Seeing & Being Seen: A Call and a Longing
By Abigail Bargender
“Well, that was awkward.”
I had just made eye contact with a guy on campus as we passed in the hallway. The smile I gave went unnoticed because he had quickly turned his face away from me. Eager to look anywhere else.
It was understandably awkward, but it also saddened a small part of me - the part that noticed a truly alarming trend as the school year was underway and walks to and around campus made it impossible to ignore. Ladies and gentlemen, we have an enormous problem with seeing and wanting to be seen.
Perhaps I should say we have a problem with not seeing. Moments like the one I described above aren’t rare but in overabundance. Within the first couple days of classes, I realized that no one really wanted to acknowledge each other. We’re all just faces on the street and in the halls that we’d rather not look into. I’m not sure if we think we just don’t want to deal with the discomfort of making that momentary connection and impact with a stranger, or if the problem actually is that we just don’t care. Maybe it’s both.
Now, it wouldn’t be fair of me if I didn’t acknowledge that I do it too. I find it just as awkward to unintentionally look into the eyes of strangers and feel that same urge to act like it never happened. But it did happen. And what does the action of looking away say about us, our generation? We are closing ourselves off to even the slightest and simplest human interaction in favor of comfort and avoidance, but in the process of doing so, we are limiting our chances of satisfying the connection we’re naturally drawn to as social creatures.
It’s no secret that each one of us longs to be seen. Today, most pursue it through their careers, academic performance, or social media. Unfortunately, some seek it by going down self-destructive and risky paths. Human history has seen it for generations, and generations have found that fame, money, sex, and prestige could never truly satisfy if they were being honest. The things of the world never will because they are just things. Things and the world can’t see and understand and love us exactly as we are. Instead, it’s a ruthless give and take that requires us to give up a lot of ourselves before we can earn that worldly and conditional love. And yet, despite knowing the world’s love can never sustain us, we chase after it because of a deep hunger to be seen and known.
It’s in Genesis with Hagar, the maid and slave of Sarah, that we first learn that God hears and knows us and our hardship when she said, “You are God who sees me,” in chapter 16 verse 13. She’d been mistreated by Sarah and ran away. But God was there. He knew her name, He knew her pain, and He showed her He was there for her through her trials. Her realization that God saw her hit her with awe; she realized He cared to see.
A relationship with Christ is a personal journey. One has to choose for him or herself to walk His path, regardless of if we were brought up in the faith from the cradle. But when each one of us has an individual relationship with Him, our ability and willingness to see Him in others grows as that relationship grows. Through growing in Him, we will see. Through accepting His eternal and unconditional love for us that comes from living by the knowledge that He sees us, we will love.
This feeling was put upon my heart, and I wanted to ignore it. I had my excuses: “I’m an introvert';' “I’m awkward;” “People who are extroverted should be the ones to do this!” The little voice telling me to accept the challenge remained persistent, so I reluctantly gave in. Yet, in actually seeing, acknowledging and considering the people around me, I realized I had been resisting the gift of a similar awe to Hagar’s because He has fashioned each and every guy and girl around me. He made them all with more intention than I can imagine. Purposeful lives weaving between each other as we all go to and fro. It’s a beautiful thing to witness.
There’s a variation of Lamentations 1:12 that has stuck with me from my elementary and middle school years of participating in the Stations of the Cross, and it came to mind over the weeks as I mulled and considered this issue: “Come, all who pass by the way, pay attention and see: Is there any pain like my pain?” As Christians, we accept the call to serve, but to serve, we must see. This is a fact the Lord knows well. Maybe it’s time to look up from our phones, the sidewalk, or the floor. Time to see Him by seeing others and see others by seeing Him, for it is by Him that we are always seen.
St. Martin de Tours is one of the many prime examples among the saints that show us how letting our hearts be moved by the sufferings of others serves Christ. As a catechumen and a young Roman soldier, St. Martin encounters a poor, naked beggar in the cold. He took pity on the man, cut his cloak in half, and gave one of the halves to the man. In a vision, Christ appeared clothed with the half of St. Martin’s cloak which he’d given to the beggar, and He said, “Martin, a catechumen, has clothed me with this garment.”
St. Martin de Tours is inspiring, as are all the saints, but don’t be St. Martin. Be the saint God created you to be. The slightest and simplest way to start seeing and loving Christ and like Christ is to acknowledge the stranger, that eye contact was made, and know Jesus would have never looked away. Smile, nod, greet them–no matter how awkward it may seem, share the joy and light that comes from knowing and being known by Christ. When we open our hearts to see people in the littlest moments, we incrementally prepare our hearts to see and serve people in the most crucial moments.
See Jesus.
