When I was young, lying in bed waiting for sleep to arrive, I would sometimes make the mistake of concentrating on my breathing. As soon as I did, what had been natural and involuntary became a source of consternation. I would breathe too long, then too short. I would try to count out the breaths but wouldn’t quite escape that uncomfortable feeling when the breath reached the turn-around point. Lying there, it was as if I’d forgotten how to breathe. What I’d managed to easily accomplish all my life had become a herculean task.
Every Palm Sunday, when I hear that phrase read in the Gospel, “He breathed his last,” I am reminded of the importance of breath. The phrase, to my ear, isn’t the announcement of a simple fact. It isn’t just a fancy way of writing, “He died.” No, there’s a reason the phrase is recorded in precisely the way it is. One moment, a man was breathing, and the next, he wasn’t. Something stopped, and something began.
Maybe we don’t actually know how to breathe after all, and what we’ve taken for granted all this time is a skill that is secretly eluding us. We’re caught between the inhalation and exhalation. It would be shocking, I know, to encounter such a bold argument as I’m making now – that we don’t know how to breathe – but I think it’s a meditation worth our attention.
At a basic, physical level, I’m far from the first one to make this argument. A few years ago, James Nestor wrote a book called, Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art. In an interview about it, he points out: “Most of us misunderstand breathing. We see it as passive, something that we just do. Breathe, live; stop breathing, die. But breathing is not that simple and binary. How we breathe matters, too.”
He argues that, if we practice, we can improve our breathing habits and become more healthy and rejuvenate athletic performance, stop snoring, fix allergies and asthma, and even heal from autoimmune disease.
Curious blend of science and religion
There are breathing techniques that strengthen the diaphragm, reduce anxiety, help with falling asleep, and alleviate stress. These techniques are a curious blend of modern science and ancient religious practices. When I was a cyclist, all my friends went to be tested in a lab to ascertain their oxygenation levels and breathing efficiency. Meanwhile, in certain churches, breathing is a traditional aspect of praying well, and theologians like St. Hesychios taught, “Let the name of Jesus adhere to your breath, and then you will know the blessings of stillness.” Breath becomes prayer, and prayer can be fruitful and intentional even when specific images or words aren’t used.
The connection of breath to physical well-being and spirituality makes a lot of sense. The reason that such importance is placed on the breath of Jesus on the Cross is because literally everything in creation starts with a divine breath. When God created time and space, he did so by breathing out a single word. He gathered his creative energy into the fluttering, gentle wind of the Spirit and hovered over the formless void. With an exhalation - the work of all three persons of the Trinity - there emerged a single creative cry and creation sprang into being.
It’s no accident that Our Lord lets out one, great, final utterance and then breathes his last. Just as the world began with a breath, the Cross is the cause of the new creation. It is a new wind blowing over Paradise. Along with the final breath is the cry that arising from Psalm 22; “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? / Why so far from my call for help,/ from my cries of anguish?” It’s a cry that, as the Psalm proceeds and as the Passion of Our Lord unfolds, transforms from pain to a victory shout.
The same transformation from death into life is present in baptism. In the ritual, the priest literally breathes into the face of the infant. Later, he stirs the water in the font with his hand in a poetic image that participates in the First Day of Creation. The breath of God is in the baptismal water, the light of the First Day is there, and the newly christened child is a new creation. Before baptism all is death. After, all is life.
Breathing is an action I’ve given a lot of thought to, struggled with, and as an athlete turned toward my benefit. Sometimes we catch our breath. Sometimes the wind is knocked out of us. Sometimes we cry out in pain or anger. But even in our darkest moments, even at our last breath, we are in the midst of life. We’re right there at the turning point. I’m reminded of the poet Paul Claudel’s meditation, “The Supreme Cry” in which he likens the breath of the Lord reaching out at the Cross to a shepherd calling home his lambs.
