Public action included fasting for Gandhi. Again Thomas Merton comments.
When friends tried to dissuade Gandhi from fasting for the people (and Gandhi's fasts were completely public, political acts in the highest sense of the word) he replied: "God's voice has been increasingly audible as years have rolled by. He has never forsaken me even in my darkest hour. He has saved me often against myself and left me not a vestige of independence. The greater the surrender to Him, the greater has been my joy."
He was never trying to simply "apply political pressure to achieve short-term ends. His fasts were a living reminder of whose we are and how all of us have gone off in a direction that is quite antithetical to who we are to be within God's Reign. In some ways, I suppose he practiced a discipline of hope. As close as he came to death, all he would see is the possible that was not yet. Therefore, as the fast continued, is sounds like he was always looking out to the horizon...to the not yet...to the what could be...to a wholeness that embraced all - forever and ever. In the meantime, his vision was so fixed on what could be the reality of the people, he was willing to walk into the light of his own death. He would have life no other way than within the reality of a world that was dedicated to the prayerful welfare of all people. Quite a personal and public witness.
Connection: What a discipline. To go through the present with eyes on the possible...eyes so fixed there is peace even in the midst of physical distress and turmoil. What is it that catches and keeps our eyes even within one day's time?
You promise to be our guide and our strength, O God, and we desperately need you to be just that. We can be overwhelmed so easily - and when that take place - we move with the wind as it changes from moment to moment. Keep us eternally focused on your promise of new life as we go about the life that is handed to us in this day. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment