Things Keeping Us Alive, June Edition

Time to set our sights on what is amazing, what gives us joy – however small – in our daily grind. This shouldn’t be so difficult.

Yet ennui is real.

And overcoming it, even temporarily, is necessary.

Hence our monthly post, Things Keeping Us Alive. It’s a goofy list, yet it’s important for all of us sick pilgrims to retreat from our gloominess and focus on the sunshine.

We thrive in the dark and are even comforted by it, but it’s summer and time to bask in the light. Like ghastly pale sunbathers at the beach, we may look creepily out of place. Our pale souls may sparkle like terrible pop culture vampires.

What’s keeping me alive this month is you, my ghoulish cohorts. Sick Pilgrim has become a community that gives me constant comfort, even by focusing on the darker aspects of life, of faith. I’m proud to be among you broken and well-meaning dipshits.

I also have to give an overbearing shout out to my new nephew, my sister’s son. He was born on June 23. Babies are so cool. I get to be an awesome uncle. Welcome to the family, Jace.

How about some of you other sick pilgrims? What’s keeping you alive?

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Karl Persson blogs at The Inner Room and is Sick Pilgrim’s Viking correspondent.

John Donne. Because of a fairly serious eye infection, I was for a good chunk of June unable to read or write, which was difficult for me because not only my work but also those things that feed me spiritually depend on those skills. So I turned to books on tape, and one I found particularly fitting was John Donne’s Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions. Donne’s Devotions are a set of 23 spiritual reflections grounded in his experience of illness and convalescence.

Almost as though anticipating some of the modern debates around medicine, faith, and mental health, Donne raises the question in his fourth devotion of whether depending on medicine is not, in fact, a failure to depend on God. But he rejects this, concluding that “I go not from thee [God] when I go to the physician,” and that God “didst imprint a medicinal virtue in many simples [herbs], even from the beginning.” That Donne lays out some of the problems with an either/or approach to God and medicine is itself noteworthy, but what I found particularly interesting is his reliance on the opening of Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) 38 (an apocryphal book for our Protestant fellow travelers) as an authority endorsing this assertion. As I’m often in need of medicine for the sake of my sanity,  it was encouraging to discover this unexpected corroboration.

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Jonathan Ryan is an author, editor, and the co-founder of Sick Pilgrim.

Longmire. I just recently discovered this murder mystery series by Craig Johnson when I trolled Netflix for shows to binge. Western? Murder Mysteries? Good summer reading, all. The TV series ain’t bad either.

Uber. One of the things most humbling about being a missionary is traveling places and having to be dependent on people for transportation everywhere you go. So this modern loveliness that lets you press a button on a phone, have a ride in two minutes, and not have to be vulnerable, dependent or humble? Love it. I mean, I can pursue that holiness thing in other ways, right?

Char-grilled Oysters, Snow Balls, and Oak Trees. I went home to Louisiana this month, can you tell? She is a life-giving lover and she welcomed me in intimate grace with buttery carbony pearls of the sea, sugary sticky iciness, and graceful leafy arms draped open wide. She almost made me forget myself in joy. (Poo-yeah dat sounds like a good time cher -Matt)

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Allison Sullivan is a Catholic speaker, a Christian yoga instructor, and author of Rock Paper Scissors.

The West Wing. My husband and I agreeing on a show requires a great deal of compromise. West Wing has been perfect for us. It’s like The Situation Room and Gilmore Girls had a baby. The characters are well written, sophisticated, and heart infused. I would be lying if I said I hadn’t prayed actual prayers for Jed Bartlet and his staff and written him in as a third-party candidate. (#bartletforamerica) We watch it after the kids are in bed and fantasize about civil servants who are mostly well-behaved and we memorize and rehearse bits of sharp dialogue and tell each other off in new and inventive ways. It’s been really bonding.

My Sisters The Saints by Colleen Carroll Campbell. I love a story about someone having a hard time connecting to their faith. Campbell writes honestly about her misgivings and talks about her favorite saints as easily as if they are simply her friends in heaven. A bit of a holy rascal herself, she connects her story to these women who seem untouchable in their sanctity, and because I can relate to her, I find myself relating to them.

Staying with me the most is how Campbell writes about femininity. Whenever gender issues come up, I typically tune out because, as Campbell says, people “either allow their insistence on the equality of men and women to obscure the differences between the sexes, or they allow their emphasis on the differences between the sexes to obscure the equality of men and women.” That made me stand up and shout, and a book hasn’t made me do that in a while.

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Toby D’Anna is a Louisiana native living in Tacoma, Washington where he teaches middle school English. He is Sick Pilgrim’s new Bookish Bubba in Residence.

DC Comics Rebirth. I’m all about a little darkness in my devotions, but when it comes to superheroes, I prefer bright colors and earnest hope. This reworking of DC’s core titles honors tradition and provide a welcome antidote to the abysmal cinematic handling of these characters. Benjamin Percy’s take on Green Arrow as a social justice warrior in Seattle is particularly outstanding.

Films directed by Terrence Malick. Knight of Cups, the third in a series of semi-autobiographical films with heavy religious existential overtones, is now available for home viewing. Where The Tree of Life may be as perfect a film as I will ever see, Knight of Cups was poorly received by both critics and audiences. However, Malick enthusiasts will appreciate this treatment of strained family relationships and unsatisfying sexual conquests juxtaposed with questions of memory, identity, and transcendence.