By Anna Dean, Ph.D., Spiritual Resource Officer
I joined the Cornerstone of Hope team as the Spiritual Resource Officer in April 2024. After earning my B.A. from The Ohio State University, I studied politics, literature, philosophy, and theology through the Institute of Philosophic Studies, the interdisciplinary Ph.D. program at the University of Dallas. I look forward to using what I’ve learned—and all that I will learn—to help Cornerstone give hope to the grieving. Outside of work, I love baking, reading, and spending time with loved ones, especially my nieces and nephews.
Summertime is often associated with the beauty of creation—blue skies, a bright sun, gentle clouds; plants, trees, and grasses all dancing in a happy wind; birds chirping, squirrels hopping, and dogs napping in the shade. A common refrain among believers is that the glory of nature reflects the glory of God, or that the goodness and beauty of creation reveal the goodness and beauty of the Creator.
All this is perfectly true. However, there are times in life where the beauty of creation might not seem like the gift it is. For the sun might be shining, but it is not shining on us. We cannot feel its warmth or its joy. We are estranged from such pleasant things by grief.
Loss is a part of this life, a wound marring God’s perfect creation. It was not part of God’s original plan, but after the Fall, it is a reality that we all must face at some point or other.1 And when we lose someone and are forced to face this ugly reality, we can seem to be walking in darkness, even in broad daylight.
During these times, we might be insensible to the beauty and goodness of creation. We might empathize with Shakespeare’s Hamlet when he declares, “[T]his most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire—why, it appeareth nothing to me but a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors.”2 The beauty of the skies cannot reach Hamlet’s heart. He knows the heavens are majestic, but to him, they seem both poisonous and grim.
Or worse than being insensible, we might feel affronted by the beauty and goodness of creation, as if the sun itself were mocking us in our unremitting night. In this sad state, the desire to blot out the sun, or at least to hide from it, becomes understandable. We might yearn to cry with the psalmist, “Let only darkness cover me, and the light about me be night.”3
Yet, the same Psalm reminds us that God is still with us in the darkness. Psalm 139 reads:
7 Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?
Or wither shall I flee from thy presence?
8 If I ascend to heaven, thou art there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, thou art there!
9 If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
10 ever there thy hand shall lead me,
and thy right hand shall hold me.
11 If I say, “Let only darkness cover me,
and the light about me be night,”
12 even the darkness is not dark to thee,
the night is bright as the day;
for darkness is as light with thee.
The psalmist confirms that the God who made the morning and night sees us—even when we are lost; even when we are at our lowest low; even when we are in darkness.
What is more, the psalmist asserts that God knows us4, for He made us. And He created each one of us with purpose.5 And more incredibly still, He loves us.
Psalm 139 makes it quite clear that we cannot escape God or His love for us. We may refuse to reciprocate—and He allows this because love cannot be coerced without becoming a hideous simulation of love—but He never stops loving us.
We might be alienated from beauty, blinded by anguish or anger, and incapable of feeling God’s presence, but God is still there, calling to us.
In such times, may He give us the strength to respond to Our Father, the mighty Creator, and the will to learn from Christ the King, who knows what it is to suffer well, and the wisdom to seek the Holy Spirit, the great comforter.
May He heal our hurts, open our eyes, and soften our hearts. May He give us the grace to be receptive to goodness, truth, and beauty. May we learn to see as He sees, even in the dark.
And may we discover the surprising truth that sometimes beauty is most striking when contrasted with a grim backdrop. Or as G.K. Chesterton writes, “Against a dark sky all flowers look like fireworks.”6
And eventually, may we grow to a place of faith where we can sing with the psalmist, “I will sing of thy steadfast love, O Lord, for ever; with my mouth I will proclaim thy faithfulness to all generations.”7
1 “[S]in came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all men sinned.” Romans 5: 12. I use the RSVCE translation for all references to Scripture. Additionally, Saint Augustine writes, “[T]he death of the body does not come about through the law of nature, by which God ordained no death for men, but is rightly inflicted on us by reason of sin.” Augustine, The City of God against the Pagans, trans. R.W. Dyson (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 557 [Book XIII, Chapter 15].
2 William Shakespeare, The Complete Pelican Shakespeare, ed. Stephen Orgel and A.R. Braunmuller (New York: Penguin, 2002), 1362 [The Tragical History of Hamlet Prince of Denmark Act II, Scene 2, Lines 269–273].
3 Psalm 139: 11
4 “For thou didst form my inward parts, thou didst knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise thee, for thou art fearful and wonderful. Wonderful are they works! Thou knowest me right well; my frame was not hidden from thee, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth.” Psalm 139: 13–15
5 “Thy eyes beheld my unformed substance; in thy book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.” Psalm 139: 16
6 G.K. Chesterton, “The Glory of Grey” from Alarms and Discursions. “The Literature Network,” Jilac Inc., last accessed April 20, 2024, https://www.online-literature.com/chesterton/alarms-and-discursions/18/.
7 Psalm 89:1
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