(A note to Russian poet IS.)
Just finished a book yesterday on Nietzsche reception in
America from the 1890s to 1990s. Very interesting and enlightening. I went as
usual into a Starbucks coffee shop to be for a couple of hours, and make some notes with my friendly moka, then
walking alone out into another Saturday night, I happened onto, and -- needing
some impossible consolation -- into a Russian Orthodox Church (Церковь введения
во храм пресвятой Богородицы в Бараша). There was almost no one in the church, though it was during
the evening service, and I found a distant place aside to be alone with myself,
my thoughts and longings...
I thought about how when someone is ill, people go to pray
for their restoration, and how there was no place in Moscow, or likely anywhere
else?, to go and pray for the health... the safe return... the revival, the
resurrection, of God, after what FN in his "madman" well termed the requiem
aeternam deo...
How there are no real places in cities for meditation of
those suffering from agnosticism... no agnostic churches to a missing god... no "Sils Marias" in cities...
How stepping inside a Russian church allowed one suddenly, as is
almost impossible outside in the city's noisy streets, shops, cafes,...quiet
reflection on the higher, the deeper, what Berdyayev, et al, called the "vertical" questions of
life and meaning...
And then unexpectedly, I heard someone mumble something behind me, apparently
to me...and when I turned around from my isolated, solitary thoughts to see what it was, I saw a babushka, who pointed to
a carpet, indicating that I should rather stand there...
I turned back to face the iconostasis, reflected on this event for about 1.5 seconds, and walked
directly out of the church. I sincerely hoped she felt a bit guilty, or regretful ,
and might perhaps hesitate next time before bothering someone not
disturbing anyone but a missing God.
This babushka probably meant no harm, she is just a stickler for the church ritual. But, whatever her intentions, she certainly ruined a perfect moment, a moment of epiphany. I hate that in our museums, when some concerned museum worker starts screaming at a visitor who is "breaking the rules": coming up too close to the picture, touching something that shouldn't be touched etc.
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