Satt und Selig

Satt und selig is the name of a restaurant in Berlin (Spandau), situated opposite a rather large, beautiful church. The name is derives from a German saying and means full (as if: full after a good meal) and blessed. This name has annoyed me for a while. Or rather it didn’t. It was just that it triggered some reaction, both positive and negative and I could not pinpoint what they were.

Simone Weil, who herself never took part in communion (she felt unworthy or something), noticed the blessedness of those who did, expressed in beatific smiles of which the concerned were not always aware. I’ve noticed that a few times too. Furthermore, I’ve observed this in Germany but I’m sure it is the case everywhere; the regular churchgoers follow mass with a meal, at the Biergarten or at home, and a relaxed afternoon. By all definitions they (we) are satt und selig.

This is further complemented by keeping up with church seasons and feasts and giving the home a distinctively churchy atmosphere. I’m not above any of this, and I have been known to pass a couple of holy cards to friends before the birth of a child which was making them anxious, or to hide an icon in a bouquet of flowers if I thought this would be welcome, or sticking a resolute Easter flag in my mum’s kitchen while she was mourning for the death of her last parent and going through a bit of a churchy phase anyway. In H.’s terms, it’s keeping the rumour of a Loving God alive in an overly secularised society, not in itself the worst thing you could do.

I can’t help the joy. I can’t help the healing. That’s just what church does to me and to people (hopefully). But I wonder if I’m overdoing it. It’s easy to fall into complacency from this perspective. We become the happy-go-lucky Christians full of their blessed certainties and lose the ability to feel for those who are not inhabiting these certainties in quite the same ways. And as much joy as we derive from the Easter period, what I really wish I could gain was empowerment to inhabit hurt also. A joy that is so certain that it doesn’t need to be felt. A joy that is so great that it loathes sin somehow.

Maybe I’m a bit of a sicko, but I think I get why some saints sometimes inflicted physical pain on themselves (WHICH I DO NOT ADVOCATE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES FOR ME OR FOR ANYONE). Somehow they were grieved by their propensity to sin, and they were trying to get out of it. It’s hard to be grieved by sin when you’re just plain happy. And I think that it is also hard to be truly compassionate. I cannot count the time when I’ve exited church on a Sunday, in squeaky clean clothes and surrounded by good friends who love me and whom I love, only to become painfully aware of the street life around the church.

And so my stand on satt und selig? I don’t know what it is. Not in itself bad, surely. But can you be too strong, can you be too secure? One of H.’s teachers once told him the following: “you know, the congregation does not want you to be busy doing things. But when their life falls apart you’ve got to be compassionate and a solid presence. The way to do this is to be grounded in prayer, not frantic parish improvement”.

Now, just what is the relationship between the blessedness of being who we are as Christians and the ability to journey into hurt interests me. The more I enter the Christian life, the more solid I become, and this scares me. I never wanted to be solid. I wanted to be vulnerable. By becoming all satt und selig I’m losing some of the rawness which I actually like but I’m gaining a strength and stability which I (and others) can draw on.

Having all. I’m just too happy because I have all. To be of infinite worth to God (as is each and every human being) and to know it. Bliss. Maybe the progression is to start by having all and self-empty until the “all” is barely visible and hardly ever felt, but it is there nevertheless like an Ariadne’s thread. Self-empty until even the Ariadne thread breaks. Until I'm lost again.