In the Shelter by Pádraig Ó Tuama

I heard of Pádraig Ó Tuama (pronounced Pah-drick O Two-ma) listening to his interview with Krista Tippett on “On Being.” In that interview, he spoke of saying “Hello” as a prayer.

In In the Shelter, I learned more about that. Ó Tuama tells about going to a Taizé retreat and the Taizé monk has several people read the story of Jesus’ appearance to the disciples in the upper room (in John) in several different languages. The monk noted that Jesus greeted his disciples by saying, “Peace be with you.” 

The Taizé brother suggested that we pause for a moment and consider the words “Peace be with you” that the resurrected Jesus says to his locked-in followers. The Taizé brother said that, in a real sense, we can read that as “Hello.” After all, it’s the standard greeting in Hebrew, Arabic, and Aramaic.  

The disciples were there, in fear, in an upper room, locked away, and suddenly the one they had abandoned and perhaps the one they most feared to be with them was with them, and he said hello. 

Hello to you in this locked room. (p. 10)

Throughout the book, Ó Tuama does that – he tells a story or writes about something, and then ends it with “Hello to … something.” I find that use of “hello” very helpful. A while ago I wrote to my family about the fact that, ever since my brother died 11 years ago, Nov. 4, 2006, the Fall season brings on a kind of melancholy for me. I love the Fall so the first time it happened to me I had said to a friend that I didn’t know what was wrong with me, I felt sad for no known reason, and I was crying easily. She said, “Didn’t your brother die in the Fall?” and went on to say that sometimes our bodies somehow hold that memory. I think she was right. And this year, with the death of both my parents, it seems more acute – even though they died in winter at the beginning of the year. I find it somehow helpful to think to myself, “Hello grief. Hello sadness. Hello melancholy.” I’m not sure why it helps, but it does.

In another story kind of about saying hello (p. 14), Ó Tuama writes about a National Geographic story he read where a photojournalist wrote about a tribal group she’d lived with who “had no word for hello. Instead upon seeing someone, one simply said, ‘You are here’.” Then he writes, “The answer, as I recall it, was equally straightforward: ‘Yes I am.’ Whether by fact or fiction, it remains that for decades I have thought of the words ‘You are here’ and ‘Yes I am’ as good places to begin something that might be called prayer.

These phrases – “You are here” and “Yes I am” – made me think of hinani, the Hebrew word for “Here I am” that I have written about and thought of often. Things keep attracting me to that concept, of saying “Here I am” to God, ready for the mission you will give me.

One of the things I loved about In the Shelter and Pádraig Ó Tuama is that he loves The Lord of the Rings. He quotes from those books quite a few times. I love those books, too, so it gives me a lot of joy to see the words and stories from them used as ways to discuss deep things such as faith and prayer.

Ó Tuama writes some interesting things about religion. In one place (p. 24), he writes, “Religion had rarely been something that gave me hope for happiness. Effort certainly…” That made me sad. I hear that so often, where people obviously think that being religious is a matter of effort, of following rules.

It reminded me of a time with my grandma (Grace Kok, my dad’s mom). For the year my dad was in Vietnam we lived next door to my grandma, in Lynden, WA. This was a time when CRC churches pretty much all had “night church,” an evening service. Sometimes my grandma wouldn’t feel up to going to church in the evening, and instead she’d listen to the service as it was broadcast over the radio. I sat with her and listened to the service this night. Afterward, Grandma said that she was always disappointed when ministers gave sermons that did not talk about the joy of Christianity. She said something like, “Why don’t they talk about how happy it makes you?”

Don’t you love that? I didn’t think that much about it back then, but I think about it often now. Just the other day I was talking to a friend who has left the faith she grew up with. I forget exactly what my friend said, but like my Grandma I responded with something like, “It’s too bad the way people think religion is a bunch of rules. It’s all about Jesus’ love, so much love. It gives me so much joy.” As Pádraig Ó Tuama would say, hello to joy.

Pádraig Ó Tuama also writes about religion needing to know that it may not always be right (p. 193). He recalls a Peanuts cartoon where Snoopy is writing a book of theology.

Charlie Brown comes along and says, “…I hope you have a good title.” Snoopy looks up, in a superior fashion, and indicates that he has the perfect title. He resumes typing and the title of his theological oeuvre appears in typeface in the sky. “Have you ever considered that you might be wrong?”

…It is evidence of religious integrity to be fluent in living well with the questions underneath our hope. “Let us cling to you,” we say to our Jesus, and he answers, “Have you ever considered that you might be wrong?” He says, “No, do not cling to me.” He says, “Live well” and “Change” and “Learn.” He asks, “What are you doing with your power?” and he answers, “Do not miss the mark again.” He praises those who act and criticizes those who focus only on their words. He tells stories that do not end and ends stories that do not start.

Hello to the gift of being wrong.

Hello to the need for change.

In another part of the book (p. 74) he tells a story that pierced my heart. He says, as far as he can remember it, it’s a “transcript of something a twelve-year-old girl said one day.” The girl talks about a story told by a woman at a church event who “said that she was going to tell a story about God that the children would love” (p. 73).

She told us this story about the station master of a train station. The station master saw that a train was coming along and saw that the line was broken. If he didn’t change the line that the train was on, then the train would go off a cliff and everyone would die. So he needed to change the line, but he saw that his son was playing on the other line, the safe one. So he had to decide if he’d save the people or save his son. He saved the people.

The woman ended the story and said: “That’s what God’s love is like. He saved us instead of his son.” She said, “That’s a story I know the young people will love.”

I thought it was a stupid story because it just made me worry that my daddy is going to murder me.

Ó Tuama goes on to say:

The clarity of this girl’s analysis of the story was compelling…It was clear that she was, as we’d say in Cork [Note from Mavis: Pádraig Ó Tuama is Irish.], not backwards about being forwards – she said what she thought when she thought it. I thought she was marvelous. I asked her if she sometimes got into trouble in school for saying what she thought. She looked at me, as if amazed that I might have perceived this about her character, and said, “All. The. Time.” I said, “Well, take it from me, you’ve got good things to say, keep saying them,” and she looked puzzled but pleased.

Hello to being right. It’s not always easy.

This whole passage makes me happy “on many levels,” as people are wont to say. First, as I said earlier, that train story is heart-piercing, don’t you think? It’s like a cruel trick question. And for that woman to think it would be a story “the children would love.” Seriously? Ha!

Then the twelve-year-old girl’s conclusion – “It just made me worry that my daddy is going to murder me” – cracks me up.

And Pádraig Ó Tuama’s admiration for her forthrightness, I love that. I myself often get in trouble for saying what I think when I think of it. It’s so great when someone finds that to be a positive trait! Hello to being “not backwards about being forwards.”

I could go on and on about this book, but already I’ve written quite a long blog entry here. I feel like this book is “an embarrassment of riches.” There’s so much in it, so much to soak in, so much to enjoy, to savor, to tuck into your heart. I recommend it wholeheartedly.

As you can see, I used my post-it note method again.
Testimony to it being an embarrassment of riches!!