Reviews for Hell of Mercy: A Meditation on Depression and the Dark Night of the Soul

The average rating for Hell of Mercy: A Meditation on Depression and the Dark Night of the Soul based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-05-16 00:00:00 Sten Beckman A good friend on GR from Australia asked me tonight for some explanation of my "inner" spirituality. One of my answers as to why my public religious gestures have been replaced by private practice was that I mistrust the theological postures of current-day dogma. I simply said to him that "you can't sugercoat Hell!" I dislike reiterating unending commentaries to my reviews, so I thought I'd better extenuate my comments. They're all encapsulated here, where I can better talk about it all - by reviewing another book I LOVED: A Hell of Mercy. Its author knows Hell exists, too. He knows because he's been there. And so have I. In fact, I spent most of my twenties there - and looking back now, the gaps in that Saison en Enfer have been entirely filled in by my logically introspective exercises in hindsight. I relive it to this day, in the incredible revelations in Arnold Logan's novel, Springtime in Lawrence Park. And in the amazing bio From Heroin to Christ. Some books transport you back to those precarious times when you KNEW you were teetering on the Edge of the Abyss! So many of us older folks cleaned up our acts expeditiously upon remembering such times. Funny, how growing old gives you the vast spaces of leisure time you need to connect all the dots. And that part is harrowing. For some of us elderly folks it results in dementia or even Alzheimer's Disease. For the medicated self I am, though, it resulted in insight - a Pure unclouded Vision of Hell. Like the harrowing Descent into the Maelstrom of Hell Edgar Allan Poe describes - his Hell. And if you have delved to a greater extent into the hellishly cthonic sexual underworld, your efforts to escape will be exponentially more harrowing. And perhaps futile, God forbid. Subconscious dissonance, and stress, is the hallmark of Hell. Subconscious resonance, on the other, is indicative of the proximity of Heaven. If your life is dissonant it's inauthentic. Because you live out your desires instead of acting as a result of slow, peaceful insight. Tim and I - and I guess Poe - were always fairly authentic people. Authentic, and because of that, lost. Because the world at large is inauthentic: folks Living the aggressive Dream, instead of in peaceful Reality. So we ingénues can't easily abide Inauthentic folks. Freud was right! Folks who Live the Dream of desire... who don't realize the Act they live out is the tip of a Humungous Submerged Subconscious Iceberg. AKA Hell. And back in my twenties, it was the slow grind of a sorcerers' evil spell putting me into Hell, that ended in 1980 with a truly convicted conversion. So that was A Hell of Mercy. A Hell that led to God and His Heaven, for Tim, for me - and for the great medieval writer, Dante... Dante, like me, Poe and Tim, "lost the right way" of life under the intense pressures of penury, overwork and - for him - the ugly political violence of ancient Florence. He justified his 'perfectly harmless' meanderings in his own Apologia Pro Vita Sua, his Divine Comedy. It's medieval therapy, this writing. Sure it's slanted - but it's him. In the same way, the Hell Tim and I wandered into was us. Milton says in Paradise Lost: "myself is Hell; which way I turn is Hell!" That's us at times, too. All of us have ambled aimlessly into a Firestorm. So it goes. Some things just happen. It gets a Lot Better... If God uses that experience as a form of eternal deliverance through conversion, who's to gainsay that? Not me. But in my twenties? A-rovin', a-rovin' A Rovin' was my RU-I-IN! I'll go no more a-rovin'...! The old sea shanty singer was right. And so are all of us: Tim, Poe, Dante, Milton - and me. Hell's REAL.

Review # 2 was written on 2011-07-23 00:00:00 John Amith This book is a heartbreakingly candid account of Farrington's lifelong struggle to find meaning as an artist, a husband, a son, and a spritual seeker while learning to live with sometimes debilitating episodes of depression and mania. Hell of Mercy is an examination of Farrington's spiritual journey, a delicate attempt to balance the ideals of meaningful spiritual practice with the gritty,practical demands of daily life. When Farrington's mother dies, the balance is undone, and so is he. The story Farrington tells is peppered with gentle jokes and personal anecdotes, which makes his depression all the more poignant and accesible, as if you are listening to a friend over coffee. When suicide seemed like a fairly agreeable solution. Farrington tells how, with the support of his fellow artists, his wife, and his church family, he comes to understand that treating his depression amounts to embracing his spiritual journey rather than aborting it. I love this book because it is funny and honest and true. Matters of the spirit and of mental health are tricky to discuss because there are no easy answers; in most cases, there are no answers at all. Even so, Hell of Mercy is a story of hope and courage: Farrington reminds us that we are in good company, that others have walked through the valley and lived to tell.