I remember a class discussion in graduate school about the nature of God. The discussion became uncomfortable and heated as people increasingly became more intent on expressing their opinions (which they thought were factually true) than on listening to what others were trying to say. I was caught up in this discussion and trying to think of a way to counter an opinion I did not agree with, when I glanced over to my right. There, I saw a member of the class, trying hard not to show that she was crying. Big tears were falling from her eyes as she was subtly wiping them away hoping no one would notice. I honestly don’t remember anything that was said in that class or what I was thinking when I noticed her tears. All I remember are the tears. Those tears stopped me from participating further in the conversation and taught me the most important lesson of the day. People are vulnerable and when we barrel over people with opinions, even opinions about God, we hurt them. For me, God was not to be found in the arguments we were engaging in, or in our logical understanding of what we thought we knew about God. God was in the tears.
Tom Junod interviewed Fred Rogers for an article he was writing for Esquire magazine. He recalls going with Fred to visit a boy who suffered from cerebral palsy. The boy communicated through his computer and was often angry. Watching Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood consoled the boy, and he had been watching the program throughout his life. The boy was very nervous to meet his hero, Fred Rogers. Fred was very patient with him and requested a favor. He asked the boy to pray for him. Tom Junod thought this was a very clever move on Fred’s part, asking a boy who was often prayed for, who could do very little for others, to pray for him. Tom thought it was a way to make the boy feel his own significance. But when Tom expressed his admiration to Fred. Rogers said,
Oh heavens no, Tom! I didn’t ask him for his prayers for him; I asked for me. I asked him because I think that anyone who has gone through challenges like that must be very close to God. I asked him because I wanted his intercession.
Fred Rogers
Spiritual writer Henri Nouwen taught pastoral ministry courses at the prestigious colleges of Notre Dame, Yale, and Harvard. Toward the end of his life, he left the academic world to live with and take care of severely handicapped people at Daybreak, near Toronto, a L’Arche community. In a journal he wrote entitled, The Road to Daybreak, Nouwen describes his first visit to Daybreak. At that time, he was still discerning if he was called to this form of ministry. While he was unclear about whether he was called there, he saw that the handicapped people were closer to God than he was. He writes,
Jesus speaks through the broken hearts of the handicapped, who are considered marginal and useless. But God has chosen them to be the poor through whom he makes his presence known.
Henri Nouwen
Karl Rahner wrote challenging academic essays on the nature of God, and yet among his collection of writings is an essay he wrote called, “God’s Word and a Baby’s Experience.” He writes,
Thanks be to your mercy, you infinite God, that I don’t just know about you with concepts and words, but have experienced you, suffered you. Because the first and last experience of my life is you. Yes, really you yourself, not the concept of you, not your name that we give you.
Karl Rahner
Fred Rogers, Henri Nouwen, and Karl Rahner give words to what I experienced when I saw the tears of my classmate. We can try to find and know God through our reasoning, and through our logic, but that all falls away in the face of vulnerability. When we encounter vulnerability and allow it to open our hearts, we no longer reach for logical, rational words. Instead, we know that God is more fully present in our compassion and mercy than God could ever be in our opinions. And we feel our own deep vulnerability and need for God’s mercy and compassion. We let go of our defenses and trust the words of the Psalmist,
The Lord is close to the brokenhearted, saves those whose spirit is crushed.
Psalm 34:19
