“It was our first time in the desert. We didn’t take a guide. We were very stupid about that.”
If you were to make a list of American ministers who were the face of Christianity in the 20th Century, you would include Billy Graham, representing Evangelicals, Bishop Fulton Sheen, rep- resenting Roman Catholics, and Bishop James Pike, representing, uh…
James Pike might have been one of the most controversial individuals who ever called themselves Christian. On some issues, he was right on. Racial harmony, the dignity of the individual, helping the poor and seeking the spiritual side of human beings. But as iconoclasts often do, Pike went off the rails a bit. Some might make the argument that he really wasn’t Christian because he denied so many central doctrines. (He was born Catholic, became agnostic and then became an Episcopalian bishop.) After his son committed suicide in 1966, he dabbled in the occult trying to make amends with his boy from beyond the grave with a séance. His personal life was even more chaotic and disordered. An alcoholic (he eventually sobered up with AA), a womanizer (he was married three times), by the time he stepped down from his position as Episcopal bishop of Northern California, he had divorced his second wife and was living with another woman, who herself eventually committed suicide. In 1969, he and his third wife Diane who was two decades younger than he was, decided to do some research in the Judean desert for a book about the historical Jesus.
It was a fatal mistake.
Starting out by car with only two Coca-Colas to sustain them, the couple decided to drive off the beaten path in one of the most severe and forbidding places in all the world. When their back tires got stuck in a rut, the two tried to walk out of the vast wasteland. Pike decided that he could go no further and so Diane bravely continued on. For ten hours, often only walking by moonlight she eventually made it to help. An ex- tensive search party then scoured the arid and desolate wilderness in search of the hapless churchman. Five days later, Pike was found dead. He was only 56 years old.
After he was discovered, Diane offered these sad words: “We tried to follow Jesus’ footsteps. We wanted to see the conditions Jesus knew. Jim had been here six times before and I had been here once. It was our first time in the desert. We didn’t take a guide. We were very stupid about that.”
Yup.
There are plenty of lessons to be learned from the bizarre and curious story of Bishop Pike. The most obvious is be pre- pared. As one author so succinctly put it: Pike was an articulate and witty spokesman for racial equality, the poor, and the role of women in the church. But it all seems so accidental.
Pike never seemed to recognize that giving voice to the prophetic makes some private demands on the prophet. He seemed like one of those people who knew how everyone else should live their lives, but was clueless as to how to live his. He knew how the Church should change, but was unwill- ing to undergo true conversion himself. He was the pilot of his own life, but in reality needed a guide.
The first Sunday of Lent always references the story of the temptations of Jesus and his time in the desert. We too are invited into that forbidding, threatening, fierce and perilous place. We need not travel into the Judean desert, for the de- sert we need to walk can be found right inside our own hearts and souls. It is the place to do battle with the demons of our lives. And so, unlike Bishop Pike, we would do well to prepare ourselves for this inhospitable badlands.
First we need a guide. We cannot face the wilderness alone. We need others, especially those who have been through the deserts of their own lives, to help us find our way. When I was on retreat with our students from Borgia, they often ventured into very dangerous spiritual territory. But they had, almost to a person, someone to walk with them: the adults on the retreat, the student leaders. But there was an- other group that also guided them in a powerful way. Almost every one, in my groups at least, talked about how their grandparents were models and examples and guides for them. Do not take those people for granted.
Next, we take the water of baptism and the food of the Eucharist with us. The Sacraments are there to sustain us in our dark times. A couple of years ago, I found it very difficult to pray. Not a good thing for a priest, but, hey, it hap- pens. And even though celebrating baptisms and saying Mass felt like I was just going through the motions, even those seemingly pointless actions, eventually carried me through that dark time in my life. It gave me the structure, to carry on and eventually find my way through my own private desert. The Sacraments offer is a strength and a promise that eventually we will discover the path.
And finally we make it through the desert by holding on to simple things. When the Israeli army found Pike and his disabled car, they got the car out. They then turned on the motor and found that the car drove perfectly. Here is the ironic part. The car had a jack in it. Pike was an incredibly learned man, bishop and author. And yet if he and his wife had only known how to work a simple jack, he would have probably survived the ordeal.
Life gets incredibly complex, convoluted, and difficult. The desert of Lent reminds us to keep it simple. Don’t get too fancy. Don’t get too elaborate. Sometimes all life demands is the simplest of actions: saying you are sorry, telling someone that you love them, enjoying a simple sunrise, showing someone appreciation.
An author once wrote:
The desert is the place where, stripped of all that normally nourishes and supports us, we are exposed to chaos, raw fear, and demons of every kind. In the desert we are exposed, body and soul, made vulnerable to be overwhelmed by chaos and temptations of every kind. But, precisely because we are so stripped of everything we normally rely on, this is also a privileged moment for grace. Why? Because all the defense mechanisms, support systems, and distractions that we normally surround ourselves with so as to keep chaos and fear at bay work at the same time to keep much of God’s grace at bay. What we use, to buoy us up, wards off both chaos and grace, demons and the divine alike. Converse- ly, when we are helpless we are open. That is why the desert is both the place of chaos and the place of God’s closeness.
Just bring more than two Cokes and learn how to use a jack.
Father Kevin