The dark night of the soul is that moment when you realize that God is not a thing to be grasped, even in love. Rather God can only be encountered 'as that which eclipses the reality of all other things.' In this space you have moved beyond describing who God is and are left with saying what God is not. God is not all light. God is not easily understood. God is not........The dark night of the soul is a darkness that descends upon one. There is no glowing light in the darkness; the only way out of the darkness is to travel through it. Not striving. Not ordering or arranging. But breathing, existing, walking one step at a time listening for the whisper of the 'still small voice' from Elijah, or the weight of a presence that simply is. There is no pathway neither to God or from God; only is exists.
There is no safe place; there are no promises; there is nowhere to settle. It is unnerving yet also exquisite. It is gift in the pain of uncertainty where you wander asking, "Where is the God I have known?"
It is not even a spiritual practice even as it is a powerfully spiritual experience. It can not be sought; it finds you. "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living God" the writer of Hebrews tells us.
Yet in this deepest darkness, God is. Just possibly the deepest darkness is necessary to truly encounter God. Or, it is in the deepest darkness that what we encounter is truly God.
I have no answers, only the fearful journey of seeking, on this, the day of the cross.
*the original reflections on the dark night of the soul belong to St. John of the Cross
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