Dark places

     Darkness has many connotations. Dark places seem foreboding and are not usually places that we want to enter into and yet we find ourselves there no matter what we do in life. I was thinking of Jesus' time in the tomb. That is a dark place, almost the kind of thing nightmares are made of.  I know of several movies with a scene when someone is locked inside a crypt or worse, inside a coffin alive. 

      There are several hallmarks of being in dark places and oddly enough one of them is that they are often closely related to thin spaces, places where you can easily feel God at hand. I don't mean that because death might be close at hand and you might be close to meeting your maker either. No, there is great transformative power in that darkness.

       When I think back on my darkest times in life I can easily single out the time that I was coming to terms with being gay. I was a Dad, a husband, clergy and had a professional career of over 25 years in the same place, well respected and loved on many fronts. The contemplation of the fact that I might be gay was darkness to me. Tipping over the apple cart and coming out was total darkness. Even coming to terms with being gay presented me with seemingly no good solutions that make the darkness of the situation seem more intense and foreboding. No course of action for me at the time would yield a good answer. No matter which way I turned there was darkness. Struggling, faith, placing my foot forward and moving in and beyond the darkness yielded love, enormous possibilities, more love and joy.

          One of the things that I realize is how darkness plays a role in so many transformative and growth experiences. I know a missionary Priest who will be giving his Easter vigil sermon tonight. Invariably he points to how we as humans are like being in cocoon.  It is not without a great deal of struggle and perhaps a great deal of literal darkness in that cocoon that a magnificent and beautiful butterfly is born. It is a beautiful image and one placed around us in this created world so that God's is revealed and so we can see what faith can do and what great things God has in store for us. And it started with a struggle in darkness.

       Today could easily seem like one of those very dark days. It was for the Apostles and certainly seems so for Jesus, locked in the tomb with a giant stone rolled across the front. Today we are neither here nor there. We have passed through Good Friday, Jesus has died and yet we are not at Easter yet either. Another dark place. We eagerly await Easter because we know what is coming.

      If it is with the knowledge of the Resurrection, faith in God and the examples She sets forth before us in this world that we can boldly enter into dark places and know that there is light when we think there is none left. We are people of faith and filled with the potential to be unique and magnificent butterflies.  

     Darkness is not our comfort zone but it can be entered into and even embraced because we know that it is a transitional place and we will rise to great things by our struggle. We are promised the bliss of eternal happiness with God.  But for right now. darkness.