One Another’s Burdens

This is part II. Part one is at The Poor, the Maimed, the Lame, the Blind.

Then He also said to him who invited Him, “When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just.” Luke 14:12-14

 (From the mass for Tuesday of the Thirty-Fifth Week in Ordinary Time, year II.)

I have been reading Charles Williams lately. I re-read one of his novels, “Descent into Hell,” one of the finest and also strangest spiritual thrillers ever written.

I also read a book called, “Woman in Love,” by a woman named Katie Hartfiel, which was an absolutely magnificent love story. I had bought it several months ago, but when it arrived I didn’t feel like reading it. I often do that, buy books because they look interesting to me at the time, and then don’t feel interested in them when they arrive, or am busy with other interests. So it was that this book sat unread on my shelf until Sunday night, when it forced itself upon my notice. I still didn’t feel like reading it, but I felt like I ought to, and I thank God that I did.

Both of these books had in common a theme, more explicit in Williams, made obvious in practice in Katie Hartfiel’s book, of bearing one another’s burdens.

Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. Galatians 6:1-3

The Charles Williams explication of this concept is by far the most advanced and literal interpretation of the idea that I have ever come across. In his view, bearing one another’s burdens means literally and figuratively taking up someone else’s cross, whether that be fear, shame, arthritis, cancer, bereavement, annoyance or rush hour traffic related frustration. He talks about bearing that burden as simply and naturally as picking up a package for someone and carrying it from the train station to their front door. He means quite literally to take upon oneself that emotion that robs the other of his or her peace, to enter into it imaginatively in as much detail as possible, and to endure it for the other and to offer it “to the Omnipotence.” He viewed it as an immutable law of the universe, what he called “The Law of Substitution,” that we are to share one another’s burdens and thus imitate the dying God who bore the weight of all our sins, not imaginatively but really. In Williams’ view, the will to bear another’s cross really does affect a spiritual substitution. His doctrine on it is wonderfully complex and beautiful, too much so to go into here.

In Katie Hartfiel’s book she tells how she began, at the age of 17, to write letters to her Husband-to-Be, and to pray for him regularly with as much passion and fervor as she could muster, offering herself to God as a prayer warrior for him. Through the story of their life together I could see how that act of substitution transformed her husband’s life long before they ever met, but the substitution did not end there. She, herself, had serious emotional issues which prevented her from being able to respond to the man God had used her to help create and redeem. The beautiful logic of substitution is that, because her prayers had helped to make him what he was, he was the sort of man who could volunteer to help carry her cross with her, and essentially be used to heal her in a truly wonderful way.

This theme, divided into these two threads, was strong in my mind when I read and meditated on the reading from Luke that starts this post. It is very easy to bear another’s cross. It is not so easy to let another help bear mine. I could come up with a number of lofty sounding arguments for why I don’t want to “bother” the other with my troubles, but in the end it’s all hogwash. (Lovely word, by the way. So seldom used nowadays, but the poetry of calling something “hogwash” is exquisite. I recommend you take a few minutes to dive into all aspects of the word, “hogwash,” and refresh yourself in its literary perfection.)

As I was saying, refusing to burden another with my troubles is rot. Of course Jesus is the ultimate recipient of all my garbage. I can try not to burden Him by not sinning, and that is the noblest endeavor known to man. The fact of the matter, however, is that I have sinned, and I continue to sin daily, and that my only salvation lies in burdening Jesus with those sins.

Burdening another person, however, comes a little less easily. There are some things that no other human can help me with and I am right to keep those between me and Jesus. There are many, many people who simply cannot help, either because they don’t know how or because they are worse off, or simply because they cannot listen or understand. I do right to keep my struggles from them. Other people simply don’t know me. Some are so caught up in their own struggles that they cannot see anyone else. Some cannot think of anything but their own struggles and issues and so even if they are willing to listen and help, it becomes a very dark, depressing relationship because that is all you ever share. The shame that keeps us from wanting to share our crosses with another can be useful when it keeps us from sharing too much too fast, or with someone who isn’t worthy of the confidence, or someone who simply cannot help.

But the fact remains that we are all broken, every one of us. We are all sick, both by birth and environment and through our own fault and we are all in various stages of healing. Some are more sick than others, but no one is completely healthy and, this side of Heaven, most of us never will be. Only a soul that goes through purgatory on earth can be completely healthy.

The refusal to be served, to allow someone else to help you when you need it, or when they need to help you, is a very damaging thing. To give one example, we lament the death of chivalry, but chivalry doesn’t die simply because men refuse to serve. There have always been men who refused to serve, and men who chose to serve and chivalry survived. No, the most effective weapon against chivalry is the women who refuse to be served.

Think about what would happen to a child who ran up to offer his daddy a hug, only to be ignored or told to go away because daddy is busy. What would happen to a child who drew a picture for his mom, but she laughed and said it was no good. A young man who tried to help his father change the oil, only to be told to go away, you’re doing it wrong. A wife whose attempts to cook for her husband were met with nothing but criticism. A husband whose compliments were met with nothing but denial and sarcasm.

Love refused will eventually die, unless it is supernatural in origin. Only Agape, a direct sharing in God’s own love, can survive being rejected and still remain itself. All other kinds of love will eventually die, or worse, mutate into an obsession.

Selfishness, the refusal to give love, can destroy a relationship but I would contend (from my own personal experience) the refusal to receive love does inestimably more damage. Love is like a game in which children stand in a circle and toss a ball, or several balls back and forth to each other. In order for love to remain what it is, it must be passed back and forth and around the circle, faster and faster. As soon as it hits your hand you must be already throwing it to someone else. In this game, catching the ball and keeping it to yourself will start an argument. Eventually the others will force you to share out of enlightened self-interest. But to refuse to catch the ball when it is thrown to you; that ends the game entirely. That is a refusal to play, and there is no appeal.

So the command in Luke is really a two part command. He commands us not only to love those who cannot repay us, but even those who will not accept love. To love those who do not know how to love, to forgive those who are seething with resentment and self-loathing, to comfort those who refuse to be comforted, to fetch that cup of water for the person who can never fetch you a cup in return, or for the person who will throw it back in your face. Jesus is telling us to give without counting the cost, to place ourselves outside the whole weary, stodgy business of quid-pro-quo, equal rights, and all that nauseating modern jibber-jabber.

It is also a command to receive without counting the cost. It a command to those who don’t know how to love to accept being loved; to those who cannot forgive themselves to accept the forgiveness of others; to those who despise themselves to accept the comfort that other people offer. It is a command to me to let go of my pride and allow others to do for me what I cannot do for myself. Jesus is commanding me to receive that gift which I know I can never repay; to accept the burden of being loved.

Every act of love, if it is really love and not “selfishness and vainglory” (Philippians 2:3), is an utterly unrepayable act. From the act of creation to the act of redemption on the cross, all of the acts of God are completely beyond our capacity to repay. Gift is by nature free. When a human being offers something to another human being out of love he takes part in that same nature of free gift. Because it is by its nature free, it can never be earned or repaid.

We live from the first principle of our existence in debt to God. We exist infinitely more in debt to Him by our baptism, and every confession and communion infinitely increases an already infinite debt. We are not the sort of creatures who need be concerned about running up a ledger of indebtedness. To carry someone else’s burden is to place them in your debt, except that there is no debt. To allow someone else to carry my burden is to allow myself to be obliged to them, except that there is no obligation. There is no question of rights or decency or reciprocity. There is only the freedom to love the other, and the rejoicing in being loved by the other. There is only the sharing in the total outpouring of gift that is God’s love.

But to do that we must accept His love, His mercy, His comfort. Not simply from Him, must we accept it, but from other humans. Other weak, broken, poor and maimed, blind and lame human beings like ourselves, these are the means of grace which God has decreed for our humility and salvation.

So ask. Ask for the mercy. Let someone serve you today. This day I challenge you to sit down, relax your fierce walls, and say to someone who loves you, “Could you get me a drink of water, please?”

That is the way to the true freedom of love.