The Theology of <i>Peanuts</i>, Chapter 4: The Great Pumpkin

i.
On September 26, 1928 Gonxha Agnes Bojaxhiu, then 18 years old, left her home in Skopje to join the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Ireland. On September 5, 1997 Gonxha died at 9:30 p.m. in Calcutta. But by that time Gonxha was known to the world as Mother Teresa.

The transformation of Gonxha Agnes Bojaxhiu into Mother Teresa was an extraordinary spiritual journey. In 1947, in a letter to her Archbishop, then Sister Teresa recounts how the Voice of Jesus had consistently come to her, asking for her to create the Sisters of Charity to reach out to the poor of India. As Mother Teresa recounted it, the Voice asked and demanded:

"I want Indian Missionary Sisters of Charity--who would be My fire of love amongst the very poor--the sick--the dying--the little street children--The poor I want you to bring to me--and the Sisters that would offer their lives as victims of my love--would bring these souls to Me. You are I know the most unacceptable person, weak & sinful, but just because you are that I want to use you, for my Glory! Wilt thou refuse?" (1)

This incident and others pushed Sister Teresa to begin her work among the poor in Calcutta. During the time of her calling she described her experiences with Jesus as "so much union." (2) Her mystical experiences of union with Christ were experienced as "love," " trust," "sweetness," and "consolation." (2) On December 21, 1948 Mother Teresa entered the slums of Calcutta as a Missionary of Charity for the first time. Through so much effort, petitioning, and preparation she had finally fulfilled the call of God. She had obeyed the Voice of Jesus. But suddenly, mysteriously, and painfully, that Voice now went silent.

In recent years, as Mother Teresa moves through the process considering her for sainthood, various aspects of her ministry and spiritual life have been brought into the public sphere. Recently, many of the private letters of Mother Teresa have been published in the book Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light. Many of these letters were shocking in that they revealed the dark spiritual journey Mother Teresa walked for so many years. As noted above, prior to the beginning of the Calcutta work Mother Teresa's mystical encounters with Christ were vibrant, powerful, and intimate. But God seemed to abandon her just as the ministry started. For the next 40 years Mother Teresa's experience with the Divine was characterized by a profound sense of God's absence. Both the depth and length of her "dark night of the soul" was startling to those who only knew her public face of faith.

To get a sense of the profound distress Mother Teresa experienced due to the loss of God's Presence it is best to read some of her words directly:

July 3, 1959
In the darkness...

Lord, my God, who am I that You should forsake me? The child of your love--and now become as the most hated one--the one You have thrown away as unwanted--unloved. I call, I cling, I want--and there is no One to answer--no One on Whom I can cling--no, No One.--Alone. The darkness is so dark--and I am alone.--Unwanted, forsaken.--The loneliness of the heart that wants love is unbearable.--Where is my faith?--even deep down, right in, there is nothing but emptiness & darkness.--My God--how painful is this unknown pain. It pains without ceasing.--I have no faith.--I dare not utter the words & thoughts that crowd in my heart--& make me suffer untold agony. So many unanswered questions live within me--I am afraid to uncover them--because of the blasphemy--If there be God,--please forgive me. (3)

September 1959
Part of My Confession Today
My own Jesus,
...They say people in hell suffer eternal pain because of the loss of God--they would go through all that suffering if they had just a little hope of possessing God.--In my soul I feel just that terrible pain of loss--of God not wanting me--of God not being God--of God not really existing (Jesus, please forgive my blasphemies--I have been told to write everything). That darkness surrounds me on all sides--I can't lift my soul to God...

In my heart there is no faith--no love--no trust--there is so much pain--the pain of longing, the pain of not being wanted.--I want God with all the powers of my soul--and yet there between us--there is terrible separation.--I don't pray any longer... (4)

Much later, Mother Teresa began to see her experience of the absence of God as a form of God's Presence. In this, Mother Teresa began see her experience of abandonment as a mystical union with Christ in his abandonment at Golgotha:

October 1961
No, Father [Neuner], I am not alone.--I have His darkness--I have His pain--I have the terrible longing for God--to love and not to be loved. I know I have Jesus... (5)

ii.
In July of 1948, the year Mother Teresa began her ministry in Calcutta, Charles Schulz was baptized in Phalen Lake in St. Paul, Minnesotta.

It is often recounted that Charles Schulz was a Christian. This is true but incomplete. After his baptism Schulz was for many years an active and zealous member of the Church of God. But as the years passed Schulz's faith began to cool as be became increasingly disillusioned with religion. Late in life Schulz's religious views were markedly different from those he held in 1948. For example, the older Schulz contended that "...I don't think God wants to be worshipped. I think the only pure worship of God is by loving one another, and I think all other forms of worship become a substitute for the love that we should show one another." (6) Comparing his years of fundamentalism with the views he held late in life Schulz has said, "I'm not an orthodox believer, and I'm becoming less of one all the time." (7)

iii.
Loss. Abandonment. Absence.

It is a part of the human condition to feel abandoned by God. This is not a recent, modern phenomenon. It is not a product of science, secularism, or modernity. From the very beginning of the story of God the experience of the absence of God has been a ubiquitous feature of the faith experience. The Old Testament witness is filled with the voices of those who have felt abandoned by God or of those who sought God in times of trouble only to be met with a profound silence. Feeling rebuffed, the experience of lament emerges where "disappointment with God" is voiced. Even the Messiah called out "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

iv.
It is hard to say what happened to Schulz's faith over his life. Schulz has said that his strip is a kind of autobiography. When asked by the novelist Laurie Colwin if a person, after deeply reading Peanuts, "could actually write a biography portrait of you?" Schulz replied, "I think so." (8) On another occasion Schulz claimed that Peanuts captured "all my lives." (9)

If there is an autobiography running through Peanuts we might speculate that Schulz himself experienced a continued or reoccurring "dark night of the soul." Evidence for this inference comes from Schulz's repeated depiction of the disillusionment and pain associated with disappointed faith. A recurring motif in Peanuts is a depiction of the absence of God.

We are, of course, referring to the Great Pumpkin. The Great Pumpkin strips make their first appearance in November of 1959. In these strips Linus begins to tell everyone that if you sincerely wait in a pumpkin patch for the arrival of the Great Pumpkin on Halloween night the Great Pumpkin will rise up out of the patch and give you presents. In the early strips no one believes Linus. But Linus, as a "true believer," remains convinced. In the first strips we never see Linus sitting in the pumpkin patch on Halloween. But we do see him the morning after:

Images from The Complete Peanuts by Fantagraphics Books

As we can see, Schulz explicitly uses the Great Pumpkin strips to dwell on the disappointments of faith. The Great Pumpkin becomes a meditation on the failures of God, a God who never shows up. Linus is devout, passionate, and evangelistic. So much so he gain converts in later strips:

Images from The Complete Peanuts by Fantagraphics Books

But all these efforts are for naught. Linus' faith is crushed again and again. The Great Pumpkin never comes.

Images from The Complete Peanuts by Fantagraphics Books

Sometimes that is what it feels like to be in relationship with God. Sitting in a pumpkin patch. Alone. While people think you are crazy.

And wondering the next morning if they might be right.


--End Chapter 4--
--End Part 1--

Notes:
(1) p. 49 Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light
(2) p. 83 Ibid
(3) p. 186-187 Ibid
(4) p. 192-193 Ibid
(5) p. 224 Ibid
(6) p. 350 Schulz and Peanuts
(7) p. 351 Ibid
(8) p. xi Ibid
(9) p. xi Ibid