The challenge of living in obscurity.

One of the things that many of us struggle with is to live contentedly in a state of being unknown and hidden.  Somehow, the ego that is often weak and insecure strives for that proverbial fifteen seconds of fame and erroneously thinks that once that is achieved, that we can live with more satisfaction, with the knowledge that we are no longer unknown and nobodies. 

Yet, we also do know that scripture is replete with examples of people who were nobodies and lived rather hidden and even obscure lives, and it was precisely because their lives were lived this way, that God was able to use them for the unfolding of his kingdom.  The Israelite people’s 40 year exodus in the wilderness saw them being nobodies for one generation.  The power of the widow’s mite tells of how much hidden power there is in the humble act of one’s total giving, despite the seeming inconsequential amount that was given.  That Jonah was hidden away for three days in the belly of the fish is highly symbolic that goodness does gestate in the state of darkness and an acceptance of a certain unknowing before one gets tossed out to land on unfamiliar shores which provide a new platform for the unfolding of God’s often unfathomable plans.  The genealogy of Christ even includes so many people who weren’t ‘famous’ but were in fact very usable by God to attain his final purposes.  And what about the way that the encounter of two unseen and gestating babies lying silent and hidden from plain view in the wombs of Mary and Elizabeth were able to communicate their joy before they could even see the light of day, making that significant moment of encounter so powerful that it made it into the written word of Scripture and one of the mysteries of the Holy Rosary?  Indeed, there is a silent, and strangely hidden power that lies in obscurity and silence that makes of those hidden so usable in God’s eyes.  This had to be something that St Theresa of Liseux knew innately when she was so joyful in seeing herself as the smallest of flowers in God’s immense garden, and was totally contented in being so, something which gave rise to her much loved name of ‘the little flower’.

Perhaps we need to ponder anew the hidden power of obscurity whenever we feel the need to promote ourselves and to satisfy the false self.  Ronald Rolheiser once wrote about how a truly contented person is one who doesn’t find cause for sadness if he finds himself staying home on a Saturday night.  This simple statement speaks volumes about how the young or even the not-so-young mind tries so hard to not stay home on Saturday nights because doing so seems to conjure up images of being unpopular, uninvited, and thus, unliked and alone.  But the spiritually mature person is one who sees through the vapidity of such thoughts, and dares to enter willingly into the darkness of a deliberate choice to be alone perhaps because in that holy darkness, one allows God to speak to one’s deepest self.

Hopefully, this is something that speaks to my fellow brothers and sisters who are infirm and find themselves surrounded quite often not by crowds of gaiety and cacophony, but perhaps more often by the silence of hospital wards and constantly beeping medicine pumps and the discomfiting breathing sounds of their fellow room mates.  There can be a redemptive value in our seeming obscurity, but only if we are willing to offer this up as a kind of spiritual ‘raw material’ that God can use for the unfolding of his Kingdom.