Evelyn Waugh, the brilliant, British, somewhat curmudgeonly man of
letters and author of Brideshead Revisited, once wrote a novel
called Helena. It never enjoyed the popularity of
Brideshead, but was allegedly Waugh’s favorite among his novels. In
one passage, Helena, mother of the Emperor Constantine and searcher for
the True Cross, reflects on the coming of the Magi to Bethlehem. Unlike
the shepherds, simple and barefoot, who ran across the fields to the
stable without a second thought, the Magi traveled long and laboriously
with their cumbersome, extravagant, and somewhat outlandish gifts. Their
stop to make a diplomatic call on King Herod greatly complicated things
and made them arrive in Bethlehem late. So, they missed the angels and
all the excitement.
Helena both understands and pities the Magi.
“You are my special patrons,” she says, “patrons of all latecomers, of
all who have a tedious journey to make to the truth, all who are
confused by knowledge and speculation…of all who stand in danger by
reason of their talents.” And she concludes her reflections with this
lovely prayer: ”For his sake who did not reject your curious gifts, pray
always for all the learned, the oblique, the delicate. Let them not be
quite forgotten at the Throne of God when the simple come into their
kingdom.”
It is often said that the Christmas story is
best understood by the simple: God’s little ones – the young, the young
at heart, the humble, the poor. And there is truth in that for sure.
Learning and sophistication can be barriers to getting the Christmas
message, or to ‘getting’ God at all, for that matter. But Helena reminds
us that there has to be a space for those for whom, because of their
very cleverness, faith is foreign territory - people who, to quote the
novel, “stand in danger by reason of their talents.” I think, for
instance, of people of a rigorous, scientific bent whose restless,
probing minds find faith impossible or next to impossible. There are, of
course, among believers, great scientists and thinkers whose very
brilliance contributes to the clarity and keenness of their faith and
ours, but faith is arguably more difficult for them, with the result
that many dismiss the very idea of faith as antithetical to reason and
as a sellout on human intellect.
Perhaps the Magi of the Epiphany story can
serve as patron saints for just such people who wrestle with the great
questions of life and, if they come to faith at all, do so only with
great difficulty. The Magi, following the elusive star in the sky, were
searchers for truth and seekers after meaning. They will forever speak
to the learned and the clever of this world, the talented, and the
inquisitive - rigorous scientists, hard-headed empiricists - who find it
difficult to impossible to swallow churchy things like revelation and
mystery and miracle and grace. For them, an act of faith may be slow in
coming but, if and when it does come, it has a special brilliance that
grace alone can explain.
My friends in Christ, the Magi story completes
the Christmas story and broadens its appeal. It is the perfect
counterpoint to the story of shepherds at the manger. The
shepherds scurried and saw and simply believed. The Magi searched and
wondered, debated, and questioned. But in the end, even if they did
arrive a bit over-dressed and burdened with gifts that didn’t quite fit
the moment, still they arrived. And they believed!
Father Michael G. Ryan
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