The Dark Night of Long Distance Relationships: St. John of the Cross

There are iconic questions. "Whom shall I send?" "Will you marry me?" "Can you hear me now?" 

I started out in ministry as a youth and young adults pastor and one of those iconic questions was "How do I know he/she is the one?" 

Concerned with being a good and wise pastor I tried to ask some good questions, listen carefully, and offer sage advice. But what floated in the back of my mind, tongue-in-cheek, was: "Has he/she read The Dark Night of the Soul over the phone with you?" 

Kristina and I met during the summer of 2001. I recounted parts of that story in this post. We started dating, long distance, late in the fall of that same year. We dated for 1 year before we got engaged and were engaged for 1.5 years before we were married. All of this was long distance. People have often asked us about this. Our response is that there were certainly difficult things about having a long distance relationship - you miss one another, you don't get as much physical contact as you want, you can't do the things people usually do together - but there were also real gifts to having such a relationship - a lot of practice in communicating well, we dug deeply into shared interests, we were creative with one another, we built habits that have been a blessing for a lifetime. 

Practically speaking, having a long distance relationship in the days before skype and zoom meant we had three options for connection: Mail (paper or email), phone calls, and online chat (in it's early forms; think ICQ and MSN Chat). It turns out that completely removing all non-verbal cues from conversations, as is the case with online chat, is a terrible idea for relationships. Who knew? We spent a lot of time on the phone. My roommate and I, both in long distance relationships, divided up the week; 3 nights each. I also sent a lot of postcards (that's another story...). 

When a dating couple spends a lot of their time together on the phone they have to get creative. We, like all dating couples, wanted to share activities. One of those was reading together. And one of the books we read together was The Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross. And that, dear reader, is how I knew that she was the one! 

The Dark Night of the Soul has a bit of a reputation these days. It is not an entirely uncommon term to hear thrown around by preachers or mentioned in books on the spiritual life. It gets tied to the idea of experiencing the absence of God in our lives as part of our journey of faith. This is fair, I suppose, but leaves out a lot. 

What, you ask, does it leave out? The Dark Night of the Soul is a paired work; it is part of two of The Ascent of Mount Carmel. Together they describe the active and passive purification of the senses and the spirit which lead to union with God. Both works are presented as a commentary on a poem by John, though they are also much more deeply explorations of scripture and experience in walking with God. John's poetry fits among the greatest of Spanish poems and love poetry. 

"One dark night,

fired with love's urgent longings

- ah, the sheer grace! - 

I went out unseen, 

my house being now all stilled."

(Verse 1)

It has been said that there are few things more romantic you can do with your spouse than read poetry to them. Kristina and I do not often have the same taste in poetry, but we came together on this one. 

Honestly, if that was all that this book had accomplished it would be enough for it to make this list. Kristina and I read other books together over the phone but this one stands out. But this book had more of an impact than this. 

A fuller explanation of the Dark Night, though still brief, would point out that as we come to know and walk with God we are constantly tempted to turn from his face to his hands. That is, we are tempted to love him and seek him for his blessings rather than for himself. This is natural as God delights in blessing us and gives good gifts. Not only that, but the early days of one's spiritual journey are often marked by special enjoyment in the things of God, quickly experiencing the presence of God when we seek him, and what seems to be an ever deepening hunger for God. What John points out is that this is a natural place to begin but a dangerous place to stay. The reason is that we have not yet begun to darken the appetites of our senses, which are tuned to the things of the world, we have merely met God in the midst of them. Our natural passions (joy, hope, fear, and sorrow) are still disordered. The danger is that God will become one appetite among many, fit into our worldly selves, rather than being the person and force that reshapes our entire being away from the desires of the world so that we can be wholly devoted to Him. The journey to that devotion, to that union, is one of darkening. Darkening the appetites of our senses, walking the dark road of faith, and entering into the presence of God who is surrounded by clouds and thick darkness (Ps. 97:2). And it is this journey on which John seeks to offer guidance. 

Reading this book again has caused me to pause and reflect on my reading of it as a young man. I'm not sure how much I really understood or got out of it. Reading it now has been amazing and life-giving. I had to read it very slowly as one point after another struck home and required time to reflect on. But looking back I do think I learned enough, given where I was in my journey. I learned not to expect the spiritual life to be one of constant ease and encouragement. I learned to expect the many places of disorder in my life to rear up regularly and cause problems. And I learned that God has a deeply good plan, even when I don't understand it. Especially then. 

That last one was very important to me. Having been checked in my path by The Cloud of Unknowing John, in his writings, began to show me a way forward. Through this book I started to gain a deeper understanding of what faith looks like and how it is required of us in our relationship with God. 

I do have to add the same thing I added at the end of my reflections on The Cloud of Unknowing: If you pick this up know that it is not an easy read. It is a worthy read but it is another book filled with medieval catholic context that requires thoughtful engagement. 

Note: This post is part of a series which I began here. To see all the posts in the series click the label at the bottom of this post "20yrs40bks".