Uncertainty Doesn’t Usurp Faithfulness

Photo Courtesy of The King’s College

The opinions reflected in this OpEd are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of staff, faculty and students of The King's College.

I won’t lie – it’s hard being at King’s these days.  

As a senior, The King’s College has become home. I’ve been here through the COVID lockdowns, the tension of the 2020 election cycle and the general insecurity of a post-pandemic city. The Community Update on Feb. 13 felt like the breaking point. 

But I’ve kept coming back to this question that my dad would always ask: Who are we, and who are we becoming? Regardless of our circumstances, we are always being molded and shaped toward something. So who will we choose to be in the midst of uncertainty?  

Throughout my four years, I’ve learned from the best of the Christian tradition: people like Augustine, Christine de Pizan, Reinhold Niebuhr and Jean Bethke Elshtain. The historic Christian faith overflows with a wealth of wisdom — we just need to slow down enough to listen.

I want to weave a little tapestry of what I think we — the King’s community — should hear right now, using threads from Niebuhr, Tolkien and Lewis. Ultimately, the anxiety around the College’s future reveals what we love and how we cope.

The anxiety on campus is palpable. You feel it in the City Room during the community updates.  Or any time your parents ask, “how’s school?” Or when we try to plan for or imagine our futures.

So where does that leave us? What can we reach for when “what’s next” is completely unknown?

In his “Nature and Destiny of Man”, Reinhold Niebuhr states humans find themselves between freedom and finitude. God made us with free will and the ability to act, but he also made us embodied, limited creatures. We don’t know all things, but we know some things. We know enough to live in the here and now, but we can’t comprehend the past entirely or predict the future. Finitude isn’t wrong — it's just human.  

Because we don’t know everything, we’re naturally uneasy. “Anxiety,” Niebuhr argued, “is the internal precondition of sin. It is the inevitable spiritual state of man, standing in the paradoxical situation of freedom and finiteness.” This anxiety isn’t evil in itself; it is our reaction to it that determines its nature

Therefore, sin is a warped reaction to anxiety. It comes in two forms: pride and sensuality. Pride is when man tries “to hide his mortality, to overcome his insecurity by his own power and to establish his independence.” And sensuality is when “man seeks to solve the problem…by seeking to hide his freedom and by losing himself in one aspect of the world’s vitalities….It always betrays some of his abortive effort to solve the problem of finiteness and freedom.” In other words, sin is the manifestation of our emotional and spiritual coping mechanisms.    

Next, I want to turn to Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings”. Although set in a fictional fantasy world, Tolkien’s novel is drawn from and illustrates his understanding of our world. 

When the world's fate is suddenly thrust upon him, Frodo is understandably confused and anxious. Gandalf reveals that evil has returned and that Frodo’s family is in danger. Frodo replies, “I wish it need not have happened in my time.” Gandalf answers, “So do I…and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.” There it is again: finiteness and freedom.  

Everyone loves that quote, especially how Peter Jackson’s films give it a hopeful spin. But consider the next line in Tolkien’s book: “And already, Frodo, our time is beginning to look black.” Tolkien was a pretty pessimistic fellow who viewed history as “a long defeat…with some samples or glimpses of final victory.” Times ahead of King’s and our community are beginning to look black as well.

But later in the story, Éomer exclaims, “It is hard to be sure of anything among so many marvels. The world is all grown stranger…. How shall a man judge what to do in such times?” Aragorn, Tolkien’s grounded hero, responds, “As he ever has judged. Good and ill have not changed since yesteryear…. It is man’s part to discern them.” 

Even as things feel chaotic and uncertain, good and evil are the same. Our situation has changed, but our duty to discern and move forward hasn’t.

In “On Living In An Atomic Age”, C.S Lewis addresses the British public after the U. S. dropped the atomic bomb on Japan. Following the horrors of two World Wars, the dread of atomic war suddenly overshadowed life. Lewis writes, “We have been waked from a pretty dream, and now we can begin to talk about realities.” Crises don’t just challenge; they reveal.  

He goes on to say that “what…the atomic bomb [has] really done is to remind us forcibly of the sort of world we are living in and which...we were beginning to forget.” Life has always been uncertain – modernity just offers an illusion of security. Lewis encourages his readers to "let that bomb...find us doing sensible and human things...not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies...but they need not dominate our minds.”

Back to King’s. Obviously, our school closing isn’t the same as an atomic war. But everything is uncertain, and everyone has their own anxieties – from semester students to seniors. Who we are during a crisis is of the utmost importance.  

Lewis concluded, saying, "Nothing is more likely to destroy a species or a nation” – or a College! – “than a determination to survive at all costs. Those who care for something else more than civilization are the only people by whom civilization is at all likely to be preserved. Those who want Heaven must have served Earth best.” 

King’s survival – while something we obviously all want – can’t be our ultimate goal. Our dual citizenship with the City of God demands we live faithfully now in light of God’s coming Kingdom.

Enough of the academic stuff.  

I’ve sat through too many counseling sessions (and Dr. Bradley electives) to suggest we resign from our emotions. But I know that coping is inescapable. I’m not arguing for detached stoicism but sober self-evaluation.  It’s not a question of if but how we’ll cope.

I’m not pretending to know what you specifically should do or the school's future. I can’t tell you not to finish that Common Application or silently skip class. Your choices are your own. I’m just as confused and anxious as you are.  

But here’s what four years of King’s has taught me.

Despite everything, we have daily responsibilities to fulfill faithfully – classes to attend, friends to support, corners of the city to explore and churches to serve. Despite everything, we still have a God who promised He would provide, even when things seem bleakest. Despite everything, we can’t shrug off the burden of growing up. We should carry on in light of and despite our anxiety.  

Please, reach out for help. Get some fresh air. Lean on the things in your life that are secure.  

Niebuhr teaches us that anxiety is a natural part of human life, but sin, pride and sensuality aren’t justified. Tolkien reminds us that our circumstances don’t determine our choices and duty. Lewis encourages us that faithful presence despite anxiety may be the bravest way forward.  

I’ll leave you with my dad’s haunting yet hopeful question: Who are you, and who are you becoming?

Graeme Straughn is a Senior majoring in Politics, Philosophy and Economics. He is currently the President of the House of C. S. Lewis.