Monday 29 September 2014

Meditation: THE WAY by John de Gruchy

THE WAY


Acts 9:1-11
Luke 24:13-20, 28-32
"While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them...When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.  Then they recognized him and he vanished from their sight."

There is nothing more shattering than the phone call that tells you someone you love is missing or has unexpectedly died.  Isobel and I received such a call one Sunday afternoon in February 2010, the day Steve drowned in the Mooi River.  We were by no means the first or the last to receive such a call, and some of you are amongst that number.  It happens time and again, as it happened to Tom at the beginning of  the movie "The Way," which some of you have seen, and which the Congregational ministers on retreat watched last night.

Tom, an ophthalmologist in California was playing golf when the call came from the Spanish police.  His son Daniel had died while starting the ancient Camino or pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela.  Tom immediately sets off for Spain to identify the Dan's body, and decides that he is going to walk Camino himself to complete the journey that his son had failed to do.  He is a lapsed Catholic, totally unprepared for what lies ahead of him. But using Dan's hiking gear, and carrying his ashes to sprinkle along the path, Tom sets off on the Way to deal with his grief. Along the way he encounters other pilgrims.  But he is in no mood for company and brusquely pushes them away, keeping his story of grief to himself.  But he cannot shake off Joost, an overweight Dutchman who is hiking to lose weight, and in an unthinking moment he tells Joost why he is on "The Way."  Then there is Sarah, a blonde Canadian who is escaping an abusive husband and hopes to stop smoking when she reaches Santiago  de Compostela.  And finally, Jack, a quirky Irish writer suffering from "writer's block" and a perpetual hangover.  His hope is that he will be able to write again. 

Tom's need is obviously the most greatest.  He is grieving for the son he has lost, and wants to be left alone to face the road by himself.  But he can't because the way ahead is full of other people.  You cannot escape people even if you migrate to the Karoo or climb Mount Everest.  Nor can Tom escape the presence of his son who, like the living dead, keeps on appearing to help his dad find his way to healing.  The other three companions have less important reasons for their journey  Losing weight, stopping smoking, being able to write again -- none compare with the gravity of Tom's.  Yet, as they travel together, and begin to share their stories they become a community of fellow-travellers who share a common humanity.  
They laugh, cry, drink wine and eat bread together.  And as they do so we sense that the reasons they give for their pilgrimage are only symptoms of a deeper need. Their lives have lost meaning.  They are seeking for healing.   We can all identify with them because their stories are those of people we know and care about, they could well be our own story even though each of us has a different story to tell. 

"The Way" reminds me of the "Wizard of Oz." Dorothy, a young girl from Kansas is on a journey of self-discovery. Along the way she meets and is accompanied by a scarecrow searching for a brain, a tin man who needs a heart, and a cowardly lion who wants to find courage.  These are not just mythical characters, they are people we know, they are you and me. The first great account of such a journey in English was Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Not many of his pilgrims are pious or religious, some are simply rogues and others don't know why they are on the road.  But we hear their tales we begin to identify with them, for each is a human being like us in search for meaning and healing even when they do not know it. The story is, in fact, universal and perennial. 

The first followers of Jesus were known as "followers of the Way."  When Saul set off for Damascus hell-bent on capturing and killing them, he was, so Luke tells, seeking to find "any who belonged to the Way, men or women."  The early followers of Jesus not just believers who talked the talk, they were travellers who walked the walk.  Anybody can believe that Jesus is the way, the truth and the life,  but we only discover what that means when we set off and travel along the way ourselves, alone and yet in company with others.  We can read about, talk about and discuss the pilgrim way to Santiago de Compostela, but only those actually set off on the journey find what they are seeking.  Yet we are all on a journey, and each of us has a story to tell about hurts needing healing, sins needing forgiveness, hopes searching for fulfillment.  "The Way" is a mirror of the human journey, our journey, for all of us at some time have to deal with sorrow and grief, with sadness and loss.  

But to find our way it matters how we walk the Way.  It is often a lonely path, but made more lonely because we push others away, we do not want to talk about our story, it is too personal and painful.  We can sympathize with Tom, and we can learn from the experience of those whom he shunned.  As companions on the way we dare not intrude into the space of those who need solitude.  We have to keep a respectful distance and a knowing silence even when we draw near to embrace.  Yet we also feel for those whom Tom pushed away.  For we are all fellow travellers each wanting to be embraced even as we want to embrace others.  But on the way miracles happen. This disparate group of unlikely fellow-travellers begin to share their tears and their laughter, they share a glass of wine and break bread together, they become a ragbag community of pilgrims helping each other along the way which leads to the cathedral of St. James the apostle who bore witness to Jesus.  For the way does not lead nowhere, it leads to the one who is the Way. 

Is this not really what draws people to travel the Way, perhaps even without knowing it? There is another companion along the path, hidden from sight though present to us in those who travel with us.  The one who draws pilgrims to himself in Santiago travels with them like Tom's son Dan who is sometimes evident but more often not.  We might not always or even often recognize him as we travel, we might not see him in our companions.  But whether we are on the pilgrim journey to Santiago de Compostela, or Canterbury, or Volmoed, or simply on our way to work or home, we may be assured that there is someone else walking beside us, listening to our stories and sharing his own. as he did on the road to Emmaus. Slowly but surely he draws us into his embrace, giving us life and hope: 

"While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them...When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.  Then they recognized him and he vanished from their sight."


John de Gruchy
Volmoed 25 September 2014





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