HELLO!

“You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” John 8:32

“You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you odd.” Flannery O’Connor

I was pondering this comparison last night as I received an email asking me to explain Flannery O’Connor’s paraphrase of John 8:32. Flannery O'Connor (1925-1964) was a fiction writer known for her novels and short stories, which explored morality, faith, and grace through dark humour and violence in the rural American South, reflecting her devout Roman Catholic beliefs. Despite living with lupus, which took her life, she produced some of the most celebrated works, called Christian realism. I recall a documentary on her life, she lived surrounded by a collection of exotic birds. She was a true eccentric. What I loved about her writing was the deep faith that was her north star, without any sentimentalism or assurance that this faith would spare her of illness and disappointment, the world from injustice and cruelty. She was unflinching in her realism, she saw the world as it was, with all its ugliness and evil. But in the midst of this reality was a deep and profound sense of truth, justice and love.

True eccentrics, and we all know them, are often unaware they “walk to the beat of different drummer”. I admire them but I am sometimes confused by their confusion. They wonder why others seem to be frustrated by their choices. Growing up, in a conventional family. But I always felt a little “different”. My choices were not always others’ choices. I also recall never being swayed by the argument, “this is very popular” or “that is just common sense”. Lucian would say, when they were in high school, “you look just like every other Dad in our subdivision, but you are always asking why people act/think as they do.”

O’Connor’s paraphrase of John 8:32 reveals, by faith we see ourselves connected to the well-being of our kin, of our neighbour, we love them as we love ourselves. This is profoundly counter-cultural, particularly in a society that values personal freedom over commitments to others, status, materialism and success based on having more than others. To know that truth, is to “be set free”, or in O’Connor’s mindset, “makes you odd”.

People often speak of faith as an assurance that despite the affliction others may endure, they know they are safe, protected, due to their relationship with God. But O’Connor would say her faith is the assurance the affliction itself is a reminder of the need for compassion for the other, for one’s self. The temptation is not to swear, or be attracted to the other, or to consume certain substances, but rather to separate one’s self from others, in an effort to escape the inevitable. The truth, knowing  we are loved, others are loved, that we are in this together, sets us free. It also makes us odd. Some of us more than others. I am not nearly as odd as true eccentrics like O’Connor, but there is enough oddness in me to know the difference between finding truth and wanting what others have.

Peace, Kevin

PS My friend Brian Williams sent me this photo this morning. I wish I were a Wise Old Owl, but I will settle for being an Odd Old Owl.