Gray Night of the Soul?

Praying in the Dark
I miss the days of adolescence when I was able to leave the house, unknown to my parents and go outside, in our ten acres of pine trees, and pray toward the sky. I would choose any group of three stars and believe they represented the Trinity. On retreats in adulthood, often held in rural areas, the night sky draws me all the same. When there happens to be a moon in the sky, that, I believe, is the face of God. It is a holy prayer in the darkness.
I now live deep within the city, without so much as a yard to wander in during the night, in silent contemplation. It was only recently that I realized, upon checking to see if it were raining, that I realized there was not much darkness in the night. I capture sunrises and sunset and cloud formations as I go about my coming in and going out. I have, without noticing, transferred my God-in-the-moon to God-in-the-clouds.
How that is deeply metaphorical is in this:
“Even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you”. Psalms 139:12
My darkness in the city, like my darkness in my spirit, is no longer the darkest dark. It is void of stars among the city lights. It is gray. It is pregnant with light behind it; it is in the rising sun hidden behind a group of clouds at daybreak, when the sun will rise above and burn the clouds away.
The night is not as dark as my melancholy spirit on an average day. It is not as dark at my present address than it was in my pines of adolescence. It is gray.
Gray is a combination of black and white, of day and night.
Gray is exactly where my spirit meets the Holy Spirit; or better, where my spirit meets the Holy Spirit given to me. The “darkness is not dark to You”. It’s not as dark to me, either.
When I long for the darkness of ages past, I am longing for a greater contrast in my spirit; I am longing to see the difference between the light and dark, ensuring myself of the presence of light; a process in my unique spirit.
Ergo, is my “dark night of the soul” now gray? And in that all encompassing grayness has not my spirit surrendered to the “Cloud of Unknowing”? Have I truly finally surrendered that my prayers, my connection to the God of all creation, now is a process in the way of the saints that is incomprehensible? And shouldn’t prayer BE incomprehensible, if in it, we indeed surrender completely?

10 January 2017

Author: revbaum

I manage issues of faith & politics with a dry sense of humor and my own unconventional perspective. I’m ordained, progressive and “woke”. I am a chaplain, health coach, spiritual director and pastor. View all posts by revbaum