The Lonesome Valley

For a long time I put off doing things or going places because I had no one to go with. And one of the best decisions I made was to do it anyway. Go see that movie. Go eat in the fancy restaurant. Go take that road trip. I’m so glad I’ve learned to travel on my own, because otherwise, I’d miss out on doing things while waiting to make friends who will join me.

Today’s Gospel reading talks about how the disciples are to go about their work of spreading the Gospel. They are sent out in pairs. It’s a practice that still holds true as good advice. It keeps missionaries safer as they travel and spiritually more accountable—less likely to be influenced by worldly influences and stay and less likely to build up a cult of personality. It’s better to go together.

But as I sat there alone in the pew, I thought of us that do go it alone: without spouse or friend or mentor or spiritual director. I’ve struggled so long with a lack of community and spiritual connection. Years of failing to get spiritual direction, years of trying to form a community of friends who share the faith, years of pouring out of an empty vessel. I know it’s better to go together, but what happens when you have no one to walk with?

A benefit of the lockdown in 2020 was stepping away from parish life and not struggling to make it work for me. I’ve dived back in, and I’m still going, going, going, trying to make connections. But they don’t come. I can’t recall the last time I was invited instead of doing the inviting. It’s been a long time, and the person has since moved away, since someone last asked how I was doing spiritually. I don’t have that partner for accountability, and it can be freeing, but lonely. There is no one to celebrate with or mourn with or just pass the days with.

The messages are always about the importance of community and how we can’t do it alone, but they never address how to find a partner disciple and how to build connections. For those of us who seemingly don’t fit in easily, belonging is a lot of hard work, sunk costs, and unseen pain.

And not only is it lonely, but I’m also part of the problem, making someone else feel lonely and rejected. We solo spiritual travelers are sitting in the same nave and not seeing one another. I wondered who else was sitting there this morning feeling like a failure because they have no one to mission with. Who else is faithfully going alone because surely going alone is better than not going at all?

You get discouraged. You get burnt out. You get frustrated and jealous. But you keep trying. Because we are told not to go alone. And if you are eventually blessed with someone to walk with, you appreciate it more than others ever will. Until then, I can only find solace in that others are on this journey, even if I can’t see them, and that there are saints who do see me and prayerfully supporting me, and that Jesus walked a very lonely path as well. Do you think anyone ever asked him how his spiritual life was doing? Did anyone ever try to pour into him? Or was it always him pouring, him always ministering, him always giving—though he does have the benefit of pouring from an ever-overflowing jar.

In travelling alone, perhaps I am in more danger. But I get to go places I wouldn’t otherwise go. And maybe that is necessary. Maybe the lonesome valley is it’s own mission destination.