Writing as a Sacred Trust

There’s a tempest brewing around in my mind every time I sit down to write. I am overcome with the realization that there’s a certain type of responsibility built into everything I write.

Although I believe that knowledge is always in process, there is a definitive act that takes place when we put pen to paper (or fingers to keys). If truth is a journey, everything that we write is saying, in effect, come follow me.

This is the opposite-from-usual response to the pluralism and relativity implicit within “postmodernism.” So many postmoderns seem to treat their writing as disposable and inconsequential, leading to the oft-true indictment of their works as nonsensical and rubbish. Yet my response is to find that my words and writings and more important, not less, in this milieu precisely because they are my words. But they are not merely my words. They are words shaped by and shaping a community.

I can think of no other way to describe this than to call it a sacred trust. We should not say come follow me (or, even better, come follow with us) lightly, no matter if we know completely where we’re going.

Lord Christ, have mercy.

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