Things fall apart

Messages from the spirit world

Last Sunday was “Christ the King Sunday,” the end of another liturgical year. It sounds like an ancient observance, “Christ the King,” but it was only instituted in 1925 by the pope.  The world had just experienced the bloody madness of World War I, undermining confidence in Western culture and institutions. The Russian Revolution had brought down the monarchy and ushered in the Bolsheviks and the Communist Party. Totalitarian regimes, including the Nazi party in Germany and fascists in Italy, were on the rise, demanding total allegiance.

No wonder that by 1925, with the world order upended, the church felt a need to urge the faithful to remember – our allegiance is not to any worldly leader or nation but only to Christ and the kingdom of God.

But W.B. Yeats, the brilliant poet, was way ahead of the pope.  Yeats had married Georgie Hyde-Lees in 1917, and interestingly, his well-educated and classically trained wife was given to the practice of “automatic writing,” an experience in which one surrenders one’s agency to the spirit world and produces written words without consciously writing. It is a purported psychic experience in which, pencil or pen in hand, the person allows spirits to move his or her hand to write.  It sounds ridiculous to reason, but the brilliant Yeats took it very seriously and studied the images and symbols that emerged from his wife’s automatic writing.

In 1919, Yeats wrote his most famous poem, “The Second Coming,” which is replete with profound imagery that has resounded deeply with readers for more than a hundred years.  The poem opens  with especially memorable and often-quoted images:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre   
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere   
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The sense of things coming apart, the center no longer holding, the falcon spiraling farther and farther from the falconer so that he can no longer hear the voice of the falconer calling to him. “Anarchy is loosed upon the world,” and with it, “the blood-dimmed tide is loosed,”…clearly, the poem evokes remembrance of 20 million people killed in World War I. 

But the poem strikes a deep chord with modern people, as we reflect on wars and massive devastation in our own day, including the depravity and crushing violence in Ukraine, Israel, and Gaza. 

And the lines that perhaps reverberate with unique recognition and power for many Americans today evoke images of an attempted insurrection on January 6 enabled by prominent leaders:

The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Yeats’ poem certainly calls to mind the outer world of politics, culture, and international violence and struggles.  But perhaps even more poignantly, “The Second Coming” describes the inner world of people around the globe: the rise of loneliness and depression, as well as feelings of despair and a sense that we are losing our moorings, our sense of joy and purpose in life.  We are losing touch with our healing center, “the falcon cannot hear the falconer.”

Immigrants and refugees seeking safety (as Jesus’ family did when he was a baby) are often demonized rather than cared for. Victims of racism, along with people whose sexuality is not understood by the majority, encounter a society in which “the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”

But for me, the last lines of Yeats’ poem are the most haunting:

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,   
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Yes, fears about the 2024 presidential election in the United States might be conjured for many. But we might discover the real power of these last lines if we realize that they describe each of us and our vast, powerful, inner lives.  We all have a rough beast within, slouching toward our Bethlehem to be born.  And those who are unconscious of this fact, or who are in denial, are the most dangerous among us.

Self-knowledge is always necessary for spiritual growth (“I am in you,” Jesus said), and this self-knowledge always includes a humbling awareness of the darkness within (“For out of the heart come evil intentions, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander”).

Fortunately, this coming Sunday in the Christian tradition is the First Sunday of Advent when, interestingly, we read scripture containing images of the end of the world and then turn our attention to a different kind of birth in Bethlehem. How important it is that we understand these images and stories as descriptions of our inner world – our old way of being in the world is coming to an end, and a new birth will take place in each of us, in our Bethlehem. 

There’s a rough beast slouching to be born in every one of us, but there is another possibility in each of us, as well.  Jesus said we should “keep awake” because the forces in our mysterious inner lives are unpredictable and can catch us unawares. This is why we might sometimes say, “I don’t know what came over me; I wasn’t myself.” We’re all subject to such eruptions from within that catch us by surprise.

When Jesus says, “keep awake,” he does not mean to keep alert to the failings and erroneous opinions of others so that you can hammer them. That’s the self-righteous work of the rough beast that slouches to be born in everyone. Rather, he says “keep awake” so that you can welcome, nurture, and care for the birth of One whose voice seems to say, “Love your enemies, and do good to those who persecute you.” This One within you is tender and requires your vigilance and care.

One voice within will confirm your upset, anger, despair, anxiety, and loneliness.  Another seeks to open you to a way, a truth, and a life that you never thought was possible. And this other voice is so unbelievable at first, so impractical by the world’s standards, that it requires a lifetime of fits and starts in practicing spiritual attention. But nothing could be more important, because of the way things are now: “things are falling apart, the center cannot hold,” and another is stirring to be born, in each of us.