Living Symbol

Nine days and counting. Nine days until five children are safely deposited with their Mimi and Poppa. Nine days until my husband and I merge onto the interstate on-ramp with his favorite Expeditionary Force audiobook rolling. Nine days until I get to introduce him to the world-within-a-world that you and I all know as the CiRCE National Conference. I can’t wait.

Today, in preparation for my uninitiated sweetheart’s imminent immersion, we listened to D. C. Schindler’s plenary from last year, “The Symbol of Authority.” Last year, I am fairly certain you could have seen smoke pouring from my pen as I furiously scribbled notes, trying to retain a fragment of Dr. Schindler’s wisdom. One idea still stands out in my mind from almost a year ago, and the same idea caught my attention today: the etymologies of the words “symbolic” and “diabolic”. Dr. Schindler compared the parts of these words—syn, meaning together, and ballein, meaning to throw, as contrasted with dia, meaning through, across, in different directions—and these words struck a note in my heart that has been reverberating ever since. Symbol is that which throws together, while diabolic is that which throws apart.

When we are all thrown together next week (nine days!), we will embody a symbol. We symbolize the Church, a body, a family, even Love Himself, manifesting the Trinity to the world surrounding us. We are invited to enter in. If we arrive with thoughts and ideas and toss them across the gulf, sending bits and pieces of Aristotle, Dostoevsky, and Homer, Bach and Caravaggio, into the pockets of conversation, we may learn and grow and inspire, but being a symbol goes beyond learning and growth and inspiration. If the speakers remain behind the podium, with their notes and ideas, and we remain in our seats, with our observations and judgments, jotting down some choice tidbits, they will be doing the work of teaching and discipleship, and we will glean from their wisdom, but symbolic living is so much more.

Jesus prayed for us in John 17, that we would be one, as He and the Father are one. That is some serious one-ness. I don’t know that I’ve ever experienced the diversity in unity of God Himself more profoundly than I have at these CiRCE conferences. I have come to expect it. We come together from vastly different ecumenical traditions, geographical locations, cultural norms, even educational experiences. We come, in the living moment, to delight in God and each other and the world He has made. We are thrown together and manifest the love that God has for us by entering in with each other. Last year, on an afternoon between sessions, I walked down the hallway toward the main conference room and saw no less than three groups of people huddled together, obviously in prayer, some in tears. There is no tossing across happening here; we have been thrown together and become something greater than ourselves.

I cannot wait to share this experience with my husband. He has not studied classical education. He has a love-hate relationship with books. His hands bear witness to hard manual labor, dark lines of grease permanently inscribing the language he speaks best. Yet I am not worried for him. He may not experience the giddiness I do over Shakespeare or drool at the Eighth Day Books table (but really, how could you not?). He may need to go take a walk during one of the sessions while I am trying to figure out where Hermione found the Time-Turner so I can attend every. single. lecture. But I know he is welcome, and I know he has a part to play, because I know that this throwing together is larger than all of us. I know we will proclaim what we have seen and heard so that we may have fellowship with each other (1 John 1:3), and as our fellowship with God and with each other deepens, our joy will be made complete.

This magical thing that happens, this entering in with each other and finding family in a group of complete strangers, is where I think symbol happens. And this is also where the diabolical will so insidiously creep in. How better could Diabolus himself steal, kill, and destroy than to divide and separate that which Jesus Himself, in the flesh, longed to give us. How diabolic, to send us all in different directions, we who most perfectly symbolize the Love of the Three-in-One. I am praying to hold fast as a symbol. Praying against the diabolical separations that are likely to come up between my husband and me as we prepare, the fears and insecurities that prevent us from being fully present, the little pet peeves can separate each of us in conversation. I am praying for our love to be perfected as we revel in the goodness and wisdom of God together, filling up so we can be poured out, entering in so we can draw others with us. We bear His image together, and that is where symbol happens. Where Heaven touches earth. For a brief space of time, the kiss of eternity rests on us and we breathe the air of the throne room. We embody the One who took on flesh, allowing Him to be manifest, through our flesh, to each other. I can’t wait.