I’ve been thinking a lot about the liminal — about how, if I press my forefinger against my thumb as hard as I can and then measure the distance separating the two, I can still divide that distance by infinity. As close as I can bring my thumb and my forefinger together, the two are always separated by space, a distance. Even the most minuscule space can be divided in half again and again and again, into infinity. Yet still, I try to connect my fingers, I try to bridge the space, I try with everything I possess to get to the thing itself. We can get so close but never, it seems, eliminate the gap entirely.
When I’m trying contemplative prayer or meditation – or, more accurately for me, “how many times can I count my inhales before I start making my grocery list” sessions – I sometimes try to find that liminal space, that space between. We can almost get there, if we really focus; but as soon as we’re there, it’s gone. We can take a deep breath and follow it, all the way to the top. As soon as we get there, and as soon as we realize that we’re there, we have to go back down — and out comes the exhale. And so we breathe again.
When I’m trying contemplative prayer or meditation … I sometimes try to find that liminal space, that space between.
These are words.
These are metaphors.
These are images and stories.
These are relationships.
These are all attempts to pause right in that moment that can never really be paused. Words will always be symbols of concepts we’ll never truly understand. Metaphors will always point both to and away from the things they represent. Images and stories will always circle around what we really mean. And folks in relationships, no matter how hard or how long they work, will still find themselves missing one another, still in the never-ending loop of rupture and repair. This is the work of public theology — to get as close to the thing as we can. And we can’t do it alone.
This is what we try to do when we share our theology. Can we get as close to the thing itself – can we pause or notice right after the inhale and mark the moment, name the thing – before it slips right out of our hands? This is writing. Language. Storytelling. This is the work of incarnation. It’s sacrament — the meeting of two worlds, so quick it bursts in our hands. But we keep going. We keep hoping that somewhere out there is the perfect phrase, the perfect metaphor or story that will finally encapsulate what we mean. And we keep hoping that somewhere out there is the perfect receptacle, the perfect receiver, the perfect hearer who will finally understand and engage with what we mean. And then pop! There it goes again.
Jesus could do it. He could see the both and the and in everything, the sacred and the profane, without ever sacrificing one for the sake of the other. He was the axis Mundi, the thing that connected the so-called “heavenly” with the so-called “earthly.” The dividing line that we create between what is human and what is God disappears for Jesus. No either/or exists in anything. There is only both/and. Jesus could press his finger to his thumb, and they would connect completely. No wonder he walked around telling stories.
And so we write and sing and talk and create. We do these things because that is when we’re most attentive to those tiny, tender beats between the inhale and the exhale — when the either/ors begin to blur and, for just the tiniest second, we enter into a mysterious both/and. It is a failure every time.
Public theology: the tools we have
Still, we delude ourselves into thinking that this time, we’ll catch the wave at the top of the crest and hold it there, capture it, finally have a hold on the thing itself. It will crash back down. It always does. We will always talk around and about and among and through the thing, using these strange squiggly lines that stand for letters, which stand for sounds, which make words, which point to concepts, which turn into stories, our relentless attempts to make meaning out of all of this missing and dividing and getting close. It’s a spiritual discipline. It’s a deep listening. And it’s stepping into the ocean, knowing that we’ll fail. It’s trying, as author and clinical psychologist James Finley said, to fit the ocean into a thimble. It’s not going to work; it’s not going to fit. But in the attempt to hold the ocean in a thimble, maybe we’ll toss all the thimbles in, and we’ll find them surrounded by ocean — around and about and among and through.
When we do public theology, we want to find ourselves in the ocean.
When we do public theology, all are invited to jump in.
When we do public theology, the whole world can come test the waters.
When we do public theology, God calls us to fail and flail and, finally, float.
Public theology, at its best, is a never-ending attempt to catch and hold the real and then to bring us all to that space where humility takes over, where we experience the absurdity in the trying, where we come to the end of ourselves and then notice there’s a little bit more, just a little farther — over one more hill, past one more bend, up one more switchback. That feels like faith. That feels like prayer. That feels like presence. And maybe in our flailing around and in our clumsy pointing to that which cannot be pointed to, we might inspire others to try it too, in whatever meaning-making form works for them. Maybe with all of us splashing around, missing and pointing and pointing and missing, we can become that body of Christ: that incarnation that can hold the both and the and together, without sacrificing either one. Maybe, for a moment.
I know that all sounds weird and ethereal and out there. But it’s grounded in the real stuff of this world. If we take all the stuff that points to God, all the dirt and trees and sorrow and joy and stories and words, and we keep sharing it with one another, maybe a sacrament will happen. Maybe the bread and the body will become one long enough for us to get a taste.
So writing, storytelling, metaphors, images — they’re all meaning-making. They’re all as vital as breathing. They are all ways that we point to, and away from, the thing itself. And these are the tools we have. This is what we get.
