The Meaning of Meaningless

It would appear that I have not moved very far away from my days as a youth which I spend nearly immobilized by a continuous stream of thoughts in trying to unpack the relentless enigma of the meaning of the meaninglessness of in my life. Even if I am able to uncover the exact nature of this tortuous phenomenon, and it is doubtful that I should ever get that far, I am still left with the fact that, at the heart of it, my search is a quest for meaning. If meaning is all I am looking for, I should quit the hours spent agonizing in the darkness and join a civic organization. If it is simply meaning that I need to sooth this malaise then this is all I really need to do--nothing more. How dare I slip into the back pew to assuage my desire for meaning? Mine is a superficial wound that only requires a bandage not surgery--if that is all I am searching for.

It is those who simply thirst after meaning that fill the ranks of civic minded churches. It is those who feed the hungry, clothe the naked and heal the sick exclusively that are at the same time utterly blind to the tragic nature of their own eternal affairs. Yes, they are good people, people who may be totally unaware of enormity of the cosmic need that surrounds them. Christ saw his ability to forgive as much greater than any miracle He could perform to alleviate temporal suffering. Of course, this did not stop Him from healing and feeding many, countess numbers in fact; yet, His mission was to seek and save the lost. Those who were lost in sin, not simply earthly sickness.

But I digress. I can't simply return for meaning. No doubt, I will find it there as I would anywhere else that provides my idle hands with some task that distracts my mind (or soul) from longing from whatever that appears to be missing. Perhaps, it could be forgiveness but if it is then I am unaware of any desire for it at the present moment. Yet, I know that to really return I must truly desire it and no just a respite from my boredom. Of course I want to believe there is a God, just like Camus, but that doesn't amount to any kind of specific commitment. In fact, I am not even sure that would qualify as a good intention. It is purely driven by my unquenchable narcissism and how unlikely it would be to lead me to the most selfless of all.