"Even in the midst of these . . ."

I am encouraged to post by Rickey’s recent posting. I mean to be brief and casual, but sincere. One might be surprised—I have been—that English professors do not get to read books as often as the job title would suggest. But with summer in full swing and grades and committees set aside for a little while, I am reveling in books once again, a sign of a calling, I think.

Most recently, I have read Beatrice and Virgil, How People Learn, Boxers & Saints (a fascinating and moving “study”—in verbal and visual form—of empathy and history), and, finishing just today, The End of Suffering: Finding Purpose in Pain. The End of Suffering is an essay (“assay,” he suggests in a prologue) by the poet Scott Cairns, whose poetry I've shared here before and who responded graciously by sharing another poem. I want to share just a few short passages.

Early on, Cairns writes that “the hard way is pretty much the only way most of us ever manage to learn anything” (11). I’ll have to ponder that. I’m inclined to accept it, though I’m afraid my students might not. It seems largely true in the spiritual life, at any rate.

Later into the book, he writes, “Our specifically Christian undertaking is decidedly not one of transcending. It is, rather, the intentional reinspiriting of the body and its lowly matter—as manifested in the incarnation of Christ” (29). Amen.

Finally, still later, he writes, “Even in the midst of these, our over-busy, bustling, and distracted lives, even in our seasons of affliction and suffering, our deepest consolation lies in consciously experiencing our mystical membership in the body of Christ” (87). Amen and amen.