From the Library of Deacon Mike:
"One of the most important – and most neglected – elements in the beginnings of the interior life is the ability to respond to reality, to see the value and the beauty in ordinary things, to come alive to the splendor that is all around us."
One of the most funny but wrenchingly sad books which I have been fortunate to read this past year is the memoir by Martha Beck entitled "Expecting Adam". From the moment Martha and her husband John conceived their second child in September 1987, it was the beginning of a time that she and her husband now refer to as "the month It All Went To Hell." To put it mildly, the unexpected pregnancy complicated their busy lives and academic careers. Martha and John were a couple obsessed with success. They had two Harvard degrees apiece and wanted more. Then, when their unborn son, Adam, was diagnosed with Down syndrome, doctors, advisers, and friends in the Harvard community warned them that if they decided to keep the baby, they would lose all hope of achieving their carefully crafted goals. Fortunately, that's exactly what happened! By the time Adam was born, Martha and John were propelled into a world in which they were forced to redefine everything of value to them, to confront the fact that sitting on their doorstep was what many refer to as "amazing grace" offering the invitation to put their faith in miracles, and trust that they could fly with out a net. And it worked!
Although both funny and sad this story is best of all spiritual. Here are a few things that Martha discovered through her son Adam and would like you to know. She writes: "You know what, they didn't really understand. Not any of them. Not Plato, not Kant, not any of the big boys…None of those philosophers got the point. Why? Because they were always focusing on what happens to people. The meaning of life is not what happens to people…The meaning of life is what happens between people. The belief John and I shared before Adam came along – that our rigidly disciplined, distasteful work was the one and only path to a good life – now seems both horrible and silly…Adam's birth convinced us that fate was quite capable of crushing our best-laid plans…In the face of such uncertainty, the only things that seem to us worth doing are the ones that allow us to experience the strange and eventful journey of life in its full richness…In his strange way Adam is constantly reminding me that real magic doesn't come from achieving the perfect appearance, from being Cinderella at the ball with both glass slippers and a killer hair-style. The real magic is in the pumpkin, in the mice, in the moonlight; not beyond ordinary life, but within it. Despite all my years of education and training, what I have learned most about living joyfully has come from one person, and he is not on any faculty. They barely let my son into the first grade…but it scares me to think how much I owe him."
Thomas Merton did say that the beginnings of the interior life is the ability to respond to reality, to see the value and the beauty in ordinary things, to come alive to the splendor that is all around us. For Martha Beck and her husband John that splendor, that beauty was found in a little boy named Adam.
Indeed, this is a true story of birth, rebirth, and everyday magic. My wish is that it brings to you as much happiness as it has brought to me now and I am sure for years to come.
Happy Reading!!!
Mike
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