Some of our poorest thinking comes from a confusion of language. It’s a fatal error to make a noun from a word that should only be rightly used as a verb. “Marriage”, “love” and the like are words that when used as nouns, deny the reality they are meant to name. Marriage is a “doing” word. You can’t “have” a marriage, you can only “make” a marriage. “Marriage” or “faith” or “love” are activities in which we can participate and they are never things that we can have. Any attempt to “possess”, as if they were things that admitted possession, only cause the reality that the word seeks to name, to evaporate like smoke. These words all name an activity that exists only when the feet are moving on a path, usually to a destiny unknown but certain. A marriage is said to exist when two people move toward a destiny together. They don’t have to know what the destiny is but they must believe it is there and bank their lives on it. I went through a stage of wondering why anyone would ever get married. These days I rejoice when I see people who are willing to bank everything on a future together with someone else, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer. A cultural fog has descended upon us because we’re inclined to feel our way to truth or because we think that love is entirely possessed in the present moment. Love is rarely stronger than when a new born meets its parents for the first time. The child has no track record and little experience. The child is mostly potential, mostly promise and oh how love transforms and flourishes as parents become protectors and defenders of this little one’s future.

Another fatal error is when we give names to things that are simply the absence of something. It is an error we must make because it’s how our language works and yet dreadful confusion is the result. We name a “shadow” and feel confident that something positive has been identified. Yet a shadow is a place in our field of vision in which there is an absence of light. The shadow is real; it’s a real absence. “Evil” is such a word. Evil simply doesn’t exist although it’s real enough. Most people think of “good” and “evil” as opposites. When it comes to the subject of evil, mostly we think in terms of Star Wars. Most speak in terms of ‘the force’ or of a ‘dark side’. Yet all of this names nothing. Some sectors of the church get a bit of a fixation about evil and in the process fail to see that there is nothing to be afraid of because evil, when encountered, is always the absence of that which should be present. Anyway, “Satan” gets very little press in the bible. “Satan” is an ordinary Hebrew verb that is translated, “I accuse”. Literally, we do the work of Satan when we accuse our brothers and sisters.

So people and some systems can be said to be evil when they depreciate and make less of humanity. But absence can only be cured by presence and presence has nothing to fear. Physical matter is not evil when it’s just stuff.  Physical matter is only evil when we pretend that it alone is the substance of life. A fat wallet and phone full of powerful contacts is not evil. It is evil if we think life is constituted by this and this alone. Those who exercise personal power over others, empty themselves. They could gain the whole world but lose their very selves. The guys with the guns are frightening and intimidating but for those with eyes to see, this is literally nothing. Someone showed me a video this week of an execution. I felt sick as an innocent woman was shot and fell to the footpath spilling a pool of blood across the footpath. This execution was preceded by some kind of prophet who was no profit to anyone. It doesn’t matter how loud and lofty the words, they just advertised emptiness. There was no humanity present in this video except in the bowed frame of an innocent woman. And people still ask me about the relevance of Easter.

The great sadness of my life is that I often look into a face and am in awe of the beauty there to be found and yet find it entirely unrecognised by the owner of the face. I’ve seen faces lose all their teeth in just a few months. I often gaze into a face and wonder at could have been and what might be if only. The older I get the greater becomes the mystery, not the exclusive domain of the homeless, of how we punish ourselves and do many things that we know will cost us dearly. Each time my heart breaks, I’m becoming more certain that I’m looking into the abyss. There is only presence and absence. We all know both. My hunch is that when we name the absence as if it were a different kind of presence, we create for ourselves an enemy that we are ill equipped to meet and defeat. I believe an addict needs not to overcome their addiction but rather they need to be fully alive. Most addicts fixate on the addiction either to battle it or submit and I think this is the wrong approach. The way to life is by knowing that presence is a participation, it’s an activity at multiple levels. It’s important to know that the good of life is multiple. We need to be learning; we need friendship; we need to exercise for health’s sake; we need to work; we need to play; we need to stop occasionally and be in awe. We need all of these things. An addict is someone who has taken hold of one of these goods and called it, the whole good.

The beginning of clarity in these large and important issues will come when we are careful about our language.

About the Author: Rev. Graham Long
Rev. Graham Long is the Pastor and CEO of The Wayside Chapel. For the past 10 years, he has provided love and support to people on and around the streets of Sydney's Kings Cross who are homeless, mentally ill, drug addicted and often forgotten by society. Through the Wayside Chapel, Graham has created a community with 'no us and them'. A community free of judgement for people just to 'be'.