The Cemetery

. . . They were facing in another direction. The evening sunshine gave them a reddish tinge, and they trembled gently in the breeze. They seemed to be whispering to each other. Were they horrified by the ragged men who were marching past on tired feet? The color of the sunflowers - orange and yellow, gold and brown - danced before my eyes. They grew in fertile brown soil, from carefully tended mounts - behind them, gnarled trees - and above it all, a deep blue sky. . .

My Thoughts on Mary Gordon's response

When I read Edward Flannery’s and Mary Gordon’s respective responses to The Sunflower, I had radically different responses to their thoughts.

I found Flannery’s words to be thoughtful, insightful, and oddly gentle. I found them completely in harmony with my own reading of Wiesenthal’s story. Flannery’s response also contained an element of compassion for Karl, the dying Nazi soldier.

Mary Gordon’s understanding and reaction could not have been more different. Most prominent in her response is her dehumanization of Karl by never referring to him by name. She calls him “the Nazi”. She uses Nazi in place of his name six times, each time rendering the word as a spitting epithet.

Gordon sits in judgment of Karl and refuses any compassion or understanding to enter into her response. I found her understanding of forgiveness to be incomplete. Forgiveness can be freely given at any time but to truly restore a relationship, a change of behavior is required.

She also has, I believe, a total lack of understanding of a priest’s role in the sacrament of absolution; nor do Catholics desire anything more than private contrition. The practice of public penitence exists, to a certain degree in various Catholic cultures but these public displays have their roots in the extant culture it is found in.

The strongest sentiment I felt in Gordon’s response was one of anger, but was it personal anger, righteous anger, indignant anger? I couldn’t tell but I do know that her anger, no matter the source, lead to the awful eye for an eye solution she offered for true atonement. It wasn’t enough for Karl to suffer with loss of friendship, eyesight, and physical capacity. It wasn’t enough for him to have been given time to linger in pain and reflect on his heinous acts. No. Mary Gordon feels that the only appropriate setting for atonement for Karl is for him to suffer in the camps as well.

I cannot agree with her because even in the camps there was a sense of shared community, shared suffering, and opportunities for relationship. By remaining alone, Karl was denied even that. He was totally and completely alone on a human level, left alone with his thoughts. His only companion was God who never abandons anyone.

Gordon’s words suggest she has much to learn of compassion, forgiveness, relationship, and love. She must cast a wider net for deeper understanding otherwise she will remain always at an undeveloped emotion level of understanding. Until the anger is controlled, her emotional warfare will be on-going.

The Sunflower

A small sketch based on the book, The Sunflower. Click on it to see it larger.