Third-form Latin at Auckland
Grammar, back in the late 1940s, was a bracing experience. As I recall, Latin was usually the first
period of the day, and so the teacher had to call the roll. It being Latin, each boy had to respond, Adsum
– present – and then sit down. Never
mind that the teacher could see perfectly well that the boy was present, or not…
the teacher pretended not to know until the boy audibly certified his presence
in a respectful manner. A curious
ritual…
Adsum matters
however. A lot of the time we are not actually
present, despite being visibly there. There
may be good reason. It happens a lot in
church – people are there but actually somewhere else.[1] I find it a useful skill at family/tribal
reunions. But also, I am reminded, there
are circumstances in which it may be necessary to cultivate what sensitive
Germans during the Nazi era called inner retreat.[2]
It is not so in contemplative
prayer. Adsum. I am here.
I have come in, I have shut the door, other people know I am not
available, I have turned off the cellphone, I have become silent and still, I
am present. I have left my baggage outside
the door – my agenda for the day, my agenda for the week, my accomplishments,
my failures, my anxieties… my memories too are lodged at the door… not because
any of these are bad things, but because for the moment (kairos) they
are surplus to requirements. Any of
these may want entrance at any time, but I am choosing to ignore that for now.
Adsum… I am here, fully me. It is the present moment, it is not
yesterday, or tomorrow. If I have aches
and pains they are present too, part of me, not the whole. I am awake.
I am paying attention, so far as I can, to the gentle repetition of the
mantra. It is comforting to know that my
true self, the self God made, knows, sees and loves, is here. I am here, in Leonard Cohen’s words, without
the costume that I wore. There is no
one I have to impress, or convince, let alone hide from or fear. God is present, and God sees only the truth
about me, in love and joy. The only word
I have – is Yes.
But there may be a problem… Father Laurence Freeman, one of our important
teachers, says that true silence happens when the “I” is absent. He writes:
Silence is… much more of course than the absence of noise and even
more than the absence of thoughts... Silence
is deeper than that, because the thought ‘I had no thoughts’ is a thought; it
is still self-consciousness. So silence…
is when the ‘“I” thought does not arise… And this I think is what Jesus is pointing to
when he tells us to leave self behind and all our possessions, and to enter
into that poverty of spirit which we enter into through the mantra, and by
living out the consequences of saying the mantra at the centre of our being.
‘The sparkling of truth devoid of “I” is the greatest austerity.’
Maybe so, but it is beyond my
experience (and I puzzle about that interpretation of Luke 9:23 and related
passages). It seems to me the kind of
comment that leads on to the strange ancient wisdom that if you know you’re
praying then you’re not praying – I wonder if St Anthony ever regretted having
said that. For the present, so to speak,
adsum is what matters. I am here,
warts and all, glad to be here, somewhat timid, paying attention, quiet and
still, deploying only my consent.
[1] In
Scotland, one bitter Sunday morning, the big stone church was full of dense fog. I climbed into the pulpit, and could see no
one beyond the front pew… rather like standing on the bridge of a battleship
off the coast of Labrador, eerie, even more fun if I’d had a fog horn… Needless
to say, the clarity of my sermon steadily dispelled the fog.
[2] Selbst
sich zurückziehen.
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