Overcoming my revulsion towards the appalling DADDY who might so easily have been described by Ruth, I slipped with relief into the role of priest and began to talk confidently about the hereafter.
‘It’s exceedingly difficult to talk intelligibly about life after death,’ I said, ‘because we’re so pitifully limited by being trapped in time and space, but if you keep firmly in mind the fact that we’re really incapable of thinking in anything but spatial and temporal terms you’ll see that heaven and hell are spatial symbols while eternal life is a temporal symbol. All religious language is symbolic in that it attempts to bridge the gap between the describable and the inexpressible, but that doesn’t mean it’s untrue. Quite the reverse. Just as poetry and myth can sometimes express truth better than prose or scientific aphorisms, so religious language can convey truth by symbols. The symbols point the way to reality, and reality is a kingdom of values. Insofar as we partake of the three absolute values – truth, goodness and beauty – we can never die because those values are eternal. Plotinus, who was probably the greatest religious philosopher who ever lived – and a pagan, incidentally – said: “Nothing that really
is
can ever perish.”’
‘Yes, I see. Or I think I see. But –’
‘You’re wondering if we survive as individuals after death. Christianity says we do. On the other hand the Indian mystics claim that we don’t; we merely become absorbed in the Absolute. However Plotinus holds that although there’s a merging with other spirits individuality is retained; each soul is as individual as a face or a body. So the question then becomes: what is the relation of this “soul” to the “I” of personality? Or in other words, who is it who survives after death? Is it the ego, the demanding self of our daily lives whom we know all too well? Or is the real self not the ego at all but the spiritual presence which we share with all other human beings, the ennobled self which often prompts men to sacrifice their lives for others and share the burden of another’s suffering? It’s worth remembering, I think, that in classical times there was no word corresponding to our own “personality” and that the cult of the individual,
glorifying the ego, is a fairly modern phenomenon. I suspect that the doctrine of survival which has come down to us means not the survival of the ego but the survival of the true self, the spiritual self, which after death joins other spirits in everlasting life – although everlasting life, of course, being outside finite time, is quite beyond our power to imagine.’ I smiled at her. ‘But you’re thinking I still haven’t answered your question about whether your father can see you following in his footsteps.’
‘Yes, you have – he’s not in space and he’s not in time so it’s ridiculous for me to picture him hovering on a cloud and watching me through a pair of binoculars!’
I laughed before saying: ‘Nevertheless it’s possible that your father’s essence, his spiritual self, can penetrate finite time and enfold your psyche in that eternal value, love. If it’s possible then your outward behaviour would reflect his love, like a mirror, and you’d be at peace, but what seems to have happened here is that his spiritual self is blocked from communicating with you because his ego is lingering on in your consciousness in the form of sad difficult memories. That often happens when someone dies leaving unhealed wounds and unresolved conflicts. The dead ego leaves a stain on the psyche which has to be wiped clean.’ I was careful not to use the word ‘exorcism’ with all its dubious and discredited connotations.
By this time several days of the honeymoon had elapsed and intimacy had become easier for her. As practice made me more adroit I was at least able to ensure she felt no acute discomfort, but her response remained maimed, reflecting the damage in her psyche, and soon I realized that her fear lay not in the possibility that I might hurt her but in the belief that she would disappoint me, just as she had disappointed DADDY, by failing to display an unflawed femininity. She seemed to be telling herself – unconsciously, of course – that if she refused to compete in this particular race she would run no risk of the ignominious failure she feared so much, and this psychological withdrawal manifested itself in a refusal to let me touch her where it mattered most.
As our honeymoon entered its second week I became more determined than ever to set matters right but I knew I had to employ some radical new strategy. Although I was doing my best to demonstrate in a multitude of ways that I found her very far from being second-rate it seemed she could never quite believe that my attitude did not spring merely from a desire to be kind. The hallmark of psychological damage is irrationality.
One wet afternoon when we were in bed together she said suddenly: ‘Do you promise me you’re not secretly wishing I were thin like all the first-rate women?’ and when I retorted: “What’s so first-rate about being thin? I like my women to be women, not effeminate boys!’ she laughed. This pleased me. Laughter in bed represented progress. As a priest I am certainly in favour of treating the intimate side of marriage with a proper reverence, but I would argue with any puritan who insists that laughter has no place in the bedroom. Sexual intercourse should be a pleasure, not a penance, and laughter can lead to that vital relaxation without which the deepest pleasure can remain unobtainable.
I said: ‘I like to hear you laugh!’ and when she kissed me I saw with my inner eye a psyche which was ready to be healed.
In my memory Father Darcy began to drone that I should exercise the charism of healing only with men and only when they became emotionally disturbed during the course of spiritual counselling, but I ceased to listen. Father Darcy had merely regarded women as a man on a diet might regard a box of chocolates: pretty to look at, delicious to taste but quite irrelevant to sensible nourishment, and certainly he had never known what it was like to be in bed with a wife who was so painfully longing to express her love in the fullest possible way.
However Father Darcy’s training was less easy to slough off than his views on my suitability for the ministry of healing, and automatically I found myself struggling to perceive my motives. I knew I wanted to heal Anne for her own sake so that she could be completely happy in the physical expression of our marriage, but beyond this truth were other less edifying truths, and lurking in their dark shadow was my old enemy, the demon
pride. The demon was making me unwilling to accept that I could not wholly satisfy my wife; he was demanding incontrovertible evidence of sexual success in order to blot out my fear of old age, and he was whispering that after seventeen years of celibacy I was entitled to the best possible marital pleasure in compensation.
Yet although I could perceive the demon’s machinations so clearly I told myself that Anne’s need remained genuine, no matter how murky my motives were, and the next moment I had begun to pray.
I prayed in words, although the silence in the room remained unbroken, and offering my powers to God I prayed that he might use me as a channel for his Holy Spirit. In an attempt to override all my unsavoury motives by an expression of selflessness I also prayed: let thy will, not mine, be done. But the prayer was a mere formality, no better than the magic incantation of the sorcerer, and the next moment it was
my
will which drove me to take Anne in my arms,
my
will which determined that I should now have what I wanted and
my
will which egged me on to embrace the solution I could no longer withstand.
Having taken Anne in my arms I said to her: ‘I’d like to try an experiment, but don’t be intimidated; if it doesn’t work it’ll be my fault, not yours.’
Despite my reassurance she immediately became nervous. ‘What sort of experiment?’
‘An exercise in telepathy. Now –’ I moved until I was astride her in such a manner that I could place my hands comfortably on her breasts ‘– don’t protest that you’re incapable of it! Imagine that I’ve switched on a wireless. All you’ve got to do is listen as I slowly turn up the volume knob – and listening will be easier if you now close your eyes and think of William.’
‘
William?
My cat?’
‘I wasn’t aware that you knew anyone else called William.’
Anne laughed, and as she thought of the safe, comforting image of her cat I was conscious of her muscles relaxing. Some seconds passed. Then I found I could distinguish her psyche clearly enough to reflect it in my mind as a visual symbol; I saw it as a bright ball with a clouded patch deep in the centre. I was unable to see William but that was because she did not know how to project the image. As an experiment I projected the image of Whitby but there was no response. I was still too far away. Moving to the edge of the bright ball I began to press into it towards the central darkness.
‘Imagine William washing his paws.’
‘I was! How clever of you!’
I thought this success was probably a coincidence; I was still unable to see William. ‘Is he in a basket?’ I said, thinking of Whitby.
‘No, William hates baskets. He’s sitting on his special blanket in my room. No, wait a minute, it’s not William at all! His hair’s too long. I’m sorry, my mind’s wandering, I must have been thinking of your description of Whitby –’
‘You’re doing splendidly. Now imagine that the voice on the wireless is becoming audible and that it’s finally possible for you to hear the message.’ As I pressed on through the brightness I was aware of a change in the visual image; I now saw a patch of rapids on a swift flowing river, and I was swimming steadily upstream towards the white water.
‘I’m afraid I’m no good at this at all,’ said Anne. ‘I can’t hear a thing.’
‘Say the first word that comes into your head.’
‘Love.’
‘Good. Now keep listening, listen to the voice, listen, listen, listen …’ I had reached the rapids and there ahead of me in the centre of the white water lay the black rock which had to be crushed. I fought my way on.
‘Trust,’ said Anne suddenly. ‘Hope. Faith.’
The rapids died. The black rock lay unprotected before me and at once I began to draw my hands down over her breasts. Anne gasped, Whitby yelped and as the vertical line of time was
fractured, past and present streamed side by side into the future.
‘Jon, your hands –’
‘Don’t be frightened, just look at me, Anne, look and keep looking –’ As I touched the rock the image of the river dissolved so that I found myself confronting the darkness at the centre of her psyche. The final visual image flashed in my mind; I saw the darkness as a cancer, and a second later my mind was stretching to encircle it.
‘Jon –’
‘Don’t speak, just listen,
listen,
LISTEN –’
But Anne no longer needed to listen. She had heard the message of love which lay far beyond the power of mere words to express, and in a moment of direct communication her psyche lay open before mine. The cancer was encircled. For one long moment I focused my entire psychic strength on it. Then as she herself placed my hand on her body the darkness exploded, her love expanded unhindered at last, and seconds later she was sobbing in my arms.
Just as Whitby had expelled the furball and all the matter which had been poisoning him, so Anne now expelled her anguish and pain on the subject of the opposite sex. She said she had hated her fiancé for calling her a sexual cripple. She had hated him for letting her down so cruelly. Men had always let her down, never asking her to dance, never taking any genuine interest in her, never realizing she was just as much a human being as the girls who had the luck to be pretty. Sometimes she had even hated Gerald for treating her like an overgrown puppy; she had hated him because he had had access to the worlds which were closed to her, the worlds of freedom and independence where young men could chase the opposite sex and have a good time and escape from the clutches of DADDY.
‘I hated Daddy too sometimes,’ said Anne. ‘He wouldn’t let me do anything or go anywhere. I wanted to go up to Oxford,
but he said higher education was pointless for women. I wanted to go to London and get a job but he said that was common and no girl of my class should consider it. All he wanted me to do was be a social success and get married and when I failed it was awful –
awful –
I hated him just as much as I hated myself – but then I felt worse than ever, so guilty, because of course I did love him very much and he was so often perfectly sweet to me –’ She broke off, unable to continue, but I picked up my counsellor’s cue with the ease born of long practice and said firmly: ‘You didn’t want someone being perfectly sweet. You wanted someone to understand the hell you were going through.’
‘But he couldn’t help not understanding! It was just the way he was made!’
‘My dear, no one should excuse their faults by saying smugly: “I’m so sorry but this is just the way I was made.”’
‘Well, he never actually did say that, but –’
‘If he didn’t you certainly shouldn’t. I’m quite willing to believe your father was a remarkable and delightful man in many ways, but you should never forget that he was also human enough to make mistakes – and some of those mistakes may well have been so serious that you have every right to be angry with him.’
‘But that makes me feel so guilty –’
‘Why? God made you as a unique individual in his own image. You wanted to be that individual and your father stopped you. This was not only a bad mistake; it was also morally wrong. You have a right to be angry, but you mustn’t turn the anger in on yourself because that only compounds the damage which has already been done. You must turn the anger outwards. Hate him for hurting you! Be angry with him for rejecting your true self! And then when all that anger and hatred have been spent you’ll be able to think: poor Daddy, never realizing what a first-class daughter he had – poor Daddy, cut off from so much love and happiness by his lack of understanding – poor Daddy, how very, very sad! And when you see, as you will, that he was the loser while you’ve gone on to win the life you were denied,
your old anger will dissolve, your new compassion will expand to take its place and then at long last forgiveness will become possible.’