On Feb. 27, 1601, three Catholics were executed at Tyburn for the crimes of priesthood (i.e., being a Catholic priest) and harboring priests. Anne Line, a convert from Puritanism and found guilty of hosting one priest, was executed by hanging. Then, one by one, the priests died in a far more horrible manner.
I'll be honest: the past several months have not been easy. Problems at all levels--professional, personal, national, ecclesial--have proliferated and intensified. Yet the final, awful culmination of these problems always seems forestalled. We can see a horrendous conclusion looming, yet we are forced into being spectators to our own demise.
Yes, I know: The Book of Job
But anybody who reads this blog probably knows the vacuity of that answer, or at least the superficial use thereof. Job, despite what James 1:7 says, is not patient. I, like many who have taught an undergraduate course on the Bible, have squelched uncountable student flare-ups over this denial.
Job serves a vital purpose by demonstrating that, contra facile readings, this complete annihilation of one's selfhood really sucks. This is especially true when your so-called 'friends' stand by nagging and not helping. And it should be laughable that stating that so requires so much language. Job's story, foreshadowing the Resurrection, concludes with the mystery that the suffering is not the final word. Our earthly existence might end in less-than-desirable circumstances, but that end is not *the* end. God's mystery unfathomably includes more than mere mortals can grasp. That is the point of Job--when God speaks out of the whirlwind, not Job enjoys material restitution.
So, yes, sometimes life does suck, but then there are other times when it's quite spectacular. THAT is life--the ebb and flow.
But not when you're apparently waiting in line at Tyburn. Lately it has not been the horrific experience itself but rather the dread anticipation knowing what is unavoidable. Tom Petty sings that "the waiting is the hardest part." Job and Tyburn substantiate this, but there's no way a nifty pop song summarizes such incipient agony.
