Weltschmerz

Midweek Evensong

The Second Week of Easter

A Reading from the First Epistle of John:

I am writing to you, little children,
    because your sins are forgiven on account of his name.
I am writing to you, fathers,
    because you know him who is from the beginning.
I am writing to you, young people,
    because you have conquered the evil one.
I write to you, children,
    because you know the Father.
I write to you, fathers,
    because you know him who is from the beginning.
I write to you, young people,
    because you are strong
    and the word of God abides in you,
    and you have overcome the evil one.

Do not love the world or the things in the world. The love of the Father is not in those who love the world, for all that is in the world—the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, the pride in riches—comes not from the Father but from the world. And the world and its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God abide forever.

The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St John:

“I ask not only on behalf of these but also on behalf of those who believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

“Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I in them.”

The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Homily:

Lord, we pray for the preacher, for you know his sins are great.

Alleluia! Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed! Alleluia!

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

The Germans have a word for everything, don’t they? One of their more useful ones is weltschmerz, world-pain. Sounds very German, doesn’t it? It’s the literary notion that the world will never live up to our expectations of it, our hopes for it. In other words, it’s the dawning realization that the world as it is, is not the world as it ought to be, as it was meant to be. Things should be better than they are. We imagine, or perhaps intuit, a fairer world, a truer world. And we ache for that.

Buddhists call this dukkha, which means not simply suffering but instability, dissatisfaction. Christians call it the Fall: this notion that the world as we know it is broken, that the world has somehow all gone wrong. And that’s a remarkable realization, when you think about it. It seems universally human. A dog does not lose sleep about the injustices of life; the dog is simply happy as a dog. But humans look at the world around us and think, “No, there is another.”

How do we know that? How do we know that this world has fallen short of its ideals? C.S. Lewis wrote that one can only know a crooked line if one has seen a straight. Perhaps we recognize the world is wrong because we once knew Eden. Perhaps we are the only creatures of this earth to be disquieted by it because we all recall, deep down inside, that we’re the ones who broke it. And this is true even of the most secular, the most atheistic.

We try to set injustice right because we know it’s wrong. The world itself is wrong. What a peculiar thing for humanity to believe! To what exactly are we comparing the entire world? To Mars, perhaps? To Venus? “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy,” Lewis continued, “the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.” That would appear to be indeed the logical conclusion.

“Do not love the world or the things in the world,” writes John in his first epistle. “The love of the Father is not in those who love the world, for all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, the pride in riches—comes not from the Father but from the world. And the world and its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God abide forever.”

What does he mean by that? Are we not to love the world that God has made? Is this not the same John who wrote over and again that God in fact is love? What we are to reject, brothers and sisters, is not the world which God loves, nor the people whom God loves, but the brokenness of the world, the injustice of it. We are to despise its fallenness, while loving all that it is meant to be.

The temporary things, the broken things, the false things—selfish desires, posturing pride, all that would exalt ourselves by breaking down our neighbors—this we must abhor. Put no trust in such things, in appetites and riches. They will disappoint you, betray you in the end. Instead let love flow unrestrained, with no thought wasted on gratifying the ego, in fat and flesh and cash. Everything that we posses will wither and decay, while everything we give away endures.

In 50 years, only your grandchildren will remember you; in 100, no-one will. What then is the purpose of amassing wealth and pointless pleasures in this temporary world? They shall all slip through your fingers like so much sifting sand. But the kindnesses we share, the knowledge we pass on, any generosity offered in the spirit of selfless self-giving grace, these things echo down eternity like ripples in a pond. And no-one and nothing can take that away.

When we give up our false selves, our false ambitions, then we are found by our true self, by the Image of God within us, the life of Christ in our veins.

The world as we know it gets everything upside-down. It teaches us to treat people like things and things like people. It lures us to worship gods of wealth and blood and pride. It imagines, almost laughably, that violence and death are the arbiters of all. Yet Christ has revealed what we’ve intuited all along: that such notions of power and glory are but rickety illusions ever ready to collapse. Our real life, our real world, is found in love and love alone. And we know it. We just barely dare to admit it.

Herein lies our hope: that we shall know the truth, and the truth shall set us free.

“The world does not know you,” Jesus says of His Father, “but I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I in them”—a love without end, a love without limit. Thus is the pain of our world overcome. Thus is salvation poured out for us all.

Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

If you would like to contribute to St Peter’s ministry online, you may do so here, and we would thank God for your generosity.