The first response to this question probably
is: It all depends on which tunnel you
are referring to. But there is a useful
sense in which the question can be addressed generically. From this perspective there can be several
responses. The first is the regularity
in which many things occur cyclically having a high and low point. If you find yourself in at a low point, just
hang on, chances are there will be a turn around. The next thing to observe
about this cyclic curve is frequency. Nearly
all things involve process. It took a
process to get us to the low point, and its reversal probably will not be
instant but will also require a process.
Yet, to be realistic we must always be mindful that miracles can occur. What our perspective tells us will take a
good bit of time can in actuality take much less. This is so generally because we lack
encyclopedic knowledge and encounter forces acting within the situation that we
have discounted or overlooked. But optimism
is warranted even in depressing times because of the human element. I think of William Faulkner’s comment:
It is easy enough to say that man is
immortal simply because he will endure: that when the last dingdong of doom has
clanged and faded from the last worthless rock hanging tideless in the last red
and dying evening, that even then there will still be one more sound: that of
his puny inexhaustible voice, still talking.
I refuse to accept this. I believe that man
will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone
among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit
capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. (Speech at the Nobel Banquet)
As a believer in divine providence and in a loving
God, I believe in redemption through repentance and faith. We cannot and do not in the end pull
ourselves up by our own bootstraps—earthly enterprise and creativity are not solely
or even fundamentally humanity based.
Since divine intervention is continually present, there is hope despite
inherent human limitations. This for the
believer is where hope ultimately resides.
This point of view holds that human hubris is the greatest challenge to a
realistic perspective and to maintaining genuine optimism, constituting an overwhelming
darkness without the light and grace of providence.
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