Oceanic prayer

"Certains se donnent tellement qu'ils parviennent à nager juste sous la surface... il n'y a presque plus rien entre eux et Dieu. Et lorsqu'ils meurent, Il n'a qu'à se baisser un petit peu pour les recueillir au creux de ses mains. C'est plus difficile d'aller chercher les hommes au fond de l'eau". Pierre Guy, Dans le ruisseau

"Some give so much of themselves that they end up swimming quite close to the surface... there is practically nothing between them and God. And when they die, He only needs to lean a little bit to scoop them out into his hands. It's harder to go and seek men at the bottom of the water".

Seneve is the catholic student newsletter of a university in central Paris. I sometimes read it to keep an eye on what French Catholic students come up with. In this funky little text, the author assimilates life on earth to life underwater, where the people living in a water stream try to imagine what life above the surface would be like.

I read this piece ages ago -several years back-. Yet somehow, this is how I still conceptualise sin: someone falls to the bottom of the stream and is far removed from the surface. The answer is to plunge to where they are. Prayer is a bit like being brought back to the surface after dwelling at the bottom of the pool for a bit too long.