Notable Quote: To Master Life’s Gloominess by Fr. Alfred Delp, SJ

The character of life is to keep going, to keep a lookout, and to endure until the vigilant heart of man and the heart of God who meets us come together: presently in the true interior meeting of the sacraments, and later in the final homecoming.  God enters only his own rooms, where someone is always keeping watch for him…This is the deeper sense of Advent: that we scrutinize this center, little by little, and set up lights of recognition in our lives, and from the center master life’s gloominess.  There is no absolute darkness…Those who really wait on the Lord God will not be disappointed.

  

This is a quote in reference to Advent—the season on waiting for the Lord to come.  You will need some background.  Father Alfred Delp was a German priest with the Jesuit order who was arrested by the Nazis for conspiring to kill Adolph Hitler, and though found not guilty of participating in the conspiracy was executed nonetheless for his association with the conspirators.  While in jail he wrote some remarkable meditations, especially since it was Advent season and his coming meeting with God. 

Before I get to the quote, here is how Regis Martin summarized in the National Catholic Register earlier this month Delp’s arrest.  

 

When Gestapo agents arrived on the morning of July 28, 1944, slipping into the back of the quaint little country church outside Munich where its pastor, Father Alfred Delp, was saying Mass, they waited until he’d finished before arresting him on a charge of treason. It hardly mattered that he had committed no treason — they were determined to destroy him anyway. His record of resistance to Nazi tyranny was sufficiently known already among members of the Reich, and the time had now come to silence him for good. So, they hauled him off to prison where he was tortured, tried and sentenced to be hanged, which took place on Feb. 2, 1945, the Feast of the Purification of Mary.

But Fr. Delp’s antagonism with the Nazis went deep in his formation.  It seemed his whole adult life was in some way a reaction to this ideology that had taken over Germany.  From Delp’s Wikiwand entry: 

 

Following philosophy studies at Pullach, he worked for 3 years as a prefect and sports teacher at Stella Matutina Kolleg in Feldkirch, Austria, where in 1933, he first experienced the Nazi regime, which forced an exodus of virtually all German students from Austria and thus the Stella Matutina by means of a punitive 1000 Mark fine to be paid by anyone entering Austria. With his Director, Fr Otto Faller and Professor Alois Grimm, he was among the first to arrive in the Black Forest, where the Jesuits opened Kolleg St. Blasien for some 300 students forced out of Austria. After St. Blasien, he completed his theology studies in Valkenburg, The Netherlands (1934–1936), and in Frankfurt (1936–1937). 

 

Upon being ordained it seemed Delp increased his resistance to the Rech, both rhetorically and in deed.

 

In 1937, Delp was ordained a Catholic priest in Munich. Delp had wanted to study for a doctorate in philosophy at the University of Munich, but he was refused admission to the university for political reasons. From 1939 on, he worked on the editorial staff of the Jesuit journal Stimmen der Zeit ("Voices of the Times"), until the Nazis suppressed it in April 1941. He was then assigned as rector of St. Georg Church, part of Heilig-Blut Parish in the Munich neighbourhood Bogenhausen. He preached both at Heilig-Blut and St. Georg, and also secretly helped Jews who were escaping to Switzerland through the underground.

But it was in joining a group called the Kreisau Circle that got him marked.

 

The Jesuit provincial, Augustin Rösch, Delp's superior in Munich, became active in the underground resistance to Hitler…Rösch introduced Delp to the Kreisau Circle. As of 1942, Delp met regularly with the clandestine group around Helmuth James Graf von Moltke to develop a model for a new social order after the Third Reich came to an end.

This finally came to a head with the July 20^th plot to assassinate Adolph Hitler.

 

After the 20 July plot to assassinate Hitler failed, a special Gestapo commission arrested and interrogated all known members of the Resistance. Delp was arrested in Munich on 28 July 1944 (eight days after Claus von Stauffenberg's attempt on Hitler's life), although he was not directly involved in the plot. He was transferred to Tegel Prison in Berlin. While in prison, he secretly began to say Mass and wrote letters, reflections on Advent, on Christmas, and other spiritual subjects, which were smuggled out of the prison before his trial.

So, the context of the quote is that Fr. Delp, consigned to prison and waiting his hanging, was able to secretly write meditations on life and the transcendental.  It recalls the fifth century Roman philosopher, Boethius, who wrote his famous On the Consolation of Philosophy while awaiting his execution.  But Delp languishes in prison in the late fall while awaiting Christmas, and so many of his meditations are on the importance of Advent, the coming of the Lord.  But this is of double significance for Delp.  Not only will he be meeting the incarnation at Christmas,; he, fully aware, will be meeting the Lord face to face upon his execution.

Each day during Advent, the days grow shorter and darker, until the beautiful light of Christmas morn.  Each day in prison, as one faces one’s execution, the days grow shorter and darker.  And so, Delp says he will endure, as we all must in our lives, “until the heart of man meets the heart of God.”  If we are prudent, through our faith and spirituality, we set up lights in our hearts to “master the gloominess.”  With God, there is no absolute darkness.