Unutterable

These are the last few paragraphs of an essay I found here, which I am not sure that I have even really begun to grasp, but it thrills me somehow, as does the initial moment of the sudden, steep descent of a highly placed roller coaster…


For myself I find dramatic irony that an alcoholic is best served by ceasing (under the supervision of a medical professional) to consume alcohol. But what is the prescription for those of us who have misused food, which we must consume to live, turning it into a poison that we must now disdain? Or what then of religion, how shall we do away with our religious distractions when the truth of the Word of God comes to us through the traditions passed down by our pious ancestors to which we owe our very souls?

We are lamentable to be sure. And we most functional are the most grievously endangered. For once calamity has struck and life begins to give way to death in an unmistakable tragedy all pride is broken and we are left with a moment of clarity.

But to those of us who are not yet clear, we wait. And the smarter we are, and the more sophisticated in our buttresses of reinforcement, the larger our superstructure of good habits and manners and education, the greater a monument we build to our own vanity, the greater we lift ourselves up; the scriptures tell us, the greater will be our collapse when God brings us down.

How long brothers and sisters? How long will we eat each other’s flesh? How long will we poison ourselves with our addiction for celebrity and scandal? Here now in Lent we chose to fast, but we chew on each other and receive the full condemnation of the saints who walked before us.

Superman has often been ridiculed (I have repeated it) as the “Big Blue Boy Scout”. Why such ridicule? Because we know we must protect our addictions, hide them even from ourselves. We know that if we had his strength we would not save the day, but let loose our will upon the world for our own benefit; just as we let our powers such as they are, even now, war against our fellow man.

— David Dickens, ‘Superman,’ Nothing Hypothetical

Χαιρε, τό των αγγέλων πολυθρύλητον θαυμα·
χαιρε, τό των δαιμόνων πολυθρήνητον τραυμα.

Chaire, to ton angéllon poly-thrýliton thávma,

chaire, to ton daimónon poly-thríniton trávma.

Rejoice! O miracle multi-thrilling to the angels!

Rejoice! O trauma multi-tearing to the devils!

Χαιρετισμοί της Παναγίας Θεοτόκου