The Slow Work of God

Before I moved to the Mount, a friend gave me an artistic rendering of the following quote by Teilhard de Chardin:

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.

We are quite naturally impatient in everything

     to reach the end without delay.

We should like to skip the intermediate stages.

We are impatient of being on the way to something

     unknown, something new.

And yet it is the law of all progress

     that it is made by passing through

     some stages of instability—

     and that it may take a very long time.

Only God could say what this new spirit

     gradually forming within you will be.

Give our Lord the benefit of believing

     that his hand is leading you,

     and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself

     in suspense and incomplete.

I was able to ponder this quote again at a retreat with The Divine Milieu, one of Chardin’s books, that was offered recently by Sr. Susan Barber at Sophia Center. Upon examining the 13.8 billion–year history of the universe as we know it—from the Big Bang to the creation of elements to the initial formation of galaxies and stars and planets to the appearance of water and microbes and plants on earth to the development of invertebrates and vertebrates to the evolution of humans to the birth of Jesus to the thousands of years after his resurrection—it is clear that God works very slowly indeed, at least in our human reckoning.

Our impatience with this slow pace of change reminds me of a quote by the writer Elizabeth Bibesco: “He is invariably in a hurry — being in a hurry is one of the tributes he pays to life.” We who love life and its possibilities want to cram in as much as we can during out short life span and are impatient with delays, especially delays in overcoming humanity’s limited understanding, intolerant attitudes, and unjust practices. It is frustrating and uncomfortable to have to pass through the long stages of instability that are inherent to “the law of all progress.” However, as I get older, I take comfort in Chardin’s reminder that we and the universe itself aren’t designed to speed through life’s changes—somehow,  slowness is an integral part of God’s process in gradually forming a new spirit within us. As a postulant, I am at a place where I am especially called to trust that God’s hand is leading me and accept the anxiety of feeling myself in suspense and incomplete—but in reality, we are all called to that trust and acceptance until our last breath on earth, so I rejoice that I am in good company!