The darkness is not darkness - A generation looking for Light

An interview with the author Br Rémi-Michel Marin-Lamellet OP

Br Giovanni interviews Br Rémi-Michel Marin-Lamellet OP, author of his first book La ténèbre n'est point ténèbre - Une génération qui cherche la lumière

1. Dear Br Rémi, in your book you talk about your generation (which is also mine!). So many things are said about us young people... In your opinion, which are the false myths about us that must be absolutely debunked?

There are a lot of them! Perhaps, first, there are the myths we have about ourselves (that could be the subject of another book, haha). But the myths that my brothers debate the most are the following.

Firstly, the myth that we are a disembodied generation, as if social networks meant that we were living in an intermediary world that wasn't 'real life'. I don't think this is true. It's just that our materiality is unthought of, it's completely new: it has its limits but it's not an illusory world.

Then there's the myth of a relativistic generation, indifferent to religion and disinterested about the past. On the contrary, I see a profound quest for truth, so strong that it doesn't hesitate to go to extremes when it thinks it's found what it's looking for.

Finally, the myth of a generation "without reference points": this is not false, but it is a myth in the sense that any generation going through profound crises is disorientated.

2. “Darkness is not darkness" means that we are not a lost cause! However, if you had to highlight one negative aspect of the youth of our generation, what would you say?

It's that of desperately surrendering to this very darkness. Thomas Merton sums it up admirably in his little book The New Man. There is a Promethean attitude in our generation, inherited from the old ones, which believes it can save itself. When it realises that this is impossible, it can voluntarily choose darkness in order to die with its head held high. A mixture of cynicism and nihilism. This is not the darkness inhabited by Christ. So perhaps our generation sins for lack of humility and lack of hope.

3. You say several times in your book that, although we are believers, we still remain, at least in part, in the darkness of our generation. If this is indeed the case - and this is also my experience - can you tell us what difference it makes to have faith?

I'm writing these words on the train back from a family funeral in Paris. It was a secular ceremony, without God, before a cremation. And yet, because this member of my family loved Opera, we listened to Mozart's Lacrimosa. Without realising it, we implored God's mercy and asked for his resurrection from the dust. For me, that's the difference. Faith doesn't erase darkness, it makes it even more dense, palpable: so we can look it in the face. It is thanks to faith that Saint Paul is able to address Death and say to it insolently, "Where is your victory?”.

For our generation, having faith means opening our eyes wide to the darkness, and seeing the Cross at its centre. And to feel, thus, a lively hope.

4. But let's also talk a bit about the generations that immediately preceded us. In your opinion, what went wrong in the transmission of the faith, which seems to have failed in most cases?

It's a big question! And everyone has their own little opinion. Just as a new president points the finger at the previous one for a country's dysfunctions. "It's the Council", "It's too much rigidity"... To be a little provocative, I'd say that I can see a failure, but that I can't lay the blame on anyone.

There are those who refused to pass on, who deserted the ship, but that's because they weren't living by the faith they should have been passing on. How could they? And then there are those who have continued to pass on, in many ways, and they have succeeded because we are here.

The question will arise for us too, one day, and that day will come sooner than we think. And what can we say except that we have been useless servants, but that we have served with all our heart?

5. At the end of the book, you try to give your readers some practical advice so that they look at our generation with a different attitude and act accordingly. What do you think the Church can do to be a place where young people can feel at home?

Well... it's more like God feels at home everywhere! But it's a good question, and I've only got one rather facile answer: that the Church should be what it should be. As Catherine of Siena, a saint from your country, said "If you are what you should be, you will set the whole world on fire!”. Let's not try to be anything other than what God is asking of us today. Then our Church will continue to be the place where God comes to make his home. From this stems all the advice I can give: listen, invite to see, proclaim the truth (in this order!).