“Drunk with the Love of God”: 31st Sunday in Ordinary Time

Source: davidepiscopalchurch

Commonweal (the Catholic journal) reprinted a 1953 piece by Thomas Merton, in which he wrote of the Psalms as poems. “The function of the Psalms is to make us share in the poetic experience of the men who wrote them. … The Psalms are at the same time the simplest and the greatest of all religious poems.

They are the songs of men—and David was the greatest of them—for whom God was more than an abstract idea, more than a frozen watchmaker sitting in his tower while his universe goes ticking away into space without him.”

Merton says that the writers of the Psalms were carried away in an ecstasy of joy when they saw God in the cosmic symbolism of the created universe. He says, “David is drunk with the love of God.”

Jesus reminds us in the Gospel about the all-encompassing love of God and neighbour to which we are called: to love God “with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength;” and to love our neighbour to the same degree that we love ourselves.

The same point comes at the end of the reading from Deuteronomy. It’s a total giving – not piecemeal or stingy. It’s a good ideal for us to strive for. None of us is perfect in our love of God or others, but we can strive.

The love that we aim for is, I think, a way of describing Merton’s drunkenness. Our actions could be a form of the poetry that Merton speaks of 

That drunkenness applies to many others besides David, and to many forms of poetic writing besides the Psalms. There is some beautiful poetry in scripture.

There is also a lot of poetry that has been inspired by scripture. The simple reason is because scripture is about life and the various writers were inspired by their experience of God’s role in the world around them.

Start with Genesis and go through to the Book of Revelation. The manner of writing in Sacred Scripture has beauty and power as it speaks of life. Many of the inspired authors were carried away in the ecstasy of which Merton writes.

God blesses us with a variety of ways of describing our spiritual and religious experiences. Some people offer poetic writing. Some paint beautiful images. Others offer their gift of voice or music.

Others are gifted with letters. Some sports writing is powerful and beautiful. I’ve even seen business writing that does much more than describe the facts and figures. I think that Merton has a point. If a writer is “drunk with the love of God,” he or she can find beauty in the dictionary.

The person recognizes that the subject matter is much more than an abstract idea. It’s not just a word. It’s laden with potent meaning.

In the secular world, this is also Halloween. In the Jesuit world, it is the feast of one of our beloved Brothers, Saint Alphonsus Rodriguez.

Commonweal (the Catholic journal) reprinted a 1953 piece by Thomas Merton, in which he wrote of the Psalms as poems. “The function of the Psalms is to make us share in the poetic experience of the men who wrote them. … The Psalms are at the same time the simplest and the greatest of all religious poems. They are the songs of men—and David was the greatest of them—for whom God was more than an abstract idea, more than a frozen watchmaker sitting in his tower while his universe goes ticking away into space without him.” Merton says that the writers of the Psalms were carried away in an ecstasy of joy when they saw God in the cosmic symbolism of the created universe. He says, “David is drunk with the love of God.”

 

Jesus reminds us in the Gospel about the all-encompassing love of God and neighbour to which we are called: to love God “with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength;” and to love our neighbour to the same degree that we love ourselves. The same point comes at the end of the reading from Deuteronomy. It’s a total giving – not piecemeal or stingy. It’s a good ideal for us to strive for. None of us is perfect in our love of God or others, but we can strive. The love that we aim for is, I think, a way of describing Merton’s drunkenness. Our actions could be a form of the poetry that Merton speaks of.

 

That drunkenness applies to many others besides David, and to many forms of poetic writing besides the Psalms. There is some beautiful poetry in scripture. There is also a lot of poetry that has been inspired by scripture. The simple reason is because scripture is about life and the various writers were inspired by their experience of God’s role in the world around them. Start with Genesis and go through to the Book of Revelation. The manner of writing in Sacred Scripture has beauty and power as it speaks of life. Many of the inspired authors were carried away in the ecstasy of which Merton writes.

 

God blesses us with a variety of ways of describing our spiritual and religious experiences. Some people offer poetic writing. Some paint beautiful images. Others offer their gift of voice or music. Others are gifted with letters. Some sports writing is powerful and beautiful. I’ve even seen business writing that does much more than describe the facts and figures. I think that Merton has a point. If a writer is “drunk with the love of God,” he or she can find beauty in the dictionary. The person recognizes that the subject matter is much more than an abstract idea. It’s not just a word. It’s laden with potent meaning.

 

In the secular world, this is also Halloween. In the Jesuit world, it is the feast of one of our beloved Brothers, Saint Alphonsus Rodriguez.

Philip Shano, SJ has many years of rich and varied experience working with Ignatian spirituality: teaching, writing and using it in his ministry. He resides in the Jesuit community in Pickering, Ontario.

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2 Comments
  • Vicky Chen
    Posted at 07:08h, 31 October Reply

    Love this reflection today. Thank you Fr. Phil.

  • Peter Bisson
    Posted at 22:58h, 31 October Reply

    Thank you Philip!

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