Reflections on Divine Providence

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Nearly two hundred years ago, John Henry Newman was born in London, the son of a banker and the first of six children. That this event would be celebrated two hundred years later could be known only by Divine Providence, Who ordained the day of birth itself. As a young man, it was Newman’s custom, especially on his birthday, to look back at the past, not in a purely human way, with only regrets and joys, but in the light of Divine Providence, and to write what he called his “birthday account”. Thus we read, for instance, in his journal entry of February 21, 1822: “My birthday. Today I am of age. … Have I grown in grace this year past? … I am now entering upon a new stage of life. Lord go with me: make me Thy true soldier” (AW, 183). And on Thursday, February 21, 1828: “Oh Lord, what a year this (1827) has been! … I am in Thy hands, O my God…”, and as he writes of his sister Mary’s death, “I do feel from the bottom of my heart that it is all right-I see, I know it to be, in God’s good Providence, the best thing for all of us…” (AW, 210-211).

As we prepare to celebrate the bicentenary of Newman’s birth, it is fitting to take a brief look at that theological reality which permeates his writings and was the foundation of his spiritual life, the doctrine of Divine Providence. This is also a fitting conclusion of the celebration of the Great Jubilee Year in which we commemorate the Incarnation of the Son of God, the Word made flesh (cf. Jn 1:14), “in whom all the providences of God centre.”

The Incarnation: Revelation of God’s Particular Providence

The Incarnation and the doctrine of Divine Providence are inextricably linked in Newman’s thought, as he shows in his sermon, A Particular Providence as Revealed in the Gospel, where he maintains that before the Incarnation mankind could discern God’s general providence, but only after the Incarnation was His particular providence for each person revealed. Indeed such was the condition of man before Christ came, favoured with some occasional notices of God’s regard for individuals, but, for the most part, instructed merely in His general Providence, as seen in the course of human affairs. … But, under the New Covenant, this distinct regard, vouchsafed by Almighty God to every one of us, is clearly revealed.

God showed Himself “no longer through the mere powers of nature, or the maze of human affairs”, but “in a sensible form, as a really existing individual being. And, at the same time, He forthwith began to speak to us as individuals” (PS III, 115).

Yet, how difficult it is for us to bring home to ourselves that God regards each of us in our comings and goings, in the inmost workings of our hearts, and that He cares for us.

If we allow ourselves to float down the current of the world, living as other men, gathering up our notions of religion here and there, as it may be, we have little or no true comprehension of a particular providence. We conceive that Almighty God works on a large plan; but we cannot realize the wonderful truth that He sees and thinks of individuals. We cannot believe He is really present everywhere, that He is wherever we are, though unseen (PS III, 116).

For, “how,” Newman asks, “shall He who is Most Holy direct His love to this man or that for the sake of each, contemplating us one by one, without infringing on His own perfections? Or even were the Supreme Being a God of unmixed benevolence, how, even then, shall the thought of Him come home to our minds with that constraining power which the kindness of a human friend exerts over us” (PS III, 119)? These questions, Newman stresses, have been answered not with words and arguments, but with that act or event which the whole Church is celebrating in a particularly solemn manner this Jubilee Year. “In order that we may understand that in spite of His mysterious perfections He has a separate knowledge and regard for individuals, He has taken upon Him the thoughts and feelings of our own nature, which we all understand is capable of such personal attachments” (PS III, 120).

The Hiddenness of Divine Providence

Newman speaks often of the hiddenness and silence of Divine Providence, and thus the necessity of faith to see it. “This is the law of providence here below,” he writes, “it works beneath a veil, and what is visible in its course does but shadow out at most, and sometimes obscures and disguises what is invisible.”

He notes that in Scripture God’s blessings are given “silently and secretly; so that we do not discern them at the time, except by faith…” (PS IV, p. 257). This is also true of “what takes place in the providences of daily life. Events happen to us pleasant or painful; we do not know at the time the meaning of them, we do not see God’s hand in them. If indeed we have faith, we confess what we do not see, and take all that happens as His…” (PS IV, 258).

Newman observes that it is a general principle of Divine Providence “that God’s presence is not discerned at the time when it is upon us, but afterwards, when we look back upon what is gone and over” (PS IV, 256). That is why Newman made it his habit to look back at his life and reflect on the workings and ways of Divine Providence therein. He recommends this to all believers:

Let a person who trusts he is on the whole serving God acceptably, look back upon his past life, and he will find how critical were moments and acts, which at the time seemed the most indifferent (PS IV, 261).

Thus Newman sees the spiritual benefits of keeping a “careful memory of all He has done for us” (PS V, 82). He notes in his diary of January 22, 1822 that he set his mind to mark certain days or times as “days or seasons of mercy, and to commemorate them in succeeding years” (AW, 179). Among those were not only joyful times, but also times of difficulty, times of disappointment and trial, as well. He knew and lived the understanding in faith that Divine Providence works in and through all circumstances of life.

Our Response to Divine Providence — Obedience

Newman’s understanding of Divine Providence is never passive or theoretical. God’s providence is not something which we can discern only by looking back at the past, but is something which we must respond to in the present. For Newman the immediate response to Divine Providence is obedience. At first glance this seems an unusual thing to say. We are used to speaking of obedience to God’s will, but not to His providence, and what Newman is saying by using the term providence in this sense is both theologically profound and spiritually demanding.

In his sermon, Divine Calls, Newman elaborates on this:

It were well if we understood this; but we are slow to master the great truth, that Christ is, as it were, walking among us, and by His hand, or eye, or voice, bidding us follow Him. We do not understand that His call is a thing which takes place now. We think it took place in the Apostles’ days; but we do not believe in it, we do not look out for it in our own case (PS VIII, 24).

Yet, God is calling us. “Whether we obey His voice or not, He graciously calls us still” (PS VIII, 23). Newman is speaking about those calls which we “hear” through the everyday, ordinary events of life. “There is nothing miraculous or extraordinary in His dealings with us. He works through our natural faculties and circumstances of life.” Such calls “involve duties” and “claim obedience.” They are given to bring us to a higher state of holiness and knowledge. “What happens to us in providence is in all essential respects what His voice was to those whom He addressed when on earth…” (PS VIII, 24). As He called Simon and Andrew, as He called James and John, so He calls us now. Let us be attune to His voice, “let us fear to miss the Saviour, while Simeon and Anna find Him. … Let us carry this thought into our daily conduct” (PS II, 115).

Newman is well aware that “faith alone can obey” divine calls (PS VIII, 22). This obedience in faith is obedience to follow we know not where. For God calls us, surely, and faith gives us the means to hear and answer His calls, but it is not given us to see the whole context, the consequences, the joys, the sorrows, the difficulties, the consolations, which come from following His call. Newman writes: “God’s hand is ever over His own and He leads them forward by a way they know not of. The utmost they can do is to believe…and as believing, to act together with God towards it” (PS IV, 261).

Nonetheless, Newman is almost harsh in his insistence that obedience to providence must be immediate, “for time stays for no one; the word of call is spoken and is gone; if we do not seize the moment, it is lost” (PS VIII, 21). And this obedience must take the form of action. It is not simply interior assent, but the realization of this interior assent in our daily lives. It is not the same for each person, because each is called individually by God. Each has his own path to tread. Newman is again almost severe in his clarity on this point:

No one has any leave to take another’s lower standard of holiness for his own. It is nothing to us what others are. If God calls us to a greater renunciation of the world, and exacts a sacrifice of our hope and fears, this is our gain, this is a mark of His love for us, this is a thing to be rejoiced in (PS VIII, 31).

If we do not respond to Divine Providence, if we do not obey His calls, we “fall behind in [our] heavenly course.” For it is “towards that one and only Truth” that He is “leading us forward”, but not without our cooperation (PS VIII, 27). “Let us beware of lapsing back; let us avoid temptation. … God may be bringing us into a higher world of religious truth; let us work with Him” (PS VIII, 30). And Newman asks: “What gain is it to be applauded, admired, courted, followed, compared with this one aim, of not being disobedient to a heavenly vision” (PS VIII, 32)?

Such, then, are the characteristics of the calls of Divine Providence in our lives. They “require instant obedience”, they “call us we know not to what”, they “call us on in darkness”, and “faith alone can obey them” (PS VIII, 22). Newman reflects further:

Let us profit by this in future, so far as this, to have faith in what we cannot see. The world seems to go on as usual. There is nothing of heaven in the face of society, in the news of the day there is nothing of heaven, in the faces of the many, or of the great, or of the rich, or of the busy, there is nothing of heaven, in the words of the eloquent, or the deeds of the powerful, or the counsels of the wise, or the resolves of the lordly, or the pomps of the wealthy, there is nothing of heaven. And yet the Ever-blessed Spirit of God is here, the Presence of the Eternal Son, ten times more glorious, more powerful than when He trod the earth in our flesh, is with us. Let us ever bear in mind this divine truth, -the more secret God’s hand is, the more powerful- the more silent, the more awful (PS IV, 265).

It is only to the eyes of finite, sinful man that God “seems to work by a process, by means and ends, by steps, by victories hardly gained, and failures repaired, and sacrifices ventured” (PS II, 84). What we see is as the wrong side of a woven piece of cloth. We see many colored threads, ends and beginnings, bits and pieces of motif, but no discernable pattern. But, as any other weaver, God knows the pattern and its beauty, and sees it as a whole. All works together to form the one infinitely beautiful and perfect pattern of the Providence of God, for “God is one, and His will one, and His purpose one, and His work one…all He is and does is absolutely perfect and complete, independent of time and place, and sovereign over creation, whether inanimate or living…” (PS II, 84).

In his Meditations and Devotions, Newman gives witness to the working of God’s providence in his life:

O my God, my whole life has been a course of mercies and blessings shewn to one who has been most unworthy of them. I require no faith, for I have had long experience, as to Thy providence towards me. Year after year Thou has carried me on – removed dangers from my path – recovered me, recruited me, refreshed me, borne with me, directed me, sustained me. O forsake me not when my strength faileth me. And Thou never wilt forsake me. I may securely repose upon Thee.

Newman’s well-known meditation on God’s providence for each one of us will serve well to conclude our reflections:

God beholds thee individually whosoever thou art. He “calls thee by thy name.” He sees thee and understands thee as He made thee. He knows what is in thee, all thy own peculiar feelings and thoughts, thy dispositions and likings, thy strength and thy weakness. He views thee in thy day of rejoicing and thy day of sorrow. He sympathizes in thy hopes and thy temptations. He interests Himself in all thy anxieties and remembrances, all the risings and fallings of thy spirit. … He notes thy very countenance, whether smiling or in tears… Thou canst not shrink from pain more than He dislikes thee bearing it; and if He puts it on thee, it is as thou would put it on thyself if thou art wise, for a greater good afterwards. … Thou art chosen to be His (PS III, 124-125).