 1 Corinthians 5: 9
This text wants to make all places the same, at least spiritually. Whether we are at home or away, we are to try to please God. There is a lot to be said about such constancy, especially because we are pretty the same psychological people whether in Bermuda or Brooklyn. Some of us know how to be lonely anywhere.
Loneliness is not something that other people, no matter their value or virtue, can resolve. Loneliness is not something that the ideal job can resolve. Bermuda, nice as it is, won't impact loneliness. Neither will Brooklyn or whatever name you give your hometown. Loneliness is unresolvable. It is the property of ancients and moderns, priests and peasants, kings and shepards, queens and chambermaids. These words will never be published in the AARP journal or in Woman's Day, each of which feature articles with titles like "The Seven
Steps to Conquor Loneliness." Loneliness is not conquerable. It is, however, manageable. We can learn to be alone but not lonely--and and even then loneliness will find its way to our souls. What is the antidote? It is to have a singular focus, a place to live outside of ourselves. Praise is as good a word as any for this.
Loneliness is what cars experience in the long term parking lot at LaGuardia, or what a pitcher feels when he throws a wild ball or what a son feels the day he realizes perhaps he never knew his father. Loneliness is what a mother feels watching her son play a national championship and lose by one point. Fully aware that this is probably his last tournament. Loneliness is the quiet in the car as you drive him to the airport. Loneliness is a clock that lost its battery, a Detroit mechanic who can't learn computers. Loneliness is an island where none of the ferries run again until Monday.
If praise is the antidote, then what is praise? Praise is the ferry that comes to carry you home to the place you always wanted to be. It is being more connected to God than you are to any human or human experience. It is knowing that no tournament is one's last, and finally, that tournaments matter less than we imagine. Praise is being of service, with the joy a car feels when it is liberated from LaGuardia or a mechanic knows when he fixes a car the old fashioned way. Loneliness is ineviatable--and praise is possible as a sidekick in it and through it.
Lose me in praise rather than in myself, great God, whether I am home or away. Amen.
Donna Schaper is Senior Minister, Judson Memorial Church, New York, New York.
| 
