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One way in which human love manifests itself is delight in another person’s particularity: the peculiar joy experienced when a friend or relative does something so typical of himself, so expressive of his personality and even foibles, that we are reminded to recall to conscious consideration why it is we liked or even came to love this person in the first place. We may then ask: is this sort of delight shared by God? Is this a reflection, a human manifestation, of God’s delight in man?
At first, one is tempted to deny it. This sort of reminding is something that God does not need: He cannot forget, as we can, nor is His attention divided, as ours is. God is also conscious of our sinfulness and failure to live up to His will — a ‘good guy’ in our eyes is, as we all are, still under Divine judgment. Yet it seems an error to ascribe this genuine human delight — a delight that seems innocent and unselfishly appreciative — purely to folly.
Instead, I expect that our delight in other people — in the childlikeness of children, or the singular enthusiasms that characterize a friend — is a momentary hint at the constant state of God’s appreciation of His good creation. He cannot forget, but neither is He bored; with God the law of diminishing returns is reversed. The more a man manifests what is good about his created self, the more delightful He is to God. Our version of this enjoyment is imperfect and short-lived, much as our earthly music must climax and fade in a moment; whereas the heavenly music is eternally constant, like God’s delight in what is good. So let us always thank God for those moments when we are given such a glimpse into how we ought to have always perceived the world, were we not weighed down by the wearying burden of sin: for God made this world and each human being good, however much we cooperate with Satan in spoiling it.
Sublime.
Saint folk say that one way of discerning God’s involvement is that one first experiences a sense of awe or possibly fear and then later a manifestation of peace and joy. The guy down stairs tends to be more abrupt and “exciting” (if-you-will) and then later the experience manifests a certain “disgust” or “emptiness.”
I wonder if people can also do that per se. I think so.
Johnboy, what you said makes sense. I think that Our Lord backs you up, when He brings out the best wine last.
Johnny Boy’s comment reminds me of one of my favorite passages from C.S. Lewis:
“‘Son,’ he said, ‘ye cannot in your present state understand eternity…. But ye can get some likeness of it if ye say that both good and evil, when they are full grown, become retrospective…. That is what mortals misunderstand. They say of some temporal suffering, ‘No future bliss can make up for it,’ not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. And of some sinful pleasure they say, ‘Let me but have this and I’ll take the consequences”: little dreaming how damnation will spread back and back into their past and contaminate the pleasure of the sin. Both processes begin even before death. The good man’s past begins to change so that his forgiven sins and remembered sorrows take on the quality of Heaven: the bad man’s past confirms to his badness and is filled only with dreariness. And that is why, at the end of all things… the Blessed will say, ‘We have never lived anywhere except in Heaven’, and the Lost, ‘We were always in Hell’. And both will speak truly.”
I’ve never read C.S. Lewis but I’ve heard that idea before (which was somewhat alluded to in my post). Which means of course my comment was not exactly original. ;)
But I was wondering if people can initiate to other people those same experiences — not just God or Satan. Perhaps it is obvious such folks can — given the fact that people live heaven or hell right now (or in other words they are disposed to either God or Satan working through them).
Johnboy, maybe you should read the Confessions to confirm your idea. I think that St. Augustine went to this Manichean leader named Faustus (yep, that was his name) in the hope that Faustus would help him stay a Manichee. But the guy’s answers kept getting worse and worse — the returns kept diminishing. But St. Ambrose kept on giving.