Dark Prayer

The water churned and pushed against the ice with a dark seriousness that reminded me of prayer.

Subzero Chicago night at the edge of the year, the edge of change, the edge of what's bearable. I stood on an old breakwater, a long, crumbling construction of concrete and steel that jutted into Lake Michigan -- just stood, feeling the wind scrape my face. Whatever thoughts came to me were honest ones. Or maybe I just needed to grieve.

"Courage grows strong at the wound."

Someone said this to me earlier this year and I felt a rush of reverence as I contemplated wounds and war, a wrecked economy, a wasted planet, hope, illusion, the holidays, the human condition. My niece just got married; the same day, a friend was mugged in the alley behind her house. The dark water undulated beyond the ice, gurgling, whispering. Dear God . . .

I don't pray easily. At least not for the big stuff. But there I was, praying, it seemed, against the tide. Dear God, let us find the courage to endure whatever is to come and the wisdom to pull together around the worst of it. Europe, shattered after World War II, finally understood this. Grant us transformation at the point of our wounds and the vision of a future beyond them. Grant us a president who believes in something beyond the military-industrial consensus that surrounds him and would own him. Grant us sanity and the courage to face our worst fears. Grant us peace.

"Peace activists in Pakistan and India are attempting desperately to be heard above the din raised by warmongers . . . in the wake of the Mumbai carnage. Jingoism is in the air -- be it from so-called nationalists (posing as analysts on television) advocating a nuclear attack for the defense of their country, or the man on the street. Be they from Pakistan or India, they speak of war with great abandon as if it is child's play."

These are the words of Zubeida Mustafa, writing for The Women's International Perspective (published a few days ago on Common Dreams). They scratch at the collective unreason of our age, the unyielding obstinacy at which I felt my dark prayer hurling itself. It's so much easier simply to be angry. How do we get beyond our national -- our global -- impasse over what empowerment means?

We live in a world in which no word is more feared than "disarmament" -- and the logic of that fear brooks no compromise. There seems to be an unbroken line of logic that runs from personal sidearms to nuclear weapons. My prayer as the year ends is that a few more stalwarts see the greater logic of laying down both their weapons and the fear that makes doing so unthinkable.

Since I was out, I decided to walk on this raw night to the Barbara Tree. That's what I call it -- the tree I had specially planted by the Chicago Park District some years ago to honor my late wife, who died of cancer in 1998. Originally the tree was a linden, but that one died in its second summer, during a drought. Eventually another tree was planted on the spot; a cherry, I think. It's still, at any rate, "her" -- leaning, just like the other one did, irreverently off square.

Death is the ultimate fear and the ultimate enemy, but when Barbara died I learned that death wasn't the enemy at all -- rather, it was something like the waves and the darkness, unknowable and beckoning and maybe no more than a doorway. What does this awareness change? I don't know, but if I hated death, my grief could have no dimension, no restorative power, and would be as trite and hellish as regret.

As I thought about Mustafa's observations about nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, and the carnage in Mumbai, I found myself groping along the seam of the horror for the wrong turn toward revenge and a desire to hurt back, consequences be damned. "They speak of war with great abandon as if it is child's play."

The turn is political: the instant promised land of victory. This real estate always appears attainable at a bargain rate, even in the nuclear era that mocks the very idea of victory. The face I see at the juncture of this wrong turn is that of our own Departing Fool, whose greatest (known) crime, in my view, was steering the United States down the path of revenge after 9/11. But he didn't do it alone.

Dear God, let George Bush be the last of his line, the 20th century's smirking bookend. Let his successor be a true leader, whose agenda transcends the interests that surround him. Courage grows strong at the wound. Let us move as a planet to a unity greater than the blood cult of nationalism.

I stroked the cold bark of the Barbara Tree one last time, then turned, struck out across the snow toward the lights of the city and the life waiting for me there.

- - -

Robert Koehler, an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist, is an editor at Tribune Media Services and nationally syndicated writer. You can respond to this column at [e-mail] or visit his Web site at commonwonders.com.

© 2008 TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.

 

Comments

[cayuse]

02:29 PM on 12/29/2008

The Cosmic Delusion (maya), there is no peace on earth

You need to work on yourself and nobody else

I do not remeber Christ saving the world. He did tell people how to save themselve though. As did Buddha, Krishna and Mohammad. Moses did too, right? The 10 commandmen­ds were not for the group, but the individual­. What went wrong?

[ChicagoSuz]

06:53 PM on 12/27/2008

I miss her, too. She would've loved Obama...

[GrainOSand]

01:41 PM on 12/27/2008

Thoughts run the spectrum regarding what the current ingredient­s of being will make for a future, world stew of existence. One is inspired to be soaring and positive in their rhetoric and one is compelled to be deep, dark, and foreboding­. One can see the makings of profound and lasting benefit to all of humankind. One can see the makings of profound and lasting detriment to all of human kind. Rumors of war, threats of war, and war without end or without reason, these are but some of the ingredient­s. Witness a groundswel­l realizatio­n of the harmful nature of our recent and ancient past, culminatin­g in uplifting a leader to forge a bold new direction for a still young nation. One with a storied past that is full of glory and barbaric treachery. Witness greed unraveling personal and national fortunes. Witness the failure of intellectu­alism without morality, democracy hostile to plurality, and the stifling properties of human banality that causes the collective head to continue to pound historical­ly impenetrab­le walls and yet hope for a crack. These are ingredient­s of the simmering stew of a coming future. Delusion and determinat­ion, hate and hope, lust and love, hypocrisy and humility, greed and graciousne­ss, ours is a study in conflictin­g ingredient­s. Ours is a time of innumerabl­e ideas, varying visions, fatal falsehoods and timeless truths.

Dark prayer lit up the night sky to show the promise of daylight, and the people saw a guiding light leading the way out of darkness.

[melpol]

12:48 PM on 12/27/2008

Retailers have suffered their worst Christmas sales in years and many are forced to declare bankruptcy­. Some are asking the states to declare sales tax holidays so they can bring back customers and stay in business. But billions of those sales taxes help support the state. The states claim they cannot provide proper services without the help of sales taxes. The U.S. government is now being asked to reimburse the states if sales taxes are temporaril­y lifted. A large part of the trillion dollar stimulus package can be used for that purpose. Once again the public sector is coming to the aid of a private sector that is in trouble. It is like the tail wagging the dog or the cart carrying the mule. The dog and mule must be restored to their proper position if sanity can be maintained­.

[canuckmoose]

07:55 AM on 12/27/2008

Beautifull­y written, Robert. Thank you.

To mangle the vernacular - fighting for peace is coitus for chastity.
[youngster­s - google 'the sixties']

As for war - "it is not logical, Jim"
[youngster­s - google 'Spock']

-Huffpo Stir

[godhelpusall]

05:17 AM on 12/27/2008

it takes real courage to pray in the face of oblivion ===

[Davwbaird]

10:18 PM on 12/26/2008

You have a way with words. Touching the truth more than can be imagined.

[plankbob]

07:20 PM on 12/26/2008

Thank you so much for this, Mr. Koehler. It's hard to have hope, given the attitude of so many Americans who don't "get it," but sometimes hope is all we have.

[Briarcircle]

06:29 PM on 12/26/2008

Thank you for this powerful piece of writing.
Maybe, just maybe we can do more than just imagine. Is their anyone of us left standing who can still defend the way this country, this world has been run into the ground? Guess we had to hit rock bottom.
Obama will only be as great a leader as we help him to be so lets's pull up our pants.

http://www­.youtube.c­om/watch?v­=vTdTt-cut­g0

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possession­s
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhoo­d of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

[NounverbPOW]

11:45 AM on 12/26/2008

"Grant us a president who believes in something beyond the military-i­ndustrial consensus that surrounds him and would own him". Profound words indeed. Wish we could somhow work this into common prayer, and lift all our voices up for this in everychurc­h and synagogue.