Tolkien’s Eucatastrophe and Good Friday
He deserves to be called a theologian, however, who comprehends the visible and manifest things of God seen through suffering and the cross… So, also, in John 14:8, where Philip spoke according to the theology of glory: “Show us the Father.” Christ forthwith set aside his flighty thought about seeing God elsewhere and led him to himself, saying, “Philip, he who has seen me has seen the Father”. For this reason true theology and recognition of God are in the crucified Christ, as it is also stated in John 10 “No one comes to the Father, but by me.” “I am the door”
When I consider my personal goals I find a list of pretty banal stuff: happy, healthy family, career success, loose fifteen pounds, the opportunity to spend more time pursuing hobbies. You know, the good things of life, according to Disney. But on Good Friday I’m confronted with a different species of good: the goodness of God.
I’ve been reading a lot of Tolkien lately. Specifically The Silmarillion because I’m hardcore. A casual Tolkien fan might be surprised after making it through The Silmarillion, wondering how the author who conceived of something as gentle and cozy as Bag End and pipeweed could write something so relentlessly grim. The book contains incredible beauty, all of it ends in destruction; there are archetypal heroes and villains, everyone is killed; there are epic quests, most of which tragically fail. You remember the Uber-powerful Galadriel and Elrond from Lord of the Rings? They’re just minor players who managed to make out alive from The Silmarillion because everyone else dies. More than a few characters just end up killing themselves because they can’t take the terrible anymore. It’s a rough read. So what does this have to with Good Friday?
I think Tolkien, when creating his legends, tapped into a key experience of the catholic faith: suffering and joy. In a word that only a philologist could coin, he called it Eucatastrophe: a “good catastrophe”. It’s the idea that the happy ending comes through suffering in a sudden, unexpected unravelling, which turns everything that proceeded it on its head. Think of Gollum being the one who ultimately destroys Sauron instead of Frodo; or the Riders of Rohan appearing just as the Witch-King enters Minas Tirith; or the Valar finally crushing Morgoth in The Silmarillion. These happy endings appear like a revelation from God and leave us in tears only because the suffering has prepared us to read them. The tragedy has cleansed our palate so we are ready for joy.
Putting aside his meticulous world-building, characters, and prose, one of the things that keeps me coming back to Tolkien is this thread of tragedy and Eucatastrophe that runs through his universe. We don’t really do tragedy in pop culture these days. Sure we love to watch misery (what else the pornography industry) but tragedy is largely missing from our stories. I think that’s why, consequently, most happy endings all feel so perfunctory. And believe me, I get it. It’s hard watching characters suffer; I get why Disney prefers to deal in sentimentality and positivity instead of trying to market tragedy to kids. But because our stories avoid suffering, they have no Eucatastrophe and they are ultimately forgettable; they are serene, pleasant, vapid, and meaningless as a Thomas Kinkade painting.
I feel that the same malady that has sucked the life out of our stories is also plaguing pop-Christianity. We want God without suffering. We want heaven without death. We want Easter without Good Friday.
Five hundred years ago, Martin Luther recognized that if you remove suffering from Christianity you haven’t actually created a more friendly, “safe-for-the-whole-family” version of Christianity; you’ve actually created a false religion. The God who is approached outside of suffering, isn’t actually a god at all. The church that won’t embrace suffering, weakness, and the cross isn’t actually Christian, no matter what the sign out front says. Suffering is an essential part of true religion and opens our eyes to the true God. Suffering is our preparation for God’s eucatastrophe. As Luther said, “true theology and recognition of God are in the crucified Christ”.
Maybe you’re someone who feels like the script of their life has gone incredibly wrong: Divorce instead of the happy marriage; abuse instead of nurturing relationships; unemployment instead of a promotion; frailty instead of power; sickness instead of health; death instead of life. Good Friday is for you.
This is a place where the tragedy of our lives won’t be denied, ignored, or glossed over with trite sayings. This is where God suffered and died a criminal’s death. Suffering cleans our eyes to look at the true God revealed on Good Friday and it helps us believe what we see there.
Through that we become a part of that story and can receive the joy of Easter. That’s why this tragic, terrible Friday, where God suffered and died for us, is also good. It is God’s species of good; so deep, sweet, and pure, which only suffering prepares us to rightly receive.
