Dark night of the soul on a bright day

I’m happy to report that my TV has decent color again. I told you a couple weeks ago how a nearby lightning strike messed up its color, leaving the people with purple faces. The set’s internal degaussing function may have been gradually mproving the problem, but the progress was at a rate of about one pixel per start-up.

My renter persuaded me to take a magnet and pass it over the screen in the bad places. Not just a couple passes, but a real “scrubbing.” And behold, I’ve got my picture back.

Now if only there were anything worth watching on.

The weather today was wonderful (or so I surmised from looking out the library windows and checking the temperatures online). One of those ideal days—lightly clouded skies (though it was clouding up by the time I took my walk), neither too cold nor too hot—that you imagine when you’re young, thinking about what the future will be like. It’s never like that, of course, but sometimes you get a little of the weather.

The world is a-buzz today with news of the publication of letters from Mother Teresa, in which she expressed feelings that God was far away from her.

This is news?

Only to people who a) have never been serious Christians (granted, there are a lot of those) or b) have never read any serious Christian writers. Sure, you won’t get much about Dark Nights of the Soul from Joel Osteen or Benny Hinn, but try reading St. Augustine. Or Pascal. Or C.S. Lewis.

Make up your minds, folks—you can criticize us for being Pollyannas, out of touch with the harsh realities of life, or you can call us posers because we don’t always feel the joy of the Lord.

But you can’t have it both ways.

0 thoughts on “Dark night of the soul on a bright day”

  1. "Sure, you won’t get much about Dark Nights of the Soul from ……. , but try reading St. Augustine. Or Pascal. Or C.S. Lewis."

    whew… right, Lars! OR Corrie ten Boom..OR Watchman Nee, OR Madam Gunyon….forgive the spelling — (pronounced gee -yawn)  

  2. But what kind of magnet, and how many passes did you make over the screen. I have purple people too.

  3. I'm not sure what to tell you. It was a circular magnet I picked up somewhere, somewhat stronger than a regular refrigerator magnet. And I kept making passes until it got better.

  4. Lars, I wish you and I frequented the same coffee shop. You sound like good company. Re the list of Christians who have experienced dark nights of the soul: "spot on," as they still say in some parts of England. And let's not forget John of the Cross, or Francis of Assissi, either.

    Only in postmodern America do some people have the notion that pain and doubt are, well, unAmerican.

  5. To be fair, generally speaking it isn’t the same people saying that we’re Polyannas who accuse us of being faithless. Personally, I found the news rather comforting–I suppose for the same reason that makes Ecclesiastes my favorite book of the Bible. I know I am faithless; I need confirmation that that’s a healthy and natural part of trying to live for God by faith.

  6. Well I did it Lars. I rubbed a magnet over the color-distorted parts of my television screen. The action set off little fireworks of light and color. After that all the spots I’d touched with the magnet were intensely green. I did this while my husband was gone—because sometimes it’s easier to get forgiveness than permission—but this was going to take some ‘splaining.

    Oh dear. I was sick to my stomach. Finally I just turned it off. A few hours later I turned it back on and the picture was beautiful. But my nerves will never be the same.

  7. Television repair, just one of the many services provided free of charge by Brandywine Books to our valued patrons.

    Honestly, you had me scared there for a moment. Glad it worked out OK.

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