Coming out of my hermit’s cave
Blog by Claire Henderson Davis, MitE Chaplain
I was born a planned Caesarean baby. My brother, who is two years older than I, was an emergency Caesarean and, at that time, it was thought that if a mother had had one C-section, she couldn’t go on to have a natural birth. So, in my case, she never went into labour and I was ripped untimely from her womb.
This is quite a violent way to be born. Usually, it is the baby who initiates labour, and birth, itself, is a process of transition from the world of the womb to the world outside the mother’s body. Having been taken from the womb without warning, this is a process I never went through.
In many ways, lockdown has been, for me, like a second experience in the womb. I have been one of the lucky ones on furlough with good support, and this has enabled me to relax into a time of retreat and growth for which I am deeply grateful. And now, as I am asked to come out of my hermit’s cave, I find that I am ready to do so. Indeed, it feels as though this time has given me an opportunity to heal from my original birth trauma – being forced from my watery home too soon and too fast. This second time round, I have choice and agency, enabling me to emerge as a whole, rather than part of me holding back saying, ‘No, I’m not ready’.
Lockdown will have had different meanings for different people. For some, suffering from domestic violence, my womb will have been their prison. For others, it will have been a time of loneliness and isolation. And for those who have lost loved ones to the virus, a time of grief and mourning. There will also be many like me who have made new discoveries, renewed relationships with partners and close family, got their bicycle out of the shed, and started listening to the birds.
Whatever our experiences, we are all now being asked, in one way or another, to re-emerge. We are all in a period of transition, a period of birth. And the world we are coming back into is not the same as the one we left. People are anxious about their health and safety, about their jobs, about the changes to our way of life and the implication of these over the long-term. We are entering the unknown and no one seems to have the answers. What might help us in these uncertain times?
The government has been talking about the virus as an enemy that we must defeat, appropriating the language of war to describe our current situation. I wonder if this is truly helpful. It perpetuates an us and them mentality as though the virus were an alien life form coming from outside our world to invade us. If we have learned anything from this experience, however, then isn’t it the exact opposite? The virus has highlighted how deeply interconnected we are as a planet and as human beings. A virus which makes the leap from animal to human in China quickly finds its way around the globe. As the whole world shuts down, the natural world begins to heal from our activities. Carbon emissions plummet, air quality improves, we all breathe easier. There is no ‘them’. There is only a complex, diverse, interconnected ‘us’ that embraces all life, including the virus. It is we together who must find a way to share this beautiful planet, living in harmony with all creation, and protecting the fragile ecosystems on which we all depend, and of which we are a part.
For Christians, baptism is a second birth. It is a birth into a community of people committed to a particular way of life that articulates a particular path to human flourishing and relationship with God. We all follow paths that we hope will lead us to flourishing, however we define it. In this moment of transition, as the world emerges from lockdown, we are collectively going through an experience of second birth. Will we take this opportunity to commit ourselves to a new normal, to a world in which we revere the sanctity of all life, respecting each other, and generously and sustainably sharing the resources of the living planet that is our home? Or will we return to the unsustainable economic, political and social structures that have been wreaking devastation on the earth, dividing its people into us and them?