Advent Day 11: Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan
Light in darkness
I believe that God is in me as the sun is in the color and fragrance of the flower—the light in my darkness, the voice in my silence.
Advent Day 11: Helen Keller (1880-1968) and Anne Sullivan (1866-1936)
The scene is the stuff of legend. In years to come, it would be retold in books, multiple films, and stages around the world: a determined young tutor thrusting the hand of her angry student into water streaming from a pump. For a month the tutor had been struggling to break into her student’s dark, silent world by teaching her a fingerspelling made into the palm of a hand. She was trying to get the girl to make a connection between the signs and the everyday things the girl touched, tasted and smelled. But the way had been rough, even violent, with fits of rage and broken dishes, as the uncomprehending student continually fought to escape her tutor.
Now, suddenly, at the pump, it all clicked.
I stood still, my whole attention fixed upon the motions of her fingers. Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten—a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that w-a-t-e-r meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand. The living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, set it free!
The tutor was Anne Sullivan, the student Helen Keller. The scene at the pump was the key that unlocked Helen’s world. Later, Helen would call it her soul’s birthday—the start of a monumental life that, in time, and with Anne by her side, became a testament to friendship, resilience, spirit and the transformative power of faith.
The Helen Keller the world came to know would never have been without Anne Sullivan and her iron will. This will was forged in the fires of childhood suffering. At five, Anne contracted an infection that robbed her of much of her sight. At eight, her mother died. Two years later, her father abandoned the family at which point she was confined to an asylum populated mainly by the terminally ill and insane. But during a government tour of the facility in 1880, fourteen year-old Anne cornered the state inspector and lobbied him not only to release her but to send her to the famed Perkins School for the Blind. Anne’s powers of persuasion proved impossible to resist. The official ordered her released and transferred to Perkins.
Anne entered Perkins, in her words, a rough, unlettered girl. Six years later, she graduated top of her class and with a determination to make the world a better place. This determination led her, first, to the Kellers of Alabama and then, in 1888—only a year after her breakthrough with Helen at the water pump—back to Perkins, with Helen as the student and Anne as tutor and friend.
If Anne’s fuel was the determination to escape her dire circumstances, Helen’s was the relentless drive to prove not only that the disabled were, in fact, very able, but also that everyone held within their souls more power and potential than they knew. If Helen had one consistent criticism of people throughout her life it was their limited view of others and themselves.
The only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision…Each day comes to me with both hands full of possibilities [in which] I discern all the verities and realities of my existence: the bliss of growth, the glory of action, the spirit of beauty. This divine love and wisdom is a fountain of life I am always happy to be near.
Helen believed that each person had in them an Inner Light that was the divine spark of God. And if God is limitless then God-in-us is also limitless. Why then, she thought, should anyone sell themselves, or anyone else, short?
Helen spent the next decade testing her limits. As she moved from one academic setting to the next, with Anne always at her side, she broke ever new ground in her abilities to communicate, which now included writing and, most improbably, speaking.
For Helen, her transformation from who she’d been when Anne came into her life to who she was by the time she was twenty felt like light, love and freedom.
Have you ever been at sea in a dense fog when it seemed as if a tangible white darkness shut you in, and the great ship groped her way toward the shore? I was like that ship, only I was without compass or sounding line and had no way of knowing how near the harbor was. ‘Light. Give me light’, was the wordless cry of my soul. And the light of love shone on me in that very hour.
In 1903, while still in college, she published the first of many bestselling books, a memoir entitled The Story of My Life. The following year, she graduated from Harvard as the first deaf and blind person in history to earn a college degree. By then, she had made an international name for herself and counted Mark Twain, Alexander Graham Bell and Queen Victoria among her many admirers.
The world Helen entered after college, in many ways, mirrors our own time. Technological changes were quickly transforming life, in ways good and bad. Communication and travel were easier than ever, and people were living longer thanks to medical break-throughs. But rapid industrialization had also wrecked the environment, provoked vast income inequality, and led to the rise of massive corporations whose leaders exercised unchecked influence on the political system.
In all such times, the winds of change (and the winds of resistance to change) blow strong. In the first two decades of the 20th century, previously fringe movements now spilled into the streets. Women demanded equal voting rights. Factory workers demanded fair pay. Socialists pushed for the break-up of corporate monopolies. And peace activists called for solutions to Europe’s escalating political chaos other than a war which they predicted (correctly) would cause devastation on a scale the world had never yet seen.
Helen lent her name, time and talents to all these movements, and more. In 1915, she created the Helen Keller International organization which, to this day, funds research and programs to help prevent and cure blindness. In 1916, she ruffled the feathers of her former Alabama neighbors by becoming a donor to the NAACP. And in 1920 she helped found the American Civil Liberties Union.
Those who looked on in wonder at Helen’s exuberant, seemingly tireless life always asked the same questions: How did she come so far? What was the source of her profound belief in herself, in the disabled and disenfranchised, and in all people?
Helen had two answers: Anne Sullivan and God.
Simply put, Anne Sullivan was gifted with a rare genius that allowed her to see the possible in the impossible. The day she had her breakthrough with Helen at the water pump, she wrote in a letter,
My heart is singing for joy this morning. A miracle has happened!
While Anne was agnostic on the Judeo-Christian God, she was nevertheless deeply spiritual. Though the stage play and film that would later dramatize her life with Helen was called The Miracle Worker, Anne did not view herself in such lofty terms. She considered herself, rather, the servant of some unseen grace: a true miracle worker in whom she had full faith but which she refused to name or try to explain.
Thanks to her keen understanding of human psychology, Anne knew that all of Helen’s accomplishments, while impressive, were not ultimately meaningful in and of them themselves. For Helen to be a whole person, with meaning and purpose, she must believe in something greater than herself.
Anne’s quest to awaken her young friend’s spirituality involved two significant meetings. The first was in 1890 when she introduced ten-year old Helen to Episcopal priest Phillips Brooks (fun fact: Brooks wrote the now-classic Christmas hymn O Little Town Of Bethlehem). Through Brooks, Helen was able to put words to a stirring in her soul she had always felt but for which she had no name.
I always knew He was there, but I didn’t know His name!
The second significant meeting came when Helen was twenty and Anne introduced her to the teachings of 18th century scientist and mystic Emanuel Swedenborg. Among Swedenborg’s core beliefs were that God is pure love; love is the governing force of the cosmos; everyone has an Inner Light that is God in them; all nature reveals Divine truths; and the afterlife is not a distant Heaven but a continuation of the soul’s journey toward God which humans are already on.
Swedenborg’s spiritual insights deeply resonated with Helen, providing her a framework by which to understand a power she had always felt within and around her:
I sense a holy passion pouring down from the springs of Infinity…I feel the flame of eternity in my soul. Here, in the midst of the everyday air, I sense the rush of ethereal rains. I am conscious of the splendor that binds all things of earth to all things of heaven.
Despite all she would accomplish, and for as celebrated as she would become, Helen held a lifelong conviction that,
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched. They must be felt with the heart. Those truths have been to my faculties what light, color and music are to the eye and ear.
Throughout the years, when publicly questioned, Anne typically expressed a nonchalant confidence in Helen. But, privately, she was continually amazed at her friend’s transformation from a silent, nearly feral young girl to a global icon. And as is always the case in these matters, though Anne continued to facilitate Helen’s increasingly whirlwind life, at some point she realized that her life had been immeasurably enriched by their friendship.
It has been the great joy of my life to help [Helen], but I have gained more from her than she could ever gain from me…I have learned to listen more deeply, to feel more intensely, and to understand more clearly…I have learned from her to find beauty in things that might seem commonplace to others. She taught me that in silence and darkness there is something profound, something spiritual, that can guide us.
By the 1930s, Anne and Helen were living in Queens, New York, along with a Scottish housekeeper named Polly Thomson. In 1935, Anne suffered a stroke which robbed her of her sight and much of her mobility. When she died the following year, Helen was at her side holding her hand. Anne was interred at the National Cathedral in Washington DC, the first woman to receive this honor.
In the decades following World War II, and with Polly Thomson now in Anne’s role, Helen resumed her global travels and advocacy for causes she believed could help heal a world shattered by war, fascism, economic ruin and nuclear bombs.
Now more than ever she found crowds hungry for her gospel of resilience and hope. While she was happy to provide that hope, she was also quick to remind people that healing would not come as a bolt from the blue, or through a messianic political figure, but by an everyday, ongoing project of faith, taken up by each person living a life which on the surface might seem small but which, in fact, was great and noble.
Helen used her own life as a metaphor for the inner and outer work ahead:
I slip back many times, I fall, I stand still. I run against hidden obstacles. I lose my temper and find it again. I trudge on. I gain a little. I feel encouraged. I get more eager and climb higher and begin to see the widening horizon. Every struggle is a victory. One more effort and I reach the luminous cloud, the blue depths of the sky, the uplands of my desire.
Helen died on June 1, 1968, at the age of eighty-seven. She was interred at the National Cathedral, next to Anne Sullivan.
Practice
Helen Keller said,
I believe that we are all touched by a divine spirit, and that no matter how small our lives may seem, they are part of a larger plan.
Modern science now affirms what the great spiritual traditions have always known: we are meaning-seeking creatures who need to feel part of something bigger than ourselves. So, it is no coincidence that a loneliness pandemic broke out after the mass adoption of social media and smart phones—technologies that promised meaning and connection while, too often, delivering distraction and isolation.
My guess is that most of us would benefit by reducing our screen time (I know I could!) and using the hours saved engaging in activities that, in Helen’s words, help our lives seem part of a larger plan.
For today’s practice, check the Screen Time on your phone (if you’re unsure how to do this, Google it or post in the Comments and I can walk you through it). What is your overall weekly usage? Your daily average? How much of that falls into the Entertainment of Social category?
Once you’ve done this, honestly assess how you’re using technology. Pay extra special attention to where you use it to fill time, avoid boredom or ease anxiety (keeping in mind that as many of us reach for our phones when feeling anxious, studies show that our anxiety actually increases in proportion to our screen time). Then make a resolution to reduce this time over the coming months. (**If you have already successfully reduced your screen time, please share tips in the Comments section**).
If you need inspiration, check out my good friend Daniel Rogers’ recent post, Extinguishing The Blue Flame, on how he took control of his screen time and gained a renewed quality of life.
Holidays at Life In The City
All in-person gatherings listed below happen at 205 East Monroe St. in Austin, Texas.
Dec. 8, 11:15 am: LITC’s original musical, Make Room In Your Heart.
Dec. 21, 6:00 pm: Blue Christmas, an intimate service for the longest night.
Dec. 23, 6:00 pm: Christmas Eve-Eve, an LITC tradition!
Dec. 29, 11:15 am: Welcome 2025 with a fun, casual service. Contemplation In The City
Life In The City’s contemplative community meets regularly to practice sacred traditions like Lectio Divina and Centering Prayer. If you’re in Austin, consider joining us. Upcoming in-person gatherings are Jan. 14, Feb. 4, Mar. 4, Apr. 8, May 6. We meet at 205 East Monroe Street in Austin. Doors open at 6pm for coffee and conversation, service from 7-8pm. You might also find meaning in our monthly newsletter in which we wrestle with how to live a spiritually engaged life in the modern world. Read more here.
Ready For More?
Read the Introduction to the 2022 edition, to find out how my experience of September 11, 2001 became my gateway to Advent.
Find more mystics, saints and prophets in our Archive.
Feedback
Catch a typo? Have suggestions for mystics, saints and prophets for a future year? Leave feedback in the Comments below or email Greg Durham at greg@litcaustin.org.
We are indeed beings made for connection - to God and each other. And, just as Anne and Helen, we don’t always know who or when or how deep those connections may be made.
Also, I second Daniel’s article on Extinguishing the Blue Flame! I, too, have been working to cut back on my social media screen time, removing Facebook and Tiktok from my phone so they aren’t in my pocket with me everywhere I go.
This was truly inspiring. Thank you.