ubi caritas

i am sure i have not been the only one here, in this place, and at any rate this is not the first time: those moments when one has been assigned motives so far removed from what was in one's heart; the sort of thing that sort of makes one doubt one's sanity: am i really such a cruel person and not even aware of it? am i so ignorant of and out of tune with myself that i secretly meant such viciousness without even knowing? now, i will admit that the subconscious is a sticky, messy, often dark and even disturbing thing, and i think it highly likely that many of the things we do contain less than pure motives that we are unaware of, even actively ignoring. i have been there, in that place, for sure. but then there are those other times: times when the subconsicous, or even conscious, of the person offended one eventually learns to be colored with resentment, anger, unforgiveness, jealousy, or just plain past hurst of which one is completley unaware. if one's own emotional history and subconscious are sticky issues, how much more those of another person altogether! especially those with whom we are thrown in contact in varying degrees of choice: co-workers, roommates, inlaws, neighbors, parishes . . . all the myriad human contacts so unavoidable in daily life. or, as the great, inimitable Lord Peter and Harriet Vane articulate: "It's the pressure of other people's personalities that does the mischief." "Yes. Best intentions no security. You may say you won't interfere with another persons's soul, but you do--merely by existing. The snag about it is the practical difficulty, so to speak, of not existing. I mean, here we all are, you know, and what are we to do about it?" what, indeed! the Christian answer, of course, is charity--that blessed mis-understood, mis-applied, over-used word that can itself at this point in history have the sound of clanging bells or crashing cymbals. oh, Lord, when everything seems so dry and overly-familiar, how does one make a point? flannery o'connor would say through violence, through shock value, but that is not my forte, at least not in the way that o'connor means, and i much fear that it would come off wrong altogether. and which is harder, do you suppose: to acknowledge one's own lack of charity, or to know that one's self is being judged from other motives? of course, it is always easier to see the lack of charity than its presence, especially in other people towards one's self. oh, poor self, poor ego, poor id! our jealously-guarded pride suffers more and more greatly the more that we cling to it, and sacrificing our pride, especially when we know we are being judged unjustly, is unpleasant to say the least. at any rate, if understanding charity is hard enough, accepting the lack of it with humility, and distinguishing how it guides justice and mercy, is far beyond my capacity at 4 a.m. after two nights without sleep. but since i couldn't sleep, i figured the least i could do was attempt to relieve some of the internal pressure by writing it off, which is what this poor old blog is for, in the first place. amen.