Expecting to Find Light

Listening for the Heartbeat of God: A Celtic Christian Spirituality, Part III

Lindsay Walden Photography

Several years ago, while J. Philip Newell presented some of the major themes of Celtic Christian spirituality to a group of people in Ottawa, Ontario, a gathering that included native people; he spoke specifically about the Celt’s practice of looking for the Light of God within all people. After he finished, a Mohawk elder stood with tears in his eyes and said,  

“As I have listened to these themes, I have been wondering where I would be today. I have been wondering where my people would be today. And I have been wondering where we would be as a Western world today if the mission that came to us from Europe centuries ago had come expecting to find Light in us.”1

What sobering and painful questions. Where would we be? 

These same Europeans who failed to see the light of God in indigenous people also came to North America, introducing their expression of Christian faith. The reason they didn’t expect to find the light of God in native people is because, since the fourth century, their Christian faith had been shaped by a doctrine we’ve come to know as “original sin,” the belief that the nature of every human being was totally depraved, fatally flawed, “opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil.”2

Who would look for light in such utter darkness? 

The story of this Mohawk elder painfully illustrates the second duality that emerged during the fourth through the sixth century when the Imperial Roman Church eliminated the influence of Celtic Christian teaching. From this point on, sinful people (ALL-BAD) were perceived as pitted against a Holy God (ALL-GOOD). Only grace through faith in Christ could bridge the chasm of this vast separation and save us from our evil nature. Sound familiar? 

The Duality of ALL-GOOD/ALL-BAD

The Roman Church believed that the sin nature inherited from Adam completely erased the image of God in us, and only baptism could restore it. This official teaching, of course, was “a convenient ‘truth’ for the builders of empire.”3

Early Celtic Christians had a vastly different view of human nature. They believed that to look into the face of a newborn was to look into the face of God. This way of viewing humanity by no means negated the infectious disease of evil and sin, but Celts contested that deeper still, engraved in the heart and soul of every person, is the image of God, the Light of Christ. “Grace is given to save our nature, not to save us from our nature.” (This grace that saves us through faith is still a gift from God, not the consequence of our own effort!)

Newell explains it this way: 

“...the essential goodness of humanity did not involve a denial of the presence of evil and of its powers over the human. Rather, it implied that at the heart of humanity is the image and goodness of God, a goodness that is obscured or covered over by the practice of wrongdoing and evil. Deeper than any wrong in us is the light of God, the light that no darkness has been able to overcome, as St. John had written.”4

Most of us in Western society have been thoroughly indoctrinated by the dogma of original sin and infected by the shame this dogma instills. Consequently, we don't expect to find light in ourselves or one another! 

The real issue with this duality is how it pits an ALL-GOOD God against ALL-BAD people. It suggests that at our core, we are opposed to God instead of being created in love by God, stamped with God’s very image, responsive to God’s Voice within–a Voice who helps us remember who we are.   

This duality creates a simplistic dichotomy. Good or bad, all or nothing, black or white, is how children see the world. Yet adults, to mature, must recognize the complexity of life with all its shadows. If our spirituality does not equip us to embrace reality, the way things really are—a very messy mixed bag—then it’s defective! We must look for the light as well as the shadow in order to embrace reality and discern our way forward in this complicated world! 

So, where would we be today if we came expecting to find light? For starters, there would be: 

• Less mudslinging, name-calling, and labeling of one another. 

• Less portrayal of those I disagree with as ALL-BAD and “my people” or “my party” or “my candidate” as ALL-GOOD. 

• Greater openness to the light in others, particularly those I disagree with.

• Wise and humble discernment of my own complicity with sin and systemic evil. 

• Fewer simplistic answers given to the complex problems facing us today.

• And greater recognition of all the good being done in the world, as opposed to recognizing only the bad. 

If these consequences are just “for starters,” where would we be if we put this light-looking expectation into practice?! 

Pause and Reflect:

1. Take a moment and consider a time when someone came to you, not expecting to find light in you. What was that like? Where would you be today if they had? 

2. Who in your life are you coming to, not expecting to find light? What would it be like to look more deeply and expectantly for the light and goodness of God in them? 

1. Christ of the Celts, J. Philip Newell, P. 14

2. Westminster Confession of Faith 

3. Christ of the Celts, J. Philip Newell, P. 20

4. Listening for the Heartbeat of God, J. Philip Newell, P. 14