HUNGER

there is a point where hunger becomes so great that it numbs you. indeed, the very hungry, those actually in danger of starvation, are those who can no longer feel hunger. cold works that way, too. there is a point where cold becomes so strong that one actually feels kind of warm. and those in greatest danger of freezing to death are those who no longer feel the cold.

i have often wondered if the soul isn't so much different. that those in greatest danger of starving to death are those who no longer feel any kind of spiritual hunger. that the souls in greatest danger of becoming as cold as stone are those who feel, to be perfectly honest, quite warm with who they are.

we become ghosts and apparitions the moment we find in ourselves no craving for spiritual food and no desire for spiritual warmth. we examine our hands and we find them to be disturbingly translucent, and yet we remain strangely undisturbed. and we quickly find ourselves perfectly at home in the coldness of our spiritual starvation.

i look upon my own soul and i wonder why i've not felt hungry nor cold in recent times.

and yet christ will let us have none of that. though we have an almost masochistic drive to withering our souls away, christ insists that he will be our bread of life. he insists that his Spirit will be in us a holy fire, warming us not from the outside in, but burning hot from the inside out.