For Nora

“And in this he showed me a little thing, the quantity of a hazel nut, lying in the palm of my hand, as it seemed. And it was as round as any ball. I looked upon it with the eye of my understanding, and thought, ‘What may this be?’ And it was answered generally thus, ‘It is all that is made.’ I marveled how it might last, for I thought it might suddenly have fallen to nothing for littleness. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and ever shall, for God loves it. And so have all things their beginning by the love of God.

In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second that God loves it. And the third, that God keeps it.”

-Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love

Matt Helm is a well known knife maker and designer from Texas. His designs are often produced in collaboration with Dauntless Manufacturing. Dauntless Manufacturing has also partnered with Wolf Forty to produce the SEAF, a knife that I own and have previously reviewed. However, knives are not the motivating factor in this write-up. This past December, Matt lost his two year old daughter, Eleanor, to RSV and Pneumonia.

I cannot tell you why little Eleanor’s death has affected me so. I don’t know Matt personally. And, I only learned of Eleanor through Matt’s Instagram posts sharing her ordeal in mid-December. But, both Eleanor and Matt’s response to her illness have stirred in me profound reflection and subsequently an immense enrichment of faith. Consequently, I want to share my thoughts on Eleanor, Matt, and the sacredness of suffering.

It is natural to wonder why God would permit such a thing. Where was He while little Eleanor was suffering in the hospital? And, not only in the hospital, but in all of her days prior as Eleanor also suffered from epilepsy? Where was He while Matt sat bedside, bible in hand, praying for improvement? For Matt and his family to then have Eleanor taken away during Christmastide, where was He? And, what terrible irony. Sadness, anger, and resentment are the natural response. While Matt may be feeling all of that now, in the midst of his daughter’s suffering he deliberately chose to responded differently. “Our burden is light,” he shared.

As a Catholic, I would argue that as Eleanor passed away, God was in the same place He was when He watched His own son die. God did not kill Eleanor, nor was God absent. You see, death is a peculiar thing. It is incompatible with God. God does not want to see us die and He would be the first to acknowledge that death is a terrible thing. And, while death is all but certain and natural to our world, it remains unnatural to us. Why might that be?

If you take a moment to ponder on the spiritual significance of the story of Adam and Eve, you will realize that we were not meant to be as intimate with God as we are now. Adam and Eve were made in the image of God. They were meant to tend to the Garden and hold dominion over the Earth. When Adam and Eve ate of the tree all of that changed. What was given to them was lost. And, they were sent out to lead lives of hardship. Experiencing death was one of many hardships. While the story of Adam and Eve is allegorical, history provides God’s answer to our sin and to our death. God’s response is to die Himself.

If it weren’t for sin, Christ would not have become one of us. In becoming human, Christ makes us more Holy. And, it is through Christ’s sacrifice that we are allowed to participate in the Holy Trinity. Despite what Adam and Eve lost, God’s offer to them is elevated in Christ. Through our suffering we are rewarded and brought closer to God. Every pain we have is Christ’s pain, and every pain of Christ is our pain.  Therefore, when you encounter suffering, you can’t just stop at saying, “What a terrible thing.” It is a terrible thing with incredible meaning.

So, let’s ask ourselves those questions again. Where was God while little Eleanor was suffering in the hospital? He was on the cross. Where was He while Matt sat bedside praying for his daughter? He too was watching His child, Jesus Christ, die. Why Christmas? What better time is there to enter our Father’s arms? You see, the death of Eleanor is the death of Christ. We die with Eleanor, Eleanor dies with Christ, and Christ dies with us.  We all die together and we wake up in our Father’s arms.

Blessed are we all to wake up as happy thieves in paradise.

I would like to ask you to pray for the Helm family. I also want to inform you that Dauntless Manufacturing is holding a raffle for Matt Helm and his family. The hope is to cover the cost of incurred medical expenses and all other related expenses for the family. the drawing is tomorrow, January 20th. There have been other knife & tool makers that have made generous material donations. These donations have been added to the prize pot. I implore you to buy a ticket.

God bless!

“There is a place called ‘heaven’ where the good here unfinished is completed; and where the stories unwritten, and the hopes unfulfilled, are continued. We may laugh together yet.”

- J. R. R. Tolkien, Letter to his son, Michael

Death

 
“Mom says death is as natural as birth, and it’s all part of the life cycle.
She says we don’t really understand it, but there are many things we don’t understand, and we just have to do the best we can with the knowledge we have.

I guess that makes sense.”
— Bill Watterson, Calvin & Hobbes, #2

On Friday, June 9th, my father-in-law passed away. His name was John. He had been ill for many years, and was cared for by his wife and children. In the weeks leading up to his death, I had been thinking of John and his wife. I thought of his struggles and her monumental efforts. In my contemplation, I kept returning to a line from Paul’s Second Epistle to Timothy. Just before Paul mentions finishing the race, he says, “I have been poured out like a drink offering.” Biblically, this line served as an allusion to offerings of wine that had to accompany every sacrifice under the old covenant. An offering was not considered complete until the drink offering was given. In my regard, John was poured out like drink offering. And, so was his wife. What a sight that was to see. While I’m sure it is now difficult for his wife and children to see past the misery of the last five years, as a witness I can only testify to the beauty of it all.

Death provides the greatest spiritual healing we can receive, not only for the one dying but for those who are closest as well. I saw God at work in the worst of it all. I saw His work again in a conversation between John’s children on the night of his burial. The experience of their father’s illness, deterioration, and death somehow served to filter their souls. It allowed them to let go of all the grievances and resentments they held on to about their father. It revealed and elevated the love they had for him, that was buried under years of weighted baggage. I have not seen them as close or as unified as they are now.

A week after John’s death, his wife sent me an article regarding a short story I shared with her a number of years ago. Her timing imparted holy bliss. The short story in question was, “Leaf by Niggle,” written by J. R. R. Tolkien. It’s about a man who, like most, is not prepared for his own death. Niggle, an artist, spends much of his life focused on a painting of a tree that he never finishes. He often procrastinates and ignores his other duties. Upon his death, he finds himself in an institution where he is assigned never ending tasks. In this purgatorial environment, and over an unknown period of time, he learns to embrace humility. He eventually moves on to the, “next stage,” where he is brought to a field. He quickly realizes it is the land of his painting. He sees the tree he spent much of his life painting fully manifested. He sees the forests and mountains in the distance. Overjoyed, he begins to cultivate the land. And, after he finishes his work, he decides to walk and press onward toward the mountains. The mountains serving as a biblical image of man ascending to communion with God.

Like Niggle, John was prone to neglect duties that weren’t of his own parochial concern. As a lawyer, he excelled and helped others with a moral fortitude I have yet to see in anyone else. He was a gatherer. He was full of wit and had a sense of humor most men would envy. However, as a husband and father, he struggled to fulfill more meaningful obligations. In spite of this failing, this man who was bedridden and without faculty, was at the height of his power. Through his suffering, his family has been healed. The bitterness has settled. I am confident that he is now walking toward those mountains, and that he is bound for glory. We can only hope to follow him.

“For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.”
— Paul, 2 Timothy 4: 6-8

Church & State

Those who created our country—the Founding Fathers and Mothers—understood that there is a divine order which transcends the human order. They saw the state, in fact, as a form of moral order and felt that the bedrock of moral order is religion.

The Mayflower Compact began with the words, “In the name of God, amen.” The Declaration of Independence appeals to “Nature’s God” and the “Creator” and “the Supreme Judge of the world.” Congress was given a chaplain, and the oaths of office are oaths before God.

James Madison in the Federalist Papers admitted that in the creation of our Republic he perceived the hand of the Almighty. John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, warned that we must never forget the God from whom our blessings flowed.

George Washington referred to religion’s profound and unsurpassed place in the heart of our nation, quite directly in his Farewell Address in 1796.

Seven years earlier, France had erected a government that was intended to be purely secular. This new government would be grounded on reason rather than the law of God. By 1796, the French Revolution had known the Reign of Terror.

And, Washington voiced reservations about the idea that there could be a wise policy without a firm moral and religious foundation. He said, “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.”

RONALD REAGAN

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

The reason the United States of America is special is because its whole structure is predicated upon a foundational truth, that our rights are not given to us by the government or other people, they are given to us by God. Therefore, it is the job of the government to protect and ensure those rights. At the core of all of our founding documents, is the belief that we are endowed by our Creator. This is significant, because it is not the government, the king, or the oligarchy that determines what our rights are. Yet, the founding documents make no determination as to who God is, or what god you have to pray to. The documents remain free from any specific establishment of religion.

In saying that our rights come from God, with no respect to an establishment of religion, comes the freedom to not have religion. However, to the atheist, I ask, how do you determine and claim those unalienable rights once you remove God from the equation? Once you remove God from the equation of America, the duty falls back to man, to King George III. You see, God serves as a fail-safe mechanism, which prohibits the government from making determinations about what you can or cannot do with your own life. Therefore, according to the founders, to really be for America, you have to allow for the existence of God. You don’t have to worship God, nor do you have to be religious. But, if there is no allowance for the fail-safe, all of it goes away.

By virtue of this principle we say, “One nation under God,” and, “In God we trust.” In saying this, God does not become a working entity within the government, but serves solely as a protector of our rights. As a believing person, I have no problem with this. As a former atheist, I can appreciate how this statement may irk non-believers. But, why? If you think of God as simply a protective measure for the society in which you say you believe in, a society that you think is good, then why do you take issue with this founding principle?

Understand this, America doesn’t exist if government is the ultimate authority. Think on the etymology of the word “worship.” It is old english, stemming from “worth-ship.” Whatever is of highest value in your life is what you worship. If you do not believe in God, then know what has taken its place. Something will fill the void. If it’s not God, it’s scientism. If it’s not scientism, it’s politics. If it’s not politics, it’s the environment. If it’s not the environment, it’s culture. Your highest aim can be any number of things, but God is ultimately replaced with something else. With that said, if you remove God from the American equation, you give government more power over your life than it deserves. As an American, I don’t want anyone having that level of control over my life. Whether or not you believe God, God serves as a pillar upon which this country is built. If you try to remove that pillar, you make the country itself less stable.

It is worth noting that taxation is another pillar. While I may hate it, it remains a pillar. As Americans, we are required to provide for some functions of the government, as it provides for the common defense, infrastructure, and the rule of law. That is why the allowance of taxation is a constitutional amendment. Do I like it? Am I in favor of it? NO. Yet, I understand its necessity in American society. In my mind, taxation, and therefore, the government should be smaller rather than larger. Following that rule of thought, the atheist also has the right to say, God should be smaller rather than larger. Yet, like taxation, God provides for a particular structural soundness. So, with respect to the founding nature of God, the atheist isn’t being marginalized, in the same way that the small government conservative or libertarian isn’t being marginalized by the existence of a taxation.

The founding fathers, diverse in their beliefs, understood the necessity of a transcendent authority. While there may have been sweeping disagreement in their personal beliefs, they knew that objective truths, clearly understood, are what give energy to culture. While the establishment clause states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,” it does not mean religion should have no place in the public square. Nor does it prohibit religion from influencing a person’s politics. As an old admirer of the late Christopher Hitchens, like him, “I want to live my life taking the risk all the time that I don’t know anything like enough yet, that I haven’t understood enough, that I can’t know enough, that I am always hungrily operating on the margins of a potentially great harvest of future knowledge and wisdom.“ Guess what? God and the Founding Fathers wouldn’t have it any other way.