Raphaël Buyse: “Put your hand on the Gospel, and don’t take it off”

It is the ducasse. On the square in Mons (Belgium), showmen have set up a glass labyrinth. A few young people have entered it: in a maze of distorting windows and mirrors, the game is to look for the exit. A group of teenagers are having fun.

But in the merry-go-round, a child is screaming. He must be 5 or 6 years old. His parents left him to venture out on his own. He bumps into the walls of the ice palace. This leisure space has become a prison. The child panics. The rowdy group of teenagers have found the way out and the child is left alone, abandoned in a deafening din. He sees his family beyond the transparent partitions, but cannot reach them. He stamps. The spasms of his body betray his anguish.

His parents, from the outside, yell at him to go right, turn left. In vain. The music is so loud he can’t hear anything. The more they shout while waving their arms, the more the child seems alone, lost, abandoned. Nothing helps: the disoriented child sobs. His mother too. Nobody seems to be able to help him… Alas, he sits down, cries bitterly, giving up trying to find a way out.

Little man, get up

This scene, as heartbreaking as it is absurd, reminds me of so many of our difficult and awkward relationships. We see each other, we look for each other. We see each other, we desire each other, we would like to meet, talk or hug each other, but the glass partitions of overrated conventions, false ideas and the distorting mirrors of our a priori prevent us from doing so.

The path that leads to others is often tortuous, just as the one that leads to oneself. And winding too, the one that leads to God. The branches of doubt, the impasses of “hear-says” and the false leads of acquired certainties are not lacking. It’s to get lost… Is there a way out?

Little man, get up. Put your hand on the first glass partition you find in front of you and don’t take it off. She is sure. Don’t lean on your fear or your loneliness. Adventure yourself by touching the real even if it seems to you, for the moment, insane. Hand on the partition, walk along the walls of the accursed labyrinth, feeling your way, without stopping: you will find the exit. A bit of fresh air.

Little guy, don’t procrastinate: don’t take four steps forward and then five steps back. Do not constantly question your progress, even if you do not yet feel the freshness of the outside. Walking. Without picking up your hand. You will overcome the wall that seems like hell to you. When things go wrong, that’s the only way you can get out of it. By relying on the little we know and the little we have. Start from reality. Stick to it and walk. So we find a way.

Be of good cheer, kid

Le palais des glaces tells me about the man lost in the universe, not knowing where he comes from, where he is, where he is going, and trying to find answers to his questions. This infernal merry-go-round speaks to me of the complexity of the human soul, sometimes inhabited by the fear of monsters which are believed to be locked in the heart of the labyrinth of existence.

We have to help each other to get out of the absurd, to rediscover the common sense of life, to get out of appearances to finally find being, of illusion to enter into the reality of existence. We need to help each other free ourselves and get out of our confinement. There is nothing more important than helping each other to live and to remain free to come and go.

Be of good cheer, kid. Do not be afraid of effort and perseverance. Don’t rely on impatience to get outside. Put your hand on the little you know about what fills you, and what you are in your depth. Take one step at a time. Calmly. And venture into the unknown. Above all, child, give up giving up.

Friend, if by chance you are looking for God and your quest brings you back to being like the little captive child of the glass palace, if you feel prisoner to everything that has been told to you about him and that disturb your life, lay your hand on the Gospel as on solid ice, and do not take it away. Then glide along the pages.

It could be that the man from Nazareth will lead you into the mystery of the “Trinity”, the mystery of a spring, a torrent and a stream of life where it is good to bathe. He will not take you out of your condition as a man. He will not volatilize the reality of your humanity; but in the sometimes enclosing maze of religion, he will raise you from the grave and put you back in the freshness of an Easter morning.

Raphael Buyse is a priest of the diocese of Lille. He wrote Otherwise, God and Otherwise, the Gospel, at Bayard, and recently Only fools can be wise at Salvador 2022.

Raphaël Buyse: “Put your hand on the Gospel, and don’t take it off”