Fall/Winter 2002-03 Newsletter

Shattered Vision

by Fr. Thomas Keating

“Now this is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about. When his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found with child through the Holy Spirit. Joseph, her husband, since he was a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her quietly. An angel appeared to Joseph in a dream saying, ‘Fear not to take Mary as your wife. For what is born of her is of the Holy Spirit.’ Joseph immediately arose and took Mary to his home.” (Matthew 1:18-21) 

Just as Abraham became the father of all who have faith by renouncing the possibility of an heir, so Joseph became the husband of Mary only after he had given up his plan to marry her. This loss and finding of Mary parallels the loss and finding of Jesus in the Temple. Joseph had set his heart on living with Mary as his wife. When her mysterious pregnancy broke up his plan, he decided that he had to give up the vision he had formed for his life—his plan of serving God with Mary as his wife. Later, Joseph had to go through the loss and finding of Jesus in the Temple, an even deeper participation in the mystery of Christ’s passion, death and resurrection. 

Every true seeker of God has to pass through this mysterious inward death and rebirth, perhaps many times over. Joseph’s love of Mary and his vision of life with her—and later his love of Jesus and his vision of life with him—were the two eyes that he had to give up in order to see with God’s eyes. He had to surrender his personal vision in order to become the vision God had for him. 

God grants us men and women who dedicate themselves to some great ideal or purpose. Vision is what gives ordinary life its direction and invests it with purpose. At the same time, as one journeys across the desert, prairie, or sea—all images of everyday life in spiritual literature—one may come upon various places of rest: an oasis, a garden of spiritual delights, or a safe harbor. One seems to have arrived at the end of one’s laborious journey and all one’s immense efforts seem to be coming to fruition. Actually, the place of rest will become a place of poison unless one hastens to push on. 

But how does one push on? Is it by giving up the vision? Not exactly. Rather, it is by being willing to do so. For that renunciation is the only way to move beyond what one thinks is the vision and to embrace what it really is. In other words, it is necessary to transcend all one’s own ideas of how to reach the place of vision in order to get there. Thus, Abraham was told by God, at the most critical moment of his life, “Take your son...Isaac, whom you love, and go the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering upon one of the mountains of which I shall tell you” (Genesis 22:2). To paraphrase the text: “Take your great vision, your ideal of the spiritual journey and how to attain it, and go to the place I will show you. There sacrifice it to me.” 

The struggle to attain to the “land of vision” may lead to discouragement or even to what is close to despair. It is like dying. Your world must be broken! And you with it! Your idea of your vocation, of the spiritual journey, of the church, of Jesus Christ, even of God himself, must be shattered. The crux of the human predicament consists of all that causes us to get stuck on thinking about our vision rather than experiencing it.

Reprinted from Awakenings (New York: Crossroad Publications, (1996), pp.101-103.

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