I think what [George] Herbert is getting at (Hopkins* is marvellous at this, too) is that our suffering is the
terrible and only teacher—Kierkegaard said famously suffering is the
characteristic of God’s love—and I think everyone senses that failure and
brokenness and loneliness cause us to perceive us as God might, as naked and
ignorant and blind. Our suffering may be the real form love takes, but we also
know that at the end of it waits infinite peace and radiance, that has been my
experience anyway. Why things are arranged this way, who knows—pretty soon we
are all going to find out.
Poet Franz Wright in an interview with Ernest Hilbert entitled, The Secret Glory.
*Gerard Manley Hopkins
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