6. LIGHT OF THE WORLD

The following is the dream of a 59-year old woman long active in Christian spiritual groups:

I am in a large rustic hall in a conference center set up like a dining hall with long tables parallel to each other in three rows. There is a small group gathered around a table in the back. I am a participant and the leader is a young woman. There are about 8 of us. One is a young man with an excellent singing voice. I have brought candles in a large paper bag. We use a fat red one at our table.

At one point we're talking about scriptures and I mention a favorite in Corinthians 3:16. [Note: John 3:16 is a well known verse to most all who read Christian scripture at all, and became a joke in a group that I was in for a long time-- anytime one wanted to offer a citation it was *:3:16.] Someone looks it up and it's the body passage [actually 1 Corinthians 12]. We talk about what part of the body we are. I realize the man is the voice and I also realize I am to be the hands. I have been taking notes for the group.

An older black woman enters in a professional dress--she is the appointed leader and is late.

She has found out that I'm the priest's wife and a speaker in my own right, and says I should be doing the teaching. With no ambivalence, I say I'm there to learn, but offer her a tall, thin, golden-brown candle to be set in a glass holder. We have trouble lighting it and she helps. It feels like mutual acceptance.

I awaken with these thoughts: I am not the head, the voice, the mouth, even the heart. I am the hands, and am willing to be so. A new thing.

Upon rereading, I notice I also bring the light. This feels good.

Commentary on the Dream (HRM)

This dream begins in a location outside of ordinary life-- in a "large rustic hall" at a conference center, where a spiritual retreat might take place. The dreamer describes herself as only "a participant" in the group meeting there. The dreamer finds herself not in the center of the meeting area but in the back of the room, in a small group led by "a young woman" (the dreamer herself?). The dreamer brings candles to this table, and she later realizes that she has brought the light, which "feels good."

What sort of light is this? In the New Testament Jesus says of himself "I am the Light of the World." In fact, the small group in this dream is discussing Scripture, where they juxtapose two verses from the Gospel of John and First Corinthians, the famous "body passage." It turns out that figures in the dream represent different parts of the body, as the group itself recognizes. The "young man with an excellent singing voice" represents the voice, while the dreamer herself represents the hands. In fact, all the time she has been "taking notes for the group," recording their deliberations just as this dream records her inner spiritual life unfolding.

Next in the dream appears an "older Black woman" who turns out to be "the appointed leader." Here is an interesting contradiction. At first the leader of the group was a young woman, presumably Caucasian (like the dreamer). But now the "appointed leader," arriving late, is no longer young but old; no longer white but Black. Something has changed in this group.

The numinous Black woman of course is also the dreamer, but is "the Other," an unknown figure who insists that the dreamer is not to remain only "a participant" in this spiritual study group. In fact, the new leader says that the dreamer is "the priest's wife" and "a leader in her own right" who should actually be doing the teaching. The dreamer resists this call ("with no ambivalence"), saying she is only there to learn, not to teach. Yet in the dream she is the one who brings the candles, the light, and the new leader helps her to light a candle.

At this point we come to the core of some of the deepest currents in Christian revelation. Believers are to be a "Light unto the nations," and they are not to "hide their light under a bushel." Yet "He who is first, shall be last" and Scripture repeatedly warns that the way to new life comes from dying to the old self. How are these contradictions to be reconciled?

The figure of the Black woman, the genuine appointed leader, is "the stone that the builders rejected" which has now become the foundation for the whole structure, the new self to be built in later life. Yet we have trouble building this new self, just the dreamer has trouble lighting the candle or acknowledging her own leadership role. We need help with illumination, as the dreamer does when the appointed leader helps to light the candle, resulting in a feeling of "mutual acceptance."

The dreamer herself reconciles all contradictions in the powerful feeling that comes forth at the end of the dream: "I am not the head, the voice, the mouth, even the heart. I am the hands, and am willing to be so." This "willing to be so" conveys the truth of genuine humility: "Those who are last shall be first." At the same time the dreamer will not resist the new life and power rising up in her in this dream: she is, after all, "the priest's wife" and "a speaker in my own right." The dream is an abiding message of faith and "assurance in things unseen." All figures in this dream are the dreamer herself, and all are, in the end, united. Whether head, voice, heart or hands, all are part of the Mystical Body of Christ, "the Light of the world."