The Greening (31 page)

She said, “It’s water upon a stone. We cannot know what the outcome will be of anything we do. We can only do – and must do – what we believe to be right.”

I missed Paul terribly. I lived and I worked, but inside there was a big, empty chasm, a desperate sadness and hunger and a pain from which I was never free. I hugged my sorrow to me, like a protective cloak. The place where I lived with my grief was private. Kind friends tried to persuade me to talk about Paul and how I felt, but I resisted. Nobody could possibly understand. Because I knew this, because I did not wish to be pressured into conversations that would cause me further pain, and perhaps because I wanted to disconnect the part of myself that felt and needed love, I distanced myself from people other than work contacts. My home became both sanctuary and prison.

My phone would ring at all hours of the day and night with news of a story that someone, somewhere, needed desperately to have publicized. I was glad of it. It gave me a purpose and an outlet for my energies. I came to care about people who were thousands of miles away, people to whom I could give practical help. I knew that meticulous reporting, rather than polemic, was my best weapon in their defence. One inaccuracy could undermine the authority of a piece, but the truth could not be refuted. Julian had taught me a lesson about reporting faithfully even those things I did not understand.

My thoughts often turned to Julian… Julian, who had been cheeky enough to question Jesus, as he gave her a message of love from the cross, as to how what he said about all being well could possibly be true when you only had to look around you to see how miserable people were, doing bad things and causing grief to themselves and to others; Julian, who piped up with a “Would you mind clarifying what you just said?” at a press conference with God. How
could I fail to like her? She even had a great sense of humour. While miraculously recovering from her illness, after being given the last rites, an enquiry from her priest as to how she was feeling elicited the response, “I have been raving half the day!” which made him chuckle. It is all there, in her book.

Sometimes I would seek solace in my copy of
Enfolded in Love
. One quotation in particular touched me: “He did not say, ‘You shall not be tempest-tossed, you shall not be work-weary, you shall not be discomforted’. But he said, ‘You shall not be overcome.’” The words made me feel safe and at peace. They reminded me of a hymn we had sung at my mother’s funeral, about travelling across life’s tempestuous seas to a better place, and having no fear of the raging storm because
“Fy Nhad sydd wrth y llyw” –
my Father will be at the helm.

In the spring Ismene invited me to the annual Julian Lecture. It was to take place at St Julian’s Church on 8 May, the anniversary of the visions. Sister Eleanor, Gregorio’s friend, was to give the talk. Ismene told me that her convent, St Etheldreda’s, had helped Gregorio’s sister to set up a Julian prayer group in East Timor. I accepted Ismene’s invitation, wanting to believe there was some pattern, sense and meaning to life and hoping it might be revealed to me on that day.

I met Ismene and Gregorio in London. Over lunch, Gregorio shared with us his worries about his country, where the brutality of the illegal regime continued unabated. His family had been influential under the Portuguese, before the Indonesian occupation, but today, like everyone else, they lived with the constant fear of imminent death. Almost every day a neighbour or friend disappeared. He felt helpless, believing he should be able to do more.

We travelled by train to Norwich and arrived at St Julian’s Church half an hour before the lecture was due to start. The church was already packed. Everyone seemed to know everyone else and there was a lively buzz of conversation. Sister Eleanor was introduced
by Sheila Upjohn, a local writer. She announced the title of the lecture as “Julian and the God of the Wayside”. Sheila spoke briefly of her own experience of Julian, saying, “Once she gets her hooks into you she won’t let go until you’ve done the work she wants you to do!”

I loved this description. Practical love was such an important part of my maternal family heritage. Stories about my grandmother and great-grandmother were all about how they helped others. Giving a helping hand to someone in distress was so natural to my mother that there was always a little gift here, a word of kindness there, some small act of generosity, done without fuss.

She used to tell me how my grandmother would give money to the miners employed by my grandfather when they ran out of cash before pay-day. She told me how my great-grandmother had carried clean bedlinen on her back across the mountain at Senghenydd, in South Wales, to a woman who was bedridden and neglected, with a houseful of children. “And the doctor said, ‘For heaven’s sake, Mrs Jones, cut her bloody toenails!’”

People used to joke about Blodwen, my aunt, that if you wanted to find her you should look in the house of the person in the village who was in most need. Like Blodwen, Julian was a practical woman. Surely such a woman would not let me down with promises that would not be kept? Julian, the person, had become important to me. Was she someone in whom I could put my trust?

Sister Eleanor stepped up to the lectern. She gave us a welcoming smile that seemed to embrace each one of us. I was astonished to hear her hit upon the very subject that had been on my mind. She said, “When life is painful and we suffer, it may seem impossible that there is any pattern or plan and that there is a God who cares for us. But it is our blindness that makes us think this way. Because we are poor in love, we cannot comprehend God’s love, which is great.

“When we know his love and have seen it at work in our lives, then we begin to see clearly. We begin to understand that our Father is very much in charge, and indeed so intimately involved in our lives that he lives within us.

“We have Julian’s testimony for this. Julian tells us how her spiritual eyes were opened and she saw her own soul, in the middle of her heart. She says, ‘The soul was as large as if it were an eternal world, and a blessed kingdom as well. Its condition showed it to be a most glorious city, in which God was seated, in rightful peace and rest. His Godhead rules and upholds both heaven and earth, and all that is, and is supreme in might, wisdom and goodness. Nor will he quit the place he holds in our soul for ever… for in us is he completely at home and has his eternal dwelling.’

“When I first encountered Julian, there was a great deal that I did not understand. And yet all the while, I felt I could trust her. I felt I had come home. The better I have come to know her, the more I have come to understand her, and to love her, as so many of you dear friends here today love her.

“I love her because she loved me first. There can be no doubt of that. It’s so clear in the way she speaks of her ‘even-Christens’, the ordinary people whom she loved. And it’s clear in the diligent way she carried out her sacred task of interpreting her message. From the pages of her book shines a mother’s love.

“But for some of us, it is very hard to simply accept her assurance of God’s love, her insistence that God regards us as his darlings and never stops loving us, no matter what we feel and no matter what we do. Because many of us have never experienced anything approximating to that kind of love.

“We are living in a new Dark Age, in which the world is enduring a loss of love, a loss of tenderness, a loss of imagination, a loss of trust, a loss of soul. For so many, the pain is so great that there can be no trust in relationships and no safety in the universe. The yearning to love and to be loved is stifled and replaced by a constant watchfulness and a defensiveness. Lonely people, belonging nowhere and to nobody, cope as best they can.

“The search for intimacy has never been so desperate. Yet many people go in fear of ridicule, condemnation and rejection. Others carry the burden of self-hate. They pass the ultimate judgement upon themselves, as if, somehow, to deaden the pain of intolerable
anxiety. They are filled with inner desolation and feelings of failure and worthlessness. Yet they are beautiful, and they are truly loved and they have reason to hope.”

The Sister’s message touched something deep within me. I quietly searched for tissues in my handbag.

Sister Eleanor continued, “How are we to take into our hearts the unconditional love that God offers us? How does a hungry vagrant approach the table of a generous host who has thrown open his doors and said, ‘Come in, you are welcome! You are the honoured guest we have all been waiting for. You are the prodigal returned and we are longing to kill the fatted calf!’ How can he believe that he is really wanted? He knows what he is – or at least, he thinks he does. Why should anyone want him?

“It is hard to accept the limitless love God offers us, because we do not understand the nature of that love, because we are so poor in love. So God comes to us in small ways that we can understand. For the great God who rules heaven and earth is also the God of the Wayside.

“If we want to find the truth, to encounter God, we must look in hidden places – the kindness of someone who offers us a seat on the bus when we are tired, who notices the need of another and goes out to meet it. When we keep our eyes open for small acts of kindness and generosity and consider where the impulse to perform those acts originated, then we meet the God of the Wayside. For such acts always spring from a loving heart. As Julian says, all goodness comes from God, and it reaches the ‘lower self’, or human personality, from the higher self – which is the soul of God who lives in us.

“And so, to grow in love, we must learn to recognize God in others and to find God in ourselves. We are asked to accept the kindness of others. We are asked to do those things that the heart tells us to do, so that in time those actions become second nature and we grow in compassion.

“In this way, we learn to give love to all people, not just the special few. We come to see people in a different light, each as an individual, each deserving of love. And we come to see ourselves in the same way. This is how the world is saved, and how we are saved.

“But when we refuse to acknowledge truth that has been revealed to us, when we resist the impulse to be kind, perhaps through fear of being misunderstood; when we reject the kindness of others, perhaps because we suspect the giver’s motives or think we do not deserve it; then we quench the Holy Spirit, as we are cautioned against in the Book of Thessalonians, and we stop the action of love. By giving and receiving love, we come into God’s way of life, we open our hearts to him and allow him to enter and change us, we grow to become what we were made to be – part of God – a destiny that will bring us joy and peace and the true fulfilment of being our real selves.”

Sister Eleanor explained that when Julian said nothing happened by chance, she was saying that we should accept and embrace all that came our way, however painful it might be. We should not try to protect ourselves from life, but take it all as an opportunity for learning.

“Julian assures us that God will not allow anything to happen to us that cannot be turned to our good. Life is our teacher and we learn and grow through our relationships with others.

“So we must not hug our pain to us, but strive to learn the lesson it brings us. We have Julian’s assurance that one day we will be glad that everything happened in just the way that it did. If we seek the companionship of the God of the Wayside, he will walk with us along our path through life, showing us that, despite the difficulties we face and the suffering we endure, it all makes sense, and that, as Julian promised us, all shall be well.”

As the lecture ended, I hurriedly wiped my eyes, hoping no one had noticed my tears. It was extraordinary. It was as though Sister Eleanor had fashioned her lecture precisely to meet my need and had been speaking to me personally.

The lecture ended to warm applause. The audience members were quickly on their feet and gathered around the Sister, congratulating her. Tea was served and we mingled with the crowd. I noticed a tall, distinguished-looking elderly man talking to Sister Eleanor.

“There’s Robert Llewelyn,” Gregorio said. I knew his name, of course, as the editor of
Enfolded in Love
and the former chaplain of Julian’s cell.

“Would you like to meet Robert?” asked Gregorio. It transpired that Gregorio had been several times to visit Robert Llewelyn at his home nearby. I said I would love to. Mr Llewelyn, who was helping himself to a cup of tea, greeted us warmly. He had the kindest eyes I had ever seen. I told him I had derived great comfort from
Enfolded in Love
. He thanked me and then questioned Gregorio solicitously about his sister.

“She is well, thank you, Robert. The Sisters are very brave,” said Gregorio.

Mr Llewelyn asked me about myself, and before I knew it I found myself telling him, hesitantly, without meaning to, about Paul’s death. As I did so, Gregorio quietly left us together. If kind looks can heal a heart, mine was a little healed in that moment. Mr Llewelyn seemed really to care about my unhappiness. He asked if he could do anything to help. Perhaps I would like to visit him. He gave me his telephone number.

“Would you like to meet Sister Eleanor? I think you would enjoy talking to her,” he said.

“I have briefly met the Sister and I would love to meet her again,” I said.

Mr Llewelyn excused himself and a few moments later returned with the Sister.

“I hope we will meet again. Do come and visit me,” he said, then shook my hand warmly and left me with Sister Eleanor.

The Sister’s smile was gentle and tender. Her presence seemed to envelop me, like a circle of love and healing light. I felt better, simply being with her. I said that I had enjoyed her talk. She thanked me and said, “I’m glad you came here today, to Julian’s little church. It’s such a little wayside place, isn’t it? You’d never notice it unless you were looking for it.”

“I was looking for it – very much so,” I replied, beginning to feel terribly sad.

Sister Eleanor touched my arm gently. “I’m glad you found it, found us, today.” She paused, and then said, “Robert told me about your great loss. I’m very sorry.” She looked as though she really meant it, really cared. Tears started to prick at the back of my eyes. Sister Eleanor continued to speak softly to me, words of comfort and reassurance, all the while looking into my eyes with kindness and understanding.