Marcel Marceau, the world’s most celebrated mime, practices an ancient art that moves in silence beyond the physical toward the spiritual.

That’s the way he sees it himself. Asked in a recent public television interview if his art is “metaphysical,” he answers “absolutely.” “I like to reveal the essence of our soul, the inside of ourselves.”

Now 76 years old, this dynamic Frenchman with frizzy hair, a face expressive of every emotion, and an amazingly lithe body continues giving over two hundred performances every year. Always his interest is to help audiences understand what it means to be enfleshed spirits.

In doing so, Marceau seduces everyone into silence.” I try to bring complete silence in the theater,” he says. When I showed the interview to a class of undergrads at Brandeis University three weeks ago, I was struck by the special quality of silence that reigned among them. It was an alive, dramatic quiet that spoke loudly of human souls deeply engaged.

Certainly Marceau’s family heritage gives him reason for understanding human life as both tragic and comic. His family home was in Strasbourg, the city that lies close to the border between Germany and France. Two horrendous world wars swept over this vulnerable place during the first half of this century.

In 1942, Marceau’s father was deported to Auschwitz and never heard of again. This happened while Marcel was still a teenager.

But growing up, he also did a kind of apprenticeship observing the great comics Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton. From both of them he drew the subtle arts of dramatizing the human comedy.

When you see him do his famous “Bip” character, modeled on Chaplin’s “Little Tramp,” you understand how deeply Marceau has entered into the human condition. Part of that condition is solitude, being alone and left to one’s own resources.

Solitude, Marceau observes, is not in itself bad. It simply reveals what each human being really is. We are also beings torn between the comic and tragic elements of life, as he shows when struggling to get the laughing mask off his face.

“Are you religious?, a priest once asked him. The question makes Marceau uncomfortable. One thing he does know, however: “When I do the creation of the world, God is in me.” During this performance he has a sharp sense of a divine power at work in him.

More broadly, he feels himself part of a larger movement to recognize the glory of the world. Using the French word “la sacralisation,” (“making things holy”), he endows human gestures with the power to render everything sacred. Thus by the skilled use of his hands, he opens up the potential of a world that we are normally oblivious of.

As a person now in his mid-seventies, he also feels the power of age. Asked specifically about the impact of age upon his art, he answers: “It enables me to go deeper.” By bringing the perspective of long experience, he can penetrate closer to the core of things than he could when still young.

The gestures and movements on which this art depends are called by Marceau “the grammar.” They are the bare bones by which the magic works. The movement that audiences see is not mere bodily motion; rather it is filled with spiritual music and feeling. It creates a “stream of silence” that carries along people who watch it.

Asked about his hopes for an artistic legacy, Marceau takes satisfaction in knowing that mime has been accepted as a universal language. It has become part of American culture by now. We have become accustomed to seeing laughing and crying without words.

This great mime hopes that more people still will come to appreciate the meaning and power of human gestures used in this ancient art. The secret is a delicate balance, he says: “not one word, not one gesture too much.”

This artist in costume – long white pants held up by suspenders, striped shirt, sweater and white shoes – walking in place can serve as a colorful and memorable image of the spiritual searcher. He does his searching  by reaching out with his bodily self upward toward the sublime and, at the same time, downward toward the depths of meaning.

Richard Griffin

Among the intriguing stories that have come down from the tradition of the Sufi masters, the famous one about a Muslim mulla, or cleric, named Nasrudin has long been my favorite. This is the version found in a book called Soul Food: Stories to Nourish the Spirit and the Heart, edited by Kornfield and Feldman.

“Mulla Nasrudin was outside on his hands and knees below a lantern when a friend walked up. ‘What are you doing, Mulla?’ his friend asked. ‘I’m looking for my key. I’ve lost it.’

So his friend got down on his hands and knees too and they both searched for a long time in the dirt beneath the lantern. Finding nothing, his friend finally turned to him and asked, ‘Where exactly did you lose it?’

Nasruddin replied, ‘I lost it in the house, but there is more light out here.’”

When I told this story to a group of elder seekers recently, they seemed thoroughly baffled. “What does it mean,” they urgently wanted to know. “Does such a nonsensical story mean anything at all?”

Without examining the contents piece by piece, we can say that the story has an immediate impact on us. It challenges us to ponder, to step back and question our ordinary values. Across the centuries, it speaks to us of a mentality that the modern world has lost.

Like all good stories from the great tradition, this one admits of many different interpretations and spiritual benefits. Here follow a few of my reflections on the anecdote, reflections I offer in the hope of stirring you to think about other meanings. The first thing that strikes me about the story is that the actions of Nasruddin are illogical. Right from the beginning of his search, he knows, of course, that the key is not in the yard but rather somewhere within his house. Nonetheless, he keeps looking for it outside in the ground.

There is something about the life of the spirit that defies reason and logic. The search for the deepest meaning goes beyond what can be defined. This search is a matter of the heart rather than of the mind.

Anyone who expects to make progress along the spiritual path cannot rely simply upon rational analysis. As the French thinker Blaise Pascal says, “The heart has reasons that reason knows not of.”

Another lesson that emerges from the story is the supreme importance of the light. It does not matter that the key remains hidden within the house; by staying outside under the lantern, Nasruddin remains in the light. To him enlightenment is infinitely more precious than any material possession, even the key that locks the door of his house.

Every spiritual tradition values enlightenment supremely. Wanting to walk in the light is the prayer of all who aspire to progress of soul. Once having caught a glimpse of the light, then everything else seems less valuable.

And why does Nasruddin treat his friend so badly? By allowing him to stay for  hours on his hands and knees fumbling around in the dirt, he forces him to waste time and effort.

Actually, as a spiritual master, Nasruddin knows that he is sharing with his friend a valuable lesson. Could he have taught this lesson any more forcefully than by drawing his friend into his own apparently fruitless activity?

Also, whatever the success of the search, we all need other people in our striving for the truth. The search becomes much more humanly valuable when we have at least one other person allied with us. It’s of vital importance to find like-minded people who value the things that we value.

Finally,  hearers of the story can learn something about staying open to surprise and gift. We cannot calculate with certainty what is going to help us progress on the way  toward truth. Human activity is ultimately less important on that path than what one receives from above. As Jesus says, “ the Spirit moves blows where it will.”

Searchers will inevitably encounter frustrations in their quest for the light. But every seeker after truth is already a gifted person. Just the desire to find God, truth, spirit, is a precious gift bestowed on the searcher from above.

Richard Griffin

The wedding was filled with beauty – people looked splendid, especially the bride and her two sisters who attended her, and the one hundred of us present in the Andover church, all in a celebrative mood.

Since my niece Jennifer was marrying a Frenchman, the liturgy was intriguingly bilingual. Christophe, for his part, seemed poised, not only for his role as bridegroom, but in serving as a kind of master of ceremonies. With remarkable aplomb for a person about to be joined in marriage, he helped steer the ushers to their spontaneous and unrehearsed duties.

As has become the norm, photographers scurried about to record every move of the bride and groom. Parents of the bridal partners looked on happily while other relatives and friends more relaxedly entered into the flow of this joyful event.

Part way through the Eucharistic liturgy I was suddenly struck by a new appreciation of how daring it is for a woman to take a man and a man to take a woman as life partner. It hit me as a move fraught with spirituality.

This realization struck home while the second reading was being proclaimed. The couple had chosen a passage from the Song of Songs, the inspired poem from the Hebrew Bible that proclaims an ardent and erotic love, of a woman and a man for each other.

“The voice of my beloved! Look, he comes, leaping upon the mountains, bounding over the hills. My beloved is like a gazelle or a young stag. Look, there he stands behind our wall, gazing in at the windows, looking through the lattice.”

“My beloved speaks and says to me: ‘Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away; for now the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth; the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.’”

This fiery love is what can impel men and women to take on the challenges of the unknown. It drives them even to give assent to the scary words “for better or for worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness or in health, till death do us part.”

Imagine the things that can happen in anyone’s future! Life after marriage can take on such a different shape from what one’s dreams have dictated. And yet the couple stands ready to dare this future, to take a leap impelled by love.

That marriages often fail cannot come as a surprise; the surprise is that they often succeed. To pull it off takes soul. You must have some spiritual depth ever to live permanently in intimacy with one other person.

Spirituality helps us acknowledge our flaws. I remember hearing of a man, aged in marriage, who starts off every day by looking in the mirror and saying “You’re not so hot yourself!”

But, more important, spirituality drives us to reach beyond ourselves and seek strongly the real good of the other person. The soul craves this union; in following this lead we enter into the life of God who is love.

As Thomas Moore says in his book Soul Mates, “Every relationship that touches the soul leads us into a dialogue with eternity, so that, even though we may think our strong emotions focus on the people around us, we are being set face to face with divinity itself, however we understand or speak that mystery.”

Marriage, to the eyes of the spiritual seeker, must indeed be seen as mystery. This word suggests that marriage has too much meaning ever to be comprehended. No matter how long we contemplate what it means for men and women to come together like this, we will never exhaust its significance.

So, whether the spouses reflect on it or not, they are caught up in a human enterprise with divine meaning. Facing one another, they somehow suggest what happens in the life of God. That’s why partners must stay open to the twistings and turnings that take place over time. These events, to the spiritually minded, are intimations of divine activity in lives lived together.

So Jennifer and Christophe, like others who have been joined in marriage, have set out on a spiritual adventure that promises surprise, challenge, and grace.

Richard Griffin

As you read this, Lutherans and Roman Catholics are making history. Or, you might say, unmaking it.

This weekend, official representatives of the two Christian churches, meeting in Augsburg, Germany, will sign a document bringing them closer together than these churches have ever been. The agreement goes far to repair almost five hundred years of sorry history.

During too much of that long era, the two churches hurled insults at one another. Starting with Martin Luther’s nailing of his 95 proposals for reform to the door of a  German church in 1517, and continuing till recent decades, Lutherans and Catholics have hardly acted toward one another with the love that Jesus said would mark his followers.

So this weekend marks the beginning of a new era for two faith communities numbering over 500 million Catholics and some sixty million Lutherans worldwide. Though many issues remain to be resolved and they have not yet progressed to sharing the Eucharist, these huge groups have taken the first step toward unity.

The new agreement centers on the theological issue called justification. This question asks, in the words of Catholic and Lutheran leaders, “how humans are set right with God.”  Until now, the two churches condemned one another’s views about the way this happens. Now, however, these different approaches are agreed not to be “church dividing.”

Here’s how the churches explain the differences: “Roman Catholics hold that good works contribute to growth in grace and that a reward in heaven is promised to these works. Lutherans emphasize that justification is complete in Christ’s saving work and that Christian living is a sign of unmerited justification.”

Most of us non-theologians will wonder what difference this reunion of churches will make to our spirituality. Many Americans have already decided that theological disputes between churches are irrelevant. As Lutheran Pastor Richard Koenig told me, “Some people will say you are kicking down an open door.”

Is there any reason to believe that making peace between two large groups of Christians can affect the spiritual outlook or practice of ordinary people?

I put this question to Krister Stendahl, retired Lutheran bishop of Stockholm. Bishop Stendahl finds spiritual values in “two different ways of speaking about the same thing.”  Lutherans have traditionally stressed the continuing sinfulness of those who have been redeemed, while Catholics tend to emphasize the possibility of the perfect life by recognizing saints.

“There are days when we need to hear one emphasis, and other days when we need to hear the other,” he concludes.

For me and, I suspect, for other people who cherish the spiritual life, peaceful and loving relationships among individual persons and whole communities of people around the world hold great importance. When we hear about disputes being settled, it  buoys up our spirit and give us hope.

After all, the spiritual life is not something purely interior. The spirit finds expression in everything that is human. When brothers and sisters who have been at odds find common ground, then we ought to be glad and celebrate their good fortune and our own.

Wherever it happens – among Palestinians and Israelis, Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland, Kosovars and Serbs – peace and reconciliation between warring communities can have a profound impact on our heart and soul.

Any agreement like this one, says Pastor Koenig, “has to be hailed as a victory in this hateful world.”  Of Lutherans, he says: “We used to look with fear and loathing at the Catholic Church.” That they no longer do surely does deserve celebration.

My hope is that the events at Augsburg this weekend will be, not the last step, but the first of a series that will eventually bring the two churches into full communion. That result is one that many spiritual people have been praying for during much of this past century.

Then members of these two churches will have removed a great scandal, namely their divisions. The prayer of Jesus, “that all may be one,” will then become a reality and these Christians will come closer to the ideal posed by their Lord. “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

If this happens spiritual seekers at large can take on new hope.

Richard Griffin

Two of my spiritual heroes came to town two weeks ago. Much to my chagrin, because of scheduling problems I did not get to see either of them. But, had I been given the privilege of engaging in dialogue with them, I now imagine some questions that I would like to have asked Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Dame Cicely Saunders.

Desmond Tutu, the more widely known of these two great-hearted people, served as Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town until his retirement three years ago. He provided leadership to the people of South Africa, of all races and faiths, during the terrible days of apartheid and helped lead the way toward its abolition.

Archbishop Tutu’s great subject is forgiveness. Starting in late 1995, when freedom from the policy of apartheid took hold in South Africa, he served as chair of the national Truth and Reconciliation Commission that has worked to bring about reconciliation in his own society. Members of this commission led the way in exposing past human rights abuses and getting offenders to admit their crimes and ask for forgiveness.

Were I present when he spoke, I would have asked the archbishop about the possibilities of real forgiveness, the spiritual ability that comes from the heart. When terrible evil has been done you, when someone has murdered one of your sons and daughters for example, how can ordinary people find the spiritual strength to forgive?

If we can, where does this strength come from? Must a person be schooled in a religious tradition to discover the courage to reach out to those who have done grievous harm? Must you believe in God or are there forms of religionless spirituality that can provide sufficient support?

Has post-apartheid South African society reached the goals that you, Archbishop Tutu, had dreamed about for so many years? Or does our often ornery human nature force you to fall back on the notion that there is something fundamentally wrong with us?

Do you hope, Archbishop, that the coming generations will put the world in better order than the idealists of the twentieth century have been able to do?

Dame Cicely Saunders deserves to be much better known than she is. After all, this eighty-year-old British doctor founded the hospice movement. She brought first to England, then to the United States and other parts of the world, a new way of helping people to die with dignity and peace of soul.

What I would have liked to ask Dame Cicely in particular concerns her recent statement that, rather than a sudden death, she would prefer a slow death from cancer. She gave as reasons for this astounding choice that a slow death would give her the opportunity to perform five tasks vital for people to finish before the end of life.

According to this wise woman, the things you need to say before your death to your loved ones go as follows: 1) I forgive you;  2) please forgive me;  3) thank you ; 4) I love you 5) Good-bye.

Given the chance to talk with Dame Cicely, I would ask her how she could find  courage to take on the pain and suffering attached to a slow and lingering death. Does not the fear and foreboding felt by people diagnosed with cancer make it impossible to carry out the tasks listed above?

Those tasks themselves do not loom large in most people’s imaginations when they think of their own death. How, Dame Cicely,  did you arrive at this list and what does the accomplishment of these tasks do for one’s spirit?

How, I would like to know further from Dame Cicely, can one overcome the abhorrence of death that has made discussion of it taboo in American society? Is not death a negative subject, contemplation of which is likely to lead toward depression and even despair?

What I imagine is that just being in the presence of Archbishop Tutu and Dame Cicely Saunders, these two heroes of the twentieth century, would itself prove an answer to my questions. Is this not our experience whenever we encounter people of great spirit? Typically, we find that their very person offers assurance to us that goes beyond the spoken responses that they have given. They themselves turn out to be the best answer.

Richard Griffin

“I’m a mountain hillbilly,” Billy Graham said of himself two Sundays ago before beginning his sermon at Harvard University’s Memorial Church. In the course of his skilled delivery, however, he showed how outdated this self-definition really is.

This best-known of the world’s evangelists is clearly a master of the spoken language.  His Bible-based preaching held in rapt attention members of the jam-packed congregation, both old and young.

Burdened by Parkinson’s Disease at eighty years of age, Rev. Graham is no longer steady on his feet. His voice, however, remains strong and his spirit vibrant. He still stands tall and speaks forcefully using only simple gestures.

And he finds personal strength in thinking about the world to come. “I’m looking forward to the future with tremendous anticipation,” he assured his listeners.

He also sprinkles his talks with humor. He told some undergrads who, to make sure they got a seat, stayed overnight on the church’s front porch: “You’re free to go asleep now.”

Of the Country Club in Brookline where the Ryder Cup tournament was recently played, this avid golfer quipped: “I played that course and almost lost my religion.”

People often write to Billy Graham asking if there is any hope. This is a time when people are desperately searching, he says. “They are searching for they know not what. They never really find an answer until they find it in God.”

The question that this famous preacher puts to everyone is simple: “Have you been born again?” Reborn is what happened to him as a teenager back in North Carolina; that’s when his own life was transformed. When the traveling preacher asked this question, young Billy felt moved to step forth and things for him were never the same again.

Preaching now, over sixty years later, Rev. Graham chose as his subject “The Real Meaning of the Cross.” His text came from Galatians: “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”

To Rev. Graham’s regret, the cross has become for many people nothing more than an ornament. It is often a design used in costume jewelry and in decorative art.

But this is to ignore the cross’s true meaning. In Rev. Graham’s faith, the cross

1) reveals the depth of human sin; 2) shows us the love of God; and 3) stands as the only way of salvation.

In this evangelist’s eyes, the cross is the sign of the suffering that Jesus endured for the world. His real suffering was not merely physical. God placed on him the sins and evils of all of us. As the Bible says, “he became sin.”

Rev. Graham finds in the Good Thief, the criminal who hung on a cross next to Jesus, the greatest faith in all the Bible. He was the one who turned to Jesus and said, “Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” This prayer merited the response from Jesus, “This day you will be with me in paradise.”

So sure of the way of the Cross is Rev. Graham that he shares with his listeners this promise: “You’ll find a life you never knew existed.”

To the young people present, Rev. Graham applied the God’s law to sexuality. If you keep this law, he promised, “there is no thrill such as when you come to your marriage bed.”

Billy Graham’s basic message is consistent: Jesus Christ is the solution to human problems. His formula for what a person needs to do to prepare for the future comes in three parts: 1) admit to God that you have sinned; 2) turn away from what is wrong; 3) turn to the cross of Jesus.

Among the many stories he shared with listeners was one about a little boy who got lost in London. A police officer who found the boy asked where he lived. The boy, however, could not remember the names of streets near his home. Finally, the child recalled that there was a church nearby with a cross on top.

The moral of the story according to the evangelist? “Take me to the cross and I can find my way home from there.”

Richard Griffin