Evelyn Underhill, and the God Who Comes to Us, Secretly – Br. Curtis Almquist

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Commemoration of Evelyn Underhill (1875-1941), Mystic and Writer

Br. Curtis Almquist

Matthew 6:5-8

In the calendar of the church we remember today an English woman, Evelyn Underhill, born in 1875. She had a vast influence on the spiritual formation of her own generation, and to generations since. In her prolific writing, speaking, and retreat leading she was revered as faithful, as insightful and passionate, as wise and practical, and all of it laced with her disarming humor.[i]

She taught how the “mystical life” is not just for the saints, but for all of us.[ii] Mysticism, for her, is how God is always coming to us in “the Sacrament of the Present Moment.” Pay attention to now. God’s presence is always in the present. Now. There will be “thin places” where God breaks through to you, often mysteriously, in here-and-now. Pay attention to now.

Evelyn Underhill comments on the Gospel lesson we have just heard: Jesus’ saying, “When you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”When you pray, shut the door. “Shutting the door” can be very challenging. She says:

• “Nearly everyone pulls [the door] to, but leaves it slightly ajar so that a whistling draught comes in from the outer world with reminders of all the worries, interests, conflicts, joys, and sorrows of daily life.” Shut the door.
• “It is no use at all to enter your room, that prayer closet, that inner sanctuary, clutching the daily newspaper…[or iPhone.]” Shut the door.
• “When we shut the door, we do not shut out any part of ourselves away from God – not even the most irreligious bits.” Come into God’s presence. Every messy bit of you. Then shut the door.
• Lastly, we hear Jesus tell us to “shut the door and pray to our Father who is in secret.” Evelyn Underhill says that there is always something in-the-dark, hidden, secret, about our [practice of the presence of] God. We should always distrust the obvious and the clear. The room, the prayer closet, where we speak to [God] is not very well lit – but the light that filters in has a quality of its own. Let your eyes adjust. Pay attention. God is always coming to us in secret, in the Sacrament of the Present Moment. Now. When? Now. [iii]

Evelyn Underhill, who died on this day in 1941, age 65. Blessed Evelyn Underhill.

[i] Evelyn Underhill writes, “The interesting thing about religion is not us but God.” “There is no such thing as coincidence, but rather God’s universe caught in the act of rhyming.”

[ii] Evelyn Underhill in Mysticism: A Study of the Nature and Development of Man’s Spiritual Consciousness. (1911).

[iii] Evelyn Underhill offers the idea of a healthy body as metaphor for a healthy spiritual life. A healthy body must have food, fresh air, and exercise to thrive. So it is in the spiritual life: one must have food, that is, a steady diet of Scripture reading and spiritual classics; fresh air, that is, to live with an attitude of praise and gratitude; and, finally, exercise—which requires a disciplined routine, and not simply reading, praising, and praying when one feels like it. Quoting St. Francis de Sales, “We seldom do well what we only do seldom.” From Prayer in Evelyn Underhill: A Modern Guide to the Ancient Quest for the Holy; Dana Greene, ed. (1988), p. 139.