Look Up

I had just moved to Chicago and was rumbling through the Loop on the “L,” eager to explore my newly conquered realm, ready to make it my own. Chicago like most metropolises is iconic, and it is easy to feel as if one has entered a movie. An epic soundtrack began to play in my head as I descended from the train a hero. I quickly realized, however that those around me were living a script that they themselves did not write. Rushed and hurried, well-dressed and homeless, I envied the seeming simplicity of their outward lives at the same time that I pitied them. I continued through the crowds and began to wonder to myself, “am I the lead, or simply another extra?” The soles of my shoes scraped against the sidewalk as I broke the rhythm of constant busyness, and I felt very small. Chicago’s famed skyscrapers stared down at me directing the circus below with money, power, and anonymity, and I sensed how easy it would be to become lost in this world and to live for what those around me were chasing …but then I looked up and saw a great crucifix carved into the façade soaring before me. The stone image of Christ, sinews rippling with strength and pain, at once a part of the city and wholly separate, was calling me from the anonymity of the city and towards something greater, but not away from my brothers and sisters flowing around me. Like the crucifix of St. Peter’s in the Loop, God is embedded in the world and in our lives but we so easily miss His presence.

Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, life becomes a race with no clear finish line. This transition is so sudden that, oftentimes, by the time one stops to evaluate his life, he has sprinted so far down the most obvious course that turning back or even veering to the right or left is too horrifying to consider. Fear numbs us to hope, and life becomes a journey of desperation. I would suggest that the solution to this sense of desperation lies in simply being open to the presence of God.

As human beings, we first begin to understand ourselves in relation to our surroundings. Our experience of the natural world has convinced us of our superiority, and modern science has only strengthened this conviction. Advancements in technology and the study of our own evolution have set us apart from the world, and rather than striving to live peacefully in creation, we struggle to solve it. Modern man, crowned by his ingenuity, looks down on the Earth, and from this vantage point, there is rarely room for God.

However, Matthew 6:25-34, read with a sincere heart, questions this confidence in humanity:

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat (or drink), or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they? Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span? Why are you anxious about clothes? Learn from the way the wild flowers grow. They do not work or spin. But I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was clothed like one of them. If God so clothes the grass of the field, which grows today and is thrown into the oven tomorrow, will he not much more provide for you, O you of little faith? So do not worry and say, “What are we to eat?” or “What are we to drink?” or “What are we to wear?” All these things the pagans seek. Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom (of God) and his righteousness, and all these things will be given you besides. Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil.¹

Humanity distinguishes itself from the rest of creation by self-perceived resourcefulness, and the ability to solve problems. Our gifts and talents are remarkable, but plants and animals problem solve in their own way. These characteristics describe us, but they fail to address the great questions that lie within us, which keep us up at night. Perhaps what makes man unique is not any superiority, but his anxiousness over whom he is and how he should live. Do we dare look at the birds of the sky or the lilies of the field? Do we really live our life as if there was more to it than food or clothing, more than stocks and bonds? Humankind has learned to soar through the clouds next to the birds, but would we not trade all of the marvels of our technology to fly with them and leave our worries on the ground below? Throughout human existence we have carried our worries with us, and the ruins deteriorating across the globe, all of our pyramids and temples have done nothing to lighten them. Under our human burdens, it is easy to feel lost, like I did that day in Chicago, but Matthew’s message of hope tempts us to have faith in God.

Julia Marchemain struggles to accept faith in Evelyn Waugh’s novel, Brideshead Revisited. Stretched between her Catholic upbringing and her chosen life that has led her from it, Julia yearns for the gift of faith, if not for herself, for her child:

Do you know last year, when I thought I was going to have a child, I’d decided to have it brought up Catholic? I hadn’t thought about religion before; I haven’t since; but just at that time, when I was waiting for the birth, I thought, “that’s one thing I can give her. It doesn’t seem to have done me much good, but my child shall have it.” It was odd, wanting to give something one had lost oneself.²

Even though she has not been able to embrace God at every moment, she knows, she senses, she understands the human need for Him, the human emptiness that only He fills. More than simply Catholicism or religion, faith is the gift she wants for her child, yet she seems to struggle with stepping towards God, neither controlling nor understanding the source of her desire. In this passage, Waugh illustrates the crucial complication of faith: in order to choose faith, we must also accept gift of faith. We cannot build and maintain faith through human actions, as we would an automobile. Faith is not to be fixed. At some point, we must step back and recognize God’s workings in our lives.

At twenty-four, my young life is harder than I ever imagined. I wake up every morning with the desire for something more than the worries and anxieties of daily life. But on days like this today, when I sob in my neighborhood coffee shop doubting what I have written on these pages, somehow through the tears, I can see God’s hand clearly in my life. Such moments are the gift of faith that gives me the courage to actively choose faith and seek the Kingdom of God. I cannot convince the reader to have faith in a god he does not know, but like St. Matthew, I wish to tempt you to do what I did that day in Chicago. When you feel lost in this world, pause and look up.

1 New American Bible. 1991.

2 Evelyn Waugh. Brideshead Revisited. Every Man’s Library. New York: Knopf, 1993. 233.