Opinion | How to Pray With Our Eyes Open
Heeding this tangible world has become more difficult for us. In “Crossing the Postmodern Divide,” the philosopher Albert Borgmann contrasts the brilliance and pliability of hyperreality — of digital life — with the “eloquent” character of material, embodied things and practices. The material world is eloquent because it demands contact with reality itself rather than a curated, ultrapalatable version of it. But with that contact comes thorns, bruises, mosquitoes and, worst of all, boredom. My backyard does not move at the pace of YouTube. It is not as bright as V.R. It does not buzz my pocket with notifications or headlines. It extends a quiet, complex blessing and leaves it up to me to receive it or not.
In his 2016 essay for New York Magazine, “I Used to Be a Human Being,” Andrew Sullivan explores the emotional and spiritual costs of a very online life. He argues that “the greatest threat to faith today is not hedonism but distraction.” If attention gives birth to devotion, then perhaps part of the mission of people of faith today is to counter distraction by calling people to the goodness and wonder of the material, embodied and natural world.
The church is now in the season of Easter, which is a 50-day period of joy and celebration.. During this time, Christians around the globe celebrate and proclaim that Jesus physically rose from the dead, not as a spirit but in a body — one marked with scar tissue and freckles, one that ate and drank, one that, though transformed, was still recognizable, touchable and palpable. Christians believe that when Jesus rose he walked on hard earth and ate fish caught from real, salty seas. This resurrected body points to the ultimate destiny of humanity. It says that we will not float away to some faraway heaven but that eternity will be found right here on earth, in what the Bible calls a “new heaven and new earth,” a place with bays and banjos, artichokes and art, dandelions and dancing. Easter is not, then, a celebration that is primarily “spiritual,” if by that we mean nonmaterial. It is instead the ultimate affirmation of materiality. It tells us that the Christian faith is as interested in mountains as it is morality; that it asks for attention not just to dogma but to dogwoods, that it is occupied not only with our souls but with our five senses.
The resurrection of Jesus is a proclamation that the material world is good and worth savoring, protecting and attending. So, to inhabit this season fully, we need to take up the task of embracing the goodness of the palpable, analog world, whether it be to make time for a hike or to notice the sweetness of gentle rain or to revel in the bitterness of good coffee or to listen to the laughter of children. “God is the biggest materialist there is,” the priest, author and chef Robert Farrar Capon once said. After all, God created the material world, Capon pointed out, he must enjoy it even more than we do.
There’s a hymn that they used to sing at my childhood church that goes, “Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace.” I get the point it’s trying to make: that encountering true hope, beauty and holiness puts pettier things in perspective. Still, my experience of faith is nearly the opposite of what the hymn describes. The more I have tried to seek God — the more I reach for truth, beauty and mystery that I know exceeds my grasp — the more bright, vivid and vital the things of earth become.
