Disturbed by reason. Via de La Plata Merida.
Almendralejo to Merida.
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I left Almendralejo on my 61st birthday. My legs felt better after the ungainly exercises the doctor had demonstrated to me in the hospital the previous afternoon. The old roman road stretched ahead and although I spotted some other pilgrims I preferred to walk alone in silence.
Via de La Plata, following the old Roman road north to Merida.
Exterior silence perhaps, but my mind was full. The day before I had marvelled at how the difficult, uncomfortable moments could become inspiring and increase my energy. I had been giving praise in the sense of wonder and gratitude. This is a prayer of sorts.
I began to have a fierce attack of rationality, well-nourished with science. There is a conflict between science and religion. For me the realm of science is the objective and the measurable and within these limits, using logic which is science’s favourite tool, fairies, resurrected incarnate gods, and love are reduced to neurological impulses in the human brain. Science wants always to explain. It invades, leaves its own territory, and writes new laws when it becomes more dominant within us than the spiritual. It is persuasive. I like, for example, Richard Dawkins. I admire the way he has explained evolutionary biology in a very simple way, graphically and with some fine analogies. I understand existential nihilism without any nausea. I suffer from the Reason delusion.
At the same time I had, for the previous three years been engaged in a personal spiritual re-awakening which had brought me very profound peace. I had been praying regularly with clearly tangible outcomes such as more energy, my walking, a healthy lifestyle, inner quiet and serenity. It was, at this point, still a process of an inward looking journey and it seemed to me necessary to continue inwards. Praying, for the moment was easy and full of good experiences. So my mind’s activity, buzzing with doubt about the whole process, especially the Christianity on which I hang my spirituality, was disturbing. Rationality was saying, “You’d be better off without this nonsense.”
Vineyards, vineyards and vineyards.
The landscape was flat. Vines, recently pruned, were awaiting their first buds. The road was straight. I had no difficulty imagining the Roman legions making this land their own, building their spa in Alange to the East, and their Amphitheatre ahead in Merida, where they had their temple to Diana. Empires, nations and men throughout human history have, in the end all died. That, in the end, is the finality of it.
This assault by reason on my spiritual life was, I remember unwelcome. I was certain, though, that I could not deal with it with logic. I don’t know why those who go all out to defend their faith enter into intellectual combat: it is reason they are fighting and it will not be defeated by reason. So much Christian Theology falls into this trap. I accept the validity of the science, the research, and admire the genius of the human mind. Nor am I willing to struggle to find the spiritual in science. There are some pleasing areas of overlap but insufficient to blur the distance between one dimension and the other. I had been bogged down enough in the past few days: I wanted dry land.
Mud, stay clear until it dries.
I recall well the moment when I discerned the illusion of logic and the weakness of making a god of the rational. Possibly it is akin to what happened to Thomas Aquinas when, near the end of his life, he experienced a vision of God. He wrote no more after that and declared that all his great work, including the Summa Theologica a highly reasoned treatise, was nothing more than “straw”. Put against the joys of the spirit, the rational is toppled from its pedestal. We, because I include myself in this, have put Reason on a throne in the past few centuries and it is no longer our servant but our master.
That, I believe, at least for me, is the key to it. There are times when I am invaded with the whole force of rationality, like an over-powering sexual desire. Science, even with the little knowledge I have of it takes control. It is best not to resist, let if flow through the circuits of my brain and let it lose its force. I can acknowledge it at least, without a battle. It passes. It always does.
What remains is the reality of encounter with God. This happens, for me, through the grammar and syntax of Christianity, its stories and metaphors, rituals, sacraments and culture. It is my mother tongue for conversing with the sacred and going beyond words into a warm embrace, loving everything on earth and everyone, rejoicing in all of nature and forgetting self. I have no sense that this Christian Way is the only way to access the divine, far from it. Given my Irish Catholic roots it is my way but I am learning a lot from Buddhists and Hindus, as are many Christians today.
The shells around the door of this monastery are the principal symbol of the pilgrim
This inner debate took me to Torremegia where the beautiful albergue was closed for renovation. I stayed in a private albergue which was very welcoming. This was only my third time in an albergue with other people since starting the Camino. We had a terrible snorer in the room and that, too, was a first time for me; quite a birthday present.
As a result, I left before dawn. Immediately, I felt welcomed by the natural world, the sunrise, the dew on the bushes coming into leaf and the birds! Extremadura is one of the finest bird-watching areas in Europe. That morning it was the arrival of flocks of kites, both red and brown. Normally each has its own territory but they were arriving from Africa and all finding wires to perch on together. I am sure there is an ornithological explanation for this but what they are doing really is congregating to give thanks for their safe arrival.
Newly arrived kites, resting
At this time of year the storks ,too, are nesting and mating. After the rain the land was richly green and dotted with spring flowers as well as worms and frogs for the storks to help with all their hard work: for I am told that they deliver babies, too.
In the distance, Merida.
I felt light walking to this great Roman city. The attack of reason had passed and, while I knew enough about the workings of evolution, it didn’t in any way seem to say anything to me about this experience of delight in walking between the mountains guarding my path while bathed in the light of a new day. This experience of a spring morning was my nourishment. The symmetry in the flowers and the chaos of landscape both held titillating beauty, suggesting another world of understanding about being alive. Why is symmetry beautiful, and chaos, too? The rational can be beautiful but not all beauty is rational by any means. Why does my heart lift up with pure joy and my lungs expand to drink in the cold air and walk across this magnificent Peninsular?
My attacks of reason haven’t ceased. I still get them and, indeed, on the Camino de Levante when I had begun to try to pray all the time, they were a bit of a torment. I think that many people call them “doubts” but I accept what my reason tells me so I am not “doubting”. Simply, the thoughts associated with rational attacks are distractions. They crop up in the wrong time and at the wrong place. My education has taught me that they should always be welcome, they are a sign of “intellect”. Not so: for my admirable fellow Scot, David Hume, reason was the slave of the passions. He was a man of extraordinary insight. Reason once more needs to become our slave and our passions need to thrive in Love, Christian Love. Reason is not a great bedfellow. It doesn’t lie quietly beside prayer and spiritual experiences but functions a bit like a snorer in the dormitory.