Originally published at National Catholic Register
“This is a lonely place…” (Matthew 14:15)
In the past few weeks I have returned, repeatedly, to this simple phrase in Matthew’s Gospel spoken by an unnamed disciple.
Where, I wondered, are the truly lonely places? Desert caves? Dense jungles, or high mountains? They are all lonely, to be sure, but even in these places we may meet other people, and certainly we will find plant or animal life. No, in the truly lonely places, we find much more desolation than this.
The lonely places are the past and the future. Here, in our imagination, we must travel alone. We bring ourselves — and only ourselves — to a world of our own making. Far too often, we look upon the land we have built and behold nothing other than the monsters we have created: doubt and fear.
In the past, we are terrorized by doubt. In the landscape of our future, every evil rises up before us.
Let us make no mistake: There are real battles that must be fought in these lonely places against doubt and fear.
“This is a lonely place, and the day is now over; send the crowds away to go into the villages and
