The Resistless Energy of Love
From Inhabited by Grace: The Way of Incarnate Love, Church Publishing, 2019
By The Very Rev. William O. Daniel, Jr., Ph.D., ’11
God is beyond in the midst of our life. ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer
At Nashotah House, where I was a seminarian, a prayer is offered every day during Evensong or at Matins on Thursdays (as it has been for decades). It’s a prayer I continue to pray even though my year of Anglican Studies at Nashotah was years ago. I found myself swept up by this prayer each and every day. Certain prayers do this to us. They call us beyond ourselves but in a way that forces us to deal with ourselves all at the same time, mindful of those around us, and attentive to our heavenly destiny.
The portion of the prayer that has followed me more than any other is this:
Bless all who may be trained here; take from them all pride, vanity, and self-conceit, and give them true humility and self-abasement . . . that they may speak with that resistless energy of love, which shall melt the hearts of sinners to the love of thee. . . .
Jesus tells his disciples not to worry about what they are to say or how they are to say it, if they are ever brought before rulers and authorities. We are not to be defensively predisposed; rather, if we live a life of humility, and our words speak the truth in love, then as the hymnist writes, the God who has been “our help in ages past” will be our sure defense. Defensiveness has only the effect of hardening the hearts of our enemies. Humility, however, disarms, and silencing our speech makes room for love to do its work. The other person’s anger exposes itself in the space of quiet humility. Sometimes speaking the truth in love is best done with silence. Humility “melts the hearts of sinners.”
A few years ago, the tragic death of three college students involved in a murder suicide wracked our small village. The family of the assailant had been deeply embedded in the community as far back as anyone could remember, and the other two were well-connected and well-loved on campus and about the town. It was a crime of passion. A young man was distraught over his ex-girlfriend becoming involved with another young man. It’s a common story. In the wake of their deaths we held a vigil in our church for all three who had died, not just the two that were killed.
In my homily, I mentioned having received a phone call from an anonymous woman. She called after hours and left a message for me, informing me that I should be ashamed of myself for holding a service in remembrance of all three young people instead of just the two who had been murdered. She said that by praying for the forgiveness of the killer I was betraying God. Growing up in the American South, and having lived in the North, I am all too aware that we Americans tend to define ourselves by opposition. It’s a very Protestant thing to do, and this has been the most difficult aspect of our Puritan heritage to shake. The woman, safe in her anonymity, would have had me condemn the young man for his crime and remember to God only those who had been murdered. This understanding of prayer is a far cry from Jesus’s cry from the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” And if there was anything the young man didn’t know, it was what he was doing. No one who takes the life of another or their own life can possibly know what they are doing.
Our prayer is always to be a prayer of forgiveness. Our prayer is always for the sake of those who have wronged us and whom we have wronged. When we slip into a “holier than thou” posture of prayer our words become contemptible. They are like the prayer of the Pharisee in the Temple who cries out to God, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.” And while we think this is a far cry from our own imaginations, how many of us have said, “I’m glad that’s not my child.” “I’m glad my spouse doesn’t act like that.” “I’m glad my parents taught me better.”
Our words are all too often defensive. We are so ready to defend our own practices, our own children, our own way of life that we refuse to acknowledge our complicity—we refuse to acknowledge that we are sinners.
“My anonymous caller is right about one thing,” I said as I spanned the room, “[Jonathan]” (and I use a pseudonym) “does not deserve forgiveness.” After a brief pause to let everyone’s anxiety stir, I continued with greater emphasis, “And neither do any of us.”
To speak with the resistless energy of love requires that we place before the mirror of our souls the desire of God and the way of radical forgiveness. All too often we place our own and often petty concerns before the mirror of our souls, which elicits a kind of spiritual schizophrenia, an inner dialogue of self-interests, fearful of everyone but me. This is why intercession is the primary form of prayer. If I am not first and foremost concerned with the needs and concerns of others in prayer, what I want will always cloud my judgment and my speech. I will not speak with resistless love because my concerns will only be my concerns. There is nothing irresistible about self-centeredness.
This is why silence is so important, not simply as a daily habit but in prayer and conversation. Stephen Covey famously said that, “Most people listen not with the intent to understand but with the intent to reply.” We listen defensively. Vehicles of “conversation” (and I use this term loosely) such as Facebook and Twitter are symptomatic of our defensive tendencies—our desire to avoid silence, serving only to deafen our hearts to others. Defensive listening comes from a heart that is either not disciplined by prayer or a heart disciplined by prayers that are self-justifying rather than humbly attentive. When my prayers have me at the center, my desire to pontificate supersedes my ability to listen with understanding. Rather than opening myself to be seen and known by others, and thereby reflecting the humility of Christ, I reject receiving myself from others, locating my identity and personhood in my autonomous self. “The practice of silence,” however, “is an agent of healing in a world of harmful words and wordiness.”
Our manner of speaking hereby makes manifest the truth of our prayers. It’s hard to hate someone that we bring before God in prayer. It’s easier to hear the person we entrust to God’s love and forgiveness. If I have a habit of speaking negatively about someone behind their back, telling others how they have harmed me and wronged me, or my general dislike for them, the only thing this reveals is my own habit of prayer, or lack thereof. What I say about anyone, regardless of its truth, says more about me than it does about the other person. It reveals my prayerful disposition, which is either formed by intercessions and concerns for another’s well-being or my own self-interests. To speak with that resistless energy of love is contingent upon a heart humbly disposed for the good of others, even those we count as enemies.
William Daniel (Ph.D. University of Nottingham) is the rector of St. Michael’s Church, Dean for Liturgy and Formation in the Episcopal Diocese of Rochester, and adjunct professor of humanities at SUNY Geneseo, in Geneseo, New York. Fr. Daniel graduated from Nashotah House in 2011. He is the author of Christ the Liturgy, (Angelico Press, 2020) Inhabited by Grace (Church Publishing, Inc., 2019), various works of poetry and social commentary, and is a roaster of coffee. You can follow Fr. Daniel at www.williamdaniel.info.