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I visited a monastery many years ago – in Greece, in fact. When I arrived, I was greeted with enthusiasm by the monks. Their liturgy overwhelmed me, and I thought, who knows, I might have more talent for divine love than the human sort! I wondered if it was possible to become a monk without too much Christianity, because you have to believe it lots, and I’m not very good at that.
I come to believe slowly, because I suffer spiritual indigestion easily!
A lot of Christianity is, indeed, a riddle. In that monastery chapel it wasn’t comfortable listening to what the Bible has to say about such things as miracles and supernatural phenomena. And I’m not into things like the Virgin Birth, the Assumption or the validity of Anglican orders.
But my monastery visit deepened my faith with the Almighty. My Christianity wasn’t, therefore, historical or even theological – as in TV programmes – it was just personal. Those monks made eternity very real to me, because they lived in it. They taught me to see the invisible.
I can’t speak about the Incarnation or the Assumption, but I’ve witnessed goodness incarnating itself in some Christians I know. Like Rembrandt, I can see it in their faces. I also can’t speak of the Resurrection fully, but I’ve witnessed, sometimes, a kind of rebirth in myself.
I occasionally drop into monasteries in this country and look forward to a sniff of their distinctive odour. It’s an institutional smell made up of incense, fish and furniture polish. But for me, it’s the odour of sanctity, because I always associate it with the renewal of my own inner self.
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