Seeing only the wallpaper

Seeing only the wallpaper

‘A hard journey we had of it; the worst time of the year.’ T. S. Eliot describes the journey of the Magi and the journey of all of us towards knowledge. We make many false turnings and have a ‘hard time’ really getting to know another person. Even John the Baptist struggled to ‘know’ Jesus. Twice, in so many sentences, he says ‘I did not know him.’ It was a journey for him too.

What is it to ‘know someone’? We can be like people who see the wall paper but not the wall. Wall paper is out of fashion but there was a time when people covered their walls in colourful designs of paper. Growing up I was sometimes reminded how, aged two, I made short work of an aunt’s favourite wall paper. Wall paper is what you see and admire but without the wall behind it would look a little silly.

When we see a disabled person we see the disability. We sympathise with the wife or husband who now has to care for their spouse who has Alzheimer’s or cancer. We knew the person before they were struck by this infirmity but we now find it difficult to spend time with them now that they are diminished and are ‘no longer the person I knew.’ But, of course, they are the same person. It is just that I have a problem making the journey to where they are now.

Perhaps it is even more difficult with someone who has always been disabled, physically or intellectually. Again, I see the disability and I find it hard to move beyond that to the person. Prudence is a young man in our l’Arche community in Zimbabwe who is disabled in mind and body. He is unable to ‘do’ anything. He just is. If you try to spend time with Prudence you will notice an amazing peace. I do not know for sure but he seems to accept every moment just as it is. He has no future and no past. He is just there teaching patience and calmness to anyone who pays attention.

The journey to know people is the journey to know God. It is the same journey. John is clear about this. ‘How can you say you love God whom you cannot see when you ignore those around you whom you can see?’ That’s the journey. And we need the wisdom of the wise men from the east to make it.

4 January 2015                        The Epiphany

Isaiah 60:1-6                           Ephesians 3:2-6                       Matthew 2;1-12