PASS IT ON #68

The Mercy of Refusals

by a Madonna House Staff Worker

“My desires are many and my cry is pitiful but ever didst Thou save me by hard refusals; and this strong mercy has wrought into my life through and through. Day by day Thou art making me worthy of the simple great gifts that Thou gavest to me unasked…Day by day Thou art making me worthy of Thy full acceptance by rescuing me ever and anon from the perils of weak, uncertain desire.” -- Gitanjali No. 14, Rabindranath Tagore

How many of us could repeat Tagore’s poem again and again as we see God’s plan unfolding in our lives? Truly each of us could write a personal salvation history in which the Redemption hasn’t taken place “once and for all” but is taking place day by day. Many of us, however, do not begin to notice the mystery that is thus at work in our lives until commitment to a life calling—be it marriage, priesthood, lay apostolate, or religious life—forces us to face ourselves as we never did before.

It is then that we perhaps admit for the first time that we did not merit such a wonderful husband or wife or vocation, that we are not worthy to change the bread and wine into the divine food, that we dare not preach the Gospel of Christ which we so inadequately live.

At this moment of commitment we are finally ready to enter willingly into God’s school, which we have been attending only grudgingly until now. Now we recognize how merciful God was when the person we thought we loved left us, when the plans for the ideal city we wanted to build crumbled into dust. We see how merciful God was when we were lonely at parties, and when our plans to go abroad fell through and we went on a retreat instead!

Each of these “refusals” on God’s part caused pain; they broke open the shell that enclosed our understanding. Thus we were free to seek goodness where before we sought only charm. We were free to look for reality where before we were escaping into dreams. These refusals of mercy freed us to seek truth instead of illusion, to struggle for love instead of popularity. In other words, to turn to God who is goodness, reality, truth and love.

God is infinite. This means that because we are small creatures, we have only begun to accept him, just as the little chipmunk, scurrying along one of the trees on the rim of the Grand Canyon, is only beginning to take in the beauty and splendor of this divine work. And just as the chipmunk is not awed by the beauty and immensity of the place in which he lives, we too are allowed to discover only as much of God as we can take in.

If then we continue to let God direct our course, we too may say with Khalil Gibran, not “God is in my heart” but “I am in the heart of God.” Since we are little, we are often narrow, though the two need not go together! We are tempted again and again to protect our wounds with privacy instead of healing them through openness. We limit ourselves to selected friends instead of expanding our hearts to include the love of all our brothers.

Therefore, instead of saying to God, “Only let me make my life simple and straight, like a flute of reed for Thee to fill with music,” we wail, “My debts are large, my failures great, my shame secret and heavy; when I come to ask for my good I quake in fear lest my prayers be granted” (Gitanjali No. 28, Tagore).

This is our natural reaction, because we are aware that that “training is the most intricate which leads to the utter simplicity of a tune.” That is why each day we must allow God to redeem us once more through the mercy of his refusals.

— Adapted from Coming Home