A Voice Praying in the Desert

There has been a lot said about "the desert of love"

Love seeks the desert because the desert is where man is handed over to God, stripped bare of his country, his friends, his fields, his home. In the desert, a person neither possesses what he loves, nor is he possessed by those who love him; he is totally submitted to God in an immense and intimate encounter.

That is why in every age the Holy Spirit has compelled all lovers to seek the desert.

We, missionaries without a boat, are seized by the same love and led by the same Spirit into new deserts.

From a sand dune, dressed in white, the missionary overlooks an expanse of lands filled with unbaptized peoples. From the top of a long subway staircase, dressed in an ordinary suit or raincoat, we overlook, on each step, during this busy rush-hour time, an expanse of heads, of bustling tling heads, waiting for the door to open. Caps, berets, hats, and hair of every color. Hundreds of heads - hundreds of souls. And there we stand, above.

And above us, and everywhere, is God.

God is everywhere - and how many souls even take notice?

In a moment, when the subway doors open, we'll climb aboard. We'll see faces, foreheads, eyes, and mouths. Mouths of lonely people, in their natural state: some greedy, some impure, some malicious; some mouths that hunger, some filled with every earthly sustenance, but few - very few - that bear the form of the Gospel.

Once we arrive at our station, we will surface into the dark, breathe the night air, and go down the street that leads home.

In the fog, the rain, or the moonlight, we will pass by other people. We will overhear them talking about their purchases, about butter, about money, about promotions, about fear, about quarrels - but hardly ever about the one we love.

To the right, to the left, stand darkened houses with tiny cracks of light, announcing that there are people alive in all this blackness.

We can well imagine what they are doing. They are constructing their fragile joys, bearing their long suffering, doing some good, doing much that is sinful.

We cannot help wonder how little light there would be if a light shined only for each person in prayer.

Yes, we have our deserts - and love leads us into them.

The same Spirit that leads our white-robed brothers and sisters into their deserts, also leads our beating heart down the turbulent stairways, into the subways, and up again to the darkened streets.

We do not envy our religious brothers and sisters.

In this crowd, heart against heart, crushed between so many bodies, on the seat we share with these three strangers, in the darkened street, our heart beats like a fist closed upon a bird.

The Holy Spirit, the whole Holy Spirit in our tiny heart, a love great as God is beating within us, like a moiling sea struggling to break out, to spread out, to penetrate into all these closed-up creatures, into all these impermeable souls.

To be able to pace every street, to sit in every metro, climb up every staircase, carry the Lord God to all places: we are certain to find a soul here or there that has preserved her human fragility before the grace of God, a soul that has forgotten to armor herself in gold or concrete.

And we can pray, pray just as they pray in all the other deserts, pray for all these people so close to us, so close to God.

A desert of people. We can plunge into the crowd as if plunging into the white desert sands.

A crowded desert, a desert of love.

The nakedness of real love.

And we do not miss the countryside, or the friend who would understand stand what we have on our hearts,or the quiet hour in the corner of a church, or the favorite book left at home.

The desert is where we become love's prey.

Won't this love that dwells in us, that explodes in us, also transform us?

Lord, Lord, let the thick skin that covers me not be a hindrance to you. Pass through it. My eyes, my hands, my mouth are yours.

This sad lady in front of me: here is my mouth for you to smile at her.

This child so pale he's almost gray: here are my eyes for you to gaze at him.

This man so tired, so weary: here is my body so that you may give him my seat, here is my voice so that you may say softly to him, "Please sit down."

This smug young man, so dull, so hard: here is my heart, that you may love him, more strongly than he has ever been loved before.

Missions to the desert, unfailing missions, sure missions, missions in which we sow God in the midst of the world, certain that, somewhere, he will take root, for: "There where love is lacking, put love, and you will reap love."

by Servant of God, Madeleine Delbrel. We, the Ordinary People of the Streets (Ressourcement: Retrieval & Renewal in Catholic Thought) (Kindle Locations 818-824). Kindle Edition.