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Signs: A New Approach to Coincidence, Synchronicity, Guidance, Life Purpose, and God's Plan

A Song in the Night

As you know, a month before this, you had a CMPE that said you should express a unified purpose in your work life, and you wondered if that CMPE was really pointing you to a book project that was on the table. You said,

I was invited to write a book about an unusual ancestor of mine who I have written about in the past: the first homesteader in Eastern Holmes County, Ohio, an Amish man who in later years wore all white and built a chair for Jesus, and called on others to prepare for the coming Kingdom<<span style='color:black'> of God on earth. There is a museum in that man's home town, and at my family reunion I gave a speech about his life. The museum director had seen my previous writing and asked for more. I'm thinking of writing a book that integrates the story of that ancestor's unusual life, with my story of investigating family history....I wonder if this book project might be the new work my CMPE was preparing me for. 

Given this, it is significant that this CMPE appears to be about this very book project.

Event 1. Jim shares with Sharon his story of being on a vision quest, alone and frightened, out in the woods all night, finding comfort in singing an old hymn (7:30pm)
At your Centering Prayer meeting, Sharon told you that she wanted to read to you a St. Augustine quotation from a book she'd just found. She also asked how the writing of your book was going. You say,

I told her that I was thinking about what it would have been like for my ancestor being alone in the wilderness of the territory that became Ohio when there were still some Native Americans living there. I told her that (in '94) I went on a vision quest to approximate some of that experience. It was an experiment that I made in large part to try to gain empathy for what it would have been like for my ancestor out there in the wilds, with Indians nearby. I was alone, in the night, and I did see a vision of a power animal, and of a Native American ritual, but instead of participating in the Indian ritual as I thought I might have done, I found my heart seeking comfort in an old song from Europe that came up for me. This song was old, but it felt very present. The song was "O Thou in Whose Presence," words by Joseph Swain 1791 (Swain was a Baptist minister and poet in 18^th century England). I then recited the words to Sharon:

O Thou, in whose presence my soul takes delight,
On whom in affliction I call,
My comfort by day and my song in the night,
My hope, my salvation, my all.

...Say, why in the valley of death should I weep,
Or lone in the wilderness rove?

Event 2. Immediately after he shares, Sharon reads the quotation she had been planning to read earlier.
Then Sharon got the book out of her back pack to read that Augustine quote. She said that she was surprised how your sharing paralleled the book. The book title, she pointed out with emphasis, was Sing a New Song (Sing a New Song: The Christian Vocation, by Timothy Radcliffe, OP). The author goes on to explain that he does not say anything particularly new. Radcliffe was the master of the Dominican order and was offering a fresh perspective on a traditional spirituality. An online review of the book says, "What is new is that Radcliffe offers us an alternative way of seeing our world, a radically old way of seeing it to be sure, a Christian perspective, but he gives it a freshness and makes us aware of it."

Here is the quotation from Augustine that she read, embedded in this quotation about the book itself:

The title of this book, Sing a New Song, is intended to suggest the vitality of religious life today, as I have discovered traveling around the Order. It is true that in some Western countries religious orders are suffering a crisis of confidence. It is precisely then that we must dare to sing a new song. St Augustine said that we, like those who travel in the dark, must sing, especially when we are afraid of the wild beasts in the night. Song conquers fear and fear is the greatest enemy of Christian life.

Proximity
Simultaneous. The two events were back-to-back.

Parallels (features shared by both events)

1. A traveler is in the wilderness at night (Jim in Ohio; "those who travel in the dark" in the quote).

2. Seeing or fearing animals (Jim's vision of a power animal; the travelers fearing wild beasts).

3. Fearing wild creatures who might attack (Jim's ancestor fearing Indians; the travelers fearing wild beasts).

4. He sings a song. (Jim sings the hymn; the travelers in the dark must sing.)

5. This song is both old and new. (Jim's song was old, but it felt very present; the song in the book title is old yet presented in a fresh way.)

6. The song brings comfort (event 1)/conquers fear (event 2).

7. The fear/discomfort is seen as mutually exclusive with the song of a Christian life rooted in God. (In the hymn, God is "My comfort by day and my song in the night"; in the Augustine quotation, song conquers the fear that is "the greatest enemy of Christian Life.")

8. The song involves a quotation from a Christian author/leader from past centuries (Joseph Swain; St. Augustine).

9. There is a book that presents a vision of the spiritual life that is old (traditional Christian) yet also new (Jim's book; Sing a New Song).

Subject situation (what the CMPE is about)

Event 1 is really about your book. In that event, you tell the story of being alone in the wilderness at night in response to a question of how your book is going. The book itself even shows up in parallel #9. So the book is the relevant situation in your life that fits the story told by the parallels. The book therefore must be the subject situation.

Interpretation

I see a great deal of "old yet new" in this CMPE (see parallels #5, #7, and #9). More specifically, the "old yet new" theme is about something Christian from centuries past being made to seem fresh and contemporary. That pattern is all over this CMPE: That is what you did with the old hymn. That is what you plan to do with your book. And that is what Radcliffe did with his book. So that pattern is what we need to apply to the subject situation of your book. Here is my attempt to do that:

In your book about your ancestor, you are meant to make the old seem new, to make his traditional Christian spirituality seem fresh, alive, present. You are meant to do what Timothy Radcliffe did: present a vision of the traditional Christian life that feels fresh for contemporary readers. To use the symbolism of your vision quest, you are meant to sing an old hymn in a way that feels very present, that brings comfort now.

How do you do that? I think the best clue lies in your '94 vision quest, the central image in this CMPE. There, you actually carried out this pattern of making the old new, in two different ways. First, you repeated in your own life your ancestor's past experience of being alone in the wilderness. Second, you sang an old hymn which came alive in your experience in the present. Based on these two examples, the key seems to be to make his spirituality come alive in your own experience, to have it become present in you.

Since your '94 vision quest is at the center of this CMPE, one thing that suggests itself is to actually tell that story in your book, as well as tell other experiences in which your ancestor's life and spirituality have come alive in your own life. In other words, maybe you should see that vision quest story as capturing the heart of the book, as being, in a sense, the whole book in miniature. The book then becomes the story of your ancestor's life as it comes alive in your own. That way, your own experience has become the bridging point for the reader. Now readers merely have to connect and identify with you and your ancestor's old song has become new for them.

This is not the only way to make his Christianity become fresh and contemporary for your readers. However, it is a way that naturally suggests itself from this CMPE. Further, it is not so different from what you were already thinking. You said, "I'm thinking of writing a book that integrates the story of that ancestor's unusual life, with my story of investigating family history." You could just change that to: "a book that integrates the story of that ancestor's unusual life and spirituality with my story of connecting with his life and spirituality." Finally, this is a very compelling literary device-to have someone the audience readily identifies with be the bridging point for some alien and unfamiliar time period, society, or world. (The movie Possession with Aaron Eckhart and Gwyneth Paltrow comes to mind.) It is used a lot because it works.

Comments

Aside from the independence issue, which it seems we can put to rest, this has all the characteristics we expect of a CMPE, including a strong list of parallels. Further, its practical utility may end up being quite sizable, in that it seems to present an overall angle from which you can write your book.

Robert Perry Robert Perry offers individual sign consultations to those who feel they may have experienced a CMPE of their own. For more information click here.

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