One of my Dad’s favorite country music artists is Charley Pride. He is remembered more for his romantic crooning songs in pop culture than for his religious songs, but he recorded some delightful heartfelt music dedicated to expressing the importance of Christ’s death and resurrection, like “He Took My Place” and “He’s the Man.”
A song of Pride’s that alludes to the salvation Christ works for us is “Whispering Hope” from the album Did You Think to Pray. It struck me as I heard the lyrics that this song hits upon something profoundly true in our human experience: hope is a quiet whispering sound, and it’s often difficult to hear it over the raucous calls to despair blaring out all around us.
Despair shouts at us through the television and social media that we are on the edge of utter catastrophe. We are told that the economy, the environment, the pandemic, and political dysfunction are looming sources of disaster. The very things that we count on for a stable and happy life, such as a healthy economy and environment, a political system focused on the common good, and a robust health care system, are themselves deeply unstable. We need to lean on something, but what we want to lean on seems to be tottering and ready to fall over itself.
Our ears filled with the sounds of despair, we often pass those sounds along to family and friends, suffusing our lives yet more with these echoes of looming disaster and impending doom. These sounds often fill our hearts as easily as they fill our ears, our inner lives becoming driven by fear and anxiety rather than by the love and generosity we hold dear.
Amidst this cacophonous concert of despair to which we are subjected, the whispering sound of hope often goes unheard. But in the stillness, God’s Word speaks to us. He speaks to us when we read Scripture, when we adore Him in the Eucharist, and when we listen for his voice in the depths of our hearts as we pray.
He speaks to us of the hope that God will always bear us up amidst all the trials and tribulations of life. He speaks to us as our hoped-for redeemer whose saving wounds have the power to heal even our despairing souls. He speaks to us of having hope that God will indeed grant us the eternal happiness we all desire. Indeed, that God desires to grant us eternal happiness.
He speaks to us in the tranquil voice that calmed the stormy sea as the Apostles looked on in amazement, their despair quieted quickly, dispelled by the one in whom they hoped. Let us strive to listen to this voice and to speak the same way, bringing Christ’s message of hope to those we love as they face the raucous storms of despair swirling around them.
✠
Photo by Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash
