Apollo 17, A Hazelnut, and Hope
Dragons Can Be Beaten — Episode 2
(Episode 1 of this story can be found here)
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I walked down the road to the West, pondering my encounter with the Knight. He had left me with more questions than answers. I wasn’t sure why I believed him except that it appeared to be the way things went in this dream, medical episode, faerie journey, or wherever I was. I kept thinking that this must not all be real, but the weight of the sword Veritas in its scabbard across my back felt real, and I remembered the Knight’s explanation:
”It depends on what you mean by real. If you are inquiring if this all really matters, then it may be more ‘real’ than anything you’ve ever encountered heretofore.”
The countryside I was walking through had a particular vibrancy to it. The green of the grass was more profound than any green I had ever seen before. The birdsong was delightful and complex, and the animals I passed seemed utterly unafraid of me. However, when it came to human habitation, every cottage and barn I passed appeared as if it had been scorched long ago, and there was no sign of the inhabitants. The whole natural world around me rejoiced, but humanity seemed absent. Was this another metaphor for me? I added it to the list of questions.
The knight had told me I had to seek three blessings on the blade of truth and would find them along the road to the West — Hope, Integrity, and Perseverance. I walked along, wondering when I would see the first of my teachers. Eventually, I entered an area with what appeared to be cross streets to my right and left, like a city grid, only more unevenly like a medieval town. As I moved further, the city seemed to start forming around me. At first, it was just vague outlines of buildings around me, with occasional fleeting shapes I assumed were people. The further I moved in, the more solid everything seemed to become, but they were still hazy, as if in an impressionist painting. As I looked ahead, I saw one building that had taken definite form. It was a small building — or a small addition to a larger building that remained cloudy but appeared to be a church.
I approached the solid building somewhat warily — the side near me held a single wooden door with a window inside. The window had a curtain drawn across it from the inside. There were a couple of wooden chairs on the porch. Next to the door was hung a small bell and a placard that read, “The Anchoress is in, and is a total Sigma.” I wasn’t sure what to make of this, but I reached up and rang the bell.
After a minute, the curtain was drawn aside, and an elderly woman smiled at me. She was dressed in a wimple and veil like a nun. “Good Morning!” she said as she smiled out at me. “Good Morning, Ma’am,” I said, “Are you the Teacher of Hope?” She got an amused look on her face. “You’ve been around that knight back East, haven’t you? He’s always talking in dramatic, high language about ‘The Teacher of This” and the “Virtue of That.’” She laughed — a most musical laugh. “I guess I am, but you can call me Julian. That’s my name in religion.” “You’re Julian? Then this is… Norwich?” She laughed again. “It’s whatever your tricky little mind is making it right now, including how it’s portraying me.” I looked around, and the city had taken solid form around us. It was a bustling medieval city, with people going every which way plying all kinds of trades. Yet there was a haunted look among the residents — the kind of look when people are just waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“There’s a lot of fear here. What are people so afraid of?” Julian’s eyes clouded for a moment, then returned. “I’ll show you,” she said. The door opened, and she stepped out. “Wait,” I gasped, “You’re an anchoress. Aren’t you supposed to be inside that cell your entire life?” “What year is it for you?” she asked. “It’s 2024.” “Well, it’s still the 1400s for me, but according to you, I’ve been dead for over 600 years. My vows no longer apply. “ She stretched in the sunshine. “That’s nice,” she said, and then she continued to stretch — and stretch — and stretch! She was getting taller and taller as she stretched — she was now a good one-hundred feet in height. No one else around seemed to notice. She smiled down at me and put down her palm. “Step on, and let me show you something.” I gingerly stepped onto her hand, and she raised me to her shoulder. I scampered clumsily out onto the cloth of her habit. “Do you see that over there?” she pointed at a large pit several streets over, blackened with fire. I nodded. “That’s the Lollard pit — they believed the church should give up its riches to aid people to live a life of poverty and imitate Christ. The local bishop declared them heretics and had them burned there. That kind of thing is happening more and more frequently.” She continued to grow until she was miles high, and I felt tiny on her shoulder. She pointed east, and I could see the English Channel, with continental Europe beyond. “Listen,” she said, and I cocked my ear and quieted my mind. I could hear weeping, crying, and wailing from all over England around me and the continent beyond. “What is that?” I asked. “The Black Death rolls over Europe, repeatedly killing thousands. It’s come through Norwich three times in my lifetime. I lost…..” she began, but then seemed to catch herself. “The amount of pain and suffering is unimaginable, and people do not know how to deal with the trauma.” I saw, as if with a telescope, long lines of people whipping themselves and throwing themselves on the ground in ashes. “People think it is the punishment of God on us for whatever sins we carry with us.” She walked South and then stepped over the channel itself. We were evidently in some ghostly form because her footfalls didn’t seem to disturb anything.
She pointed towards Southeast France, and her visage became stern. “And when her people need Holy Mother Church’s guidance the most, we have two men, one in Avignon and the other in Rome, styling themselves the Pope. The church is divided, hopelessly entangled in bitter politics, and has no time for her people.” My heart fell as the enormity of the suffering washed over me. “It all seems so hopeless. How do you keep going?” She looked down at me and lit up with a giant smile. “The Lord told me several things. If you want the blessing of hope, you must receive these as well. Are you ready?” I nodded.
“Open your hand,” she said. I hadn’t realized my hand was clasped, but indeed it was, and there was something in it, “Tell me about what you hold.” I opened my hand slowly, “It’s a hazelnut.” Julian said, “It’s so small but well-formed, beautiful, and holds the promise of new life within it.” I admired it and loved the beauty of this small thing. “Hold on to your mind,” Julian said and immediately began to grow again while simultaneously stepping back from the earth. She grew and grew until she became a vast being, like Galactus from the Marvel universe, and the earth hung before us like a blue jewel in the background of space. I recalled the famous photo called “Blue Marble” from Apollo 17. She held up her hand, cradling the earth like I did the hazelnut. Everything and everyone I had ever known and loved was there, lovingly cradled in Julian’s hand.
“It’s so delicate and so small,” Julian said, “It is set in so vast a firmament. God showed me that God holds the entire universe in love and wonder like you hold that hazelnut. The entire universe is held in being and prevented from falling into nothingness because God loves everything God has made. It is here because God loves it and exists only because God loves it. Everyone has received their being in God’s love. God is maker, lover, and keeper and can never cease to be so because of God’s love. What is the meaning of the universe? It is Love. Who shows it to us? Love. What is God showing to us? Love. Why did he show it to us? Love. Before God made humanity, God loved us. The love in which God created us is without beginning, and it has never slackened nor ever shall. All creation will see the salvation of God.”
As she said the last, she diminished in size rapidly, and suddenly, we were back on the porch outside her cell, sitting in the wooden chairs. My mind reeled from the change in scale from cosmic to small. My emotions, which had been overwhelmed with the enormity of God’s love, came to a hard crash back into the reality of 15th Century Norwich, with the fear and the disease and the violence. “How do you do it?” I gasped, “How do you continue to live with this reality when you’ve seen the overwhelming love of God for us and the mess we have made of it?” “Ah,” she said, “There was a time when this was a problem for me. God was trying to show me several things, but I was stubborn. I couldn’t deal with my anxieties over our personal sin and fallenness. I had an episode where I kind of, well, your term would be ‘freaked out?’ I demanded that God show me the answer before we go any further. God was gentle but firm with me. God seemed to say to me:
” Do you believe the lesson of the hazelnut, that I loved all things into being, that they exist because I continue to love them, and that they will continue to exist because I will not do otherwise? Well, then, know that what seems impossible to you is not impossible to me. I shall keep my word in all things and shall make all things well.”
Julian sat back in her chair. “I saw that there is a Great Deed planned by God from eternity, treasured and hidden in God’s heart, that at the end of time will make well all that is currently not. The nature of it, I cannot comprehend.”
She turned to me and took my hands. “We Christians are the people of the long hope. To use the phrase from your time, ‘The Arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.’ God is not some magical being bestowing gifts upon us in reward for prayer. God is the founding and sustaining love of the universe. Hope that endures accepts that suffering and pain are real, but it is not the end. In the end, love awaits us and all of creation. This divine hope must enable all our human struggles, or it is doomed to failure. The truth of God’s love provides the foundation…” At the word “Truth,” I could feel the sword on my back resonate with harmonics. She continued, “Recognizing God’s continued love provides hope that leads to faith through integrity and perseverance. And with those blessings, you can hope to confront the dragon. Do you see it?”
To be honest, I was mixed up. I had felt the love of God for creation, and her words had inspired me, but I questioned whether my hope would be enough when push came to shove. She laughed lightly again as she read the emotions on my face. “Yes, that was pretty much my reaction, too. Some days, it is clearer than others. But here’s the important thing. Hope does not depend on us. It depends on the one who loves the universe and holds it gently like the hazelnut. Let me see that sword of yours.”
I stood, drew Veritas out of its scabbard, and held it in my palms towards her. She laid her hands lightly upon it. “May you receive the blessing of hope, that the bearer may not lose heart.” Veritas hummed and glowed with a warm, golden hue for a second. “Thank you, Julian,” I said. She and Norwich started to fade. “May God be with you — your road is to the West,” she said. “If you see the knight again, tell him to lay off the flowery language.”
Suddenly, I was back on the road, with the city nowhere to be found. With newfound hope, I set out again to the West.
Episode 3 of this story can be found here.
The Rev. David Simmons, ObJN is the Pastor of St. Matthias Episcopal Church and First Presbyterian Church, Waukesha. He is an Oblate of and confessor to the Order of Julian of Norwich, and was a Dungeon Master for years before he became a Christian.
Apollo 17, A Hazelnut, and Hope was originally published in Preaching from the Rood Screen on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.