2006 is the centenary of the birth of the Irish writer Samuel Beckett whose plays operate within a framework that can be seen as disconsolately post-Christian. His characters operate in a void once occupied by the ability to communicate. They talk to each other - or to themselves - in a world of loneliness. They find themselves in a bleak landscape without purpose and hope.

In the play 'Waiting for Godot', Beckett shows two tramps waiting under a gaunt and leafless tree for the arrival of a Mr Godot who never turns up. In the course of two acts, they amuse themselves, in hilarious ways, to pass the time but they cannot bring themselves to move on from their tragicomic stasis. For many commentators, the bare tree presents a stark remembrance of Calvary and the surname of the stranger, whom the two tramps desperately await, offers reminders of the Christian God. The tramps are emblematic of the human condition in a world from which theological and moral meaning has been withdrawn

In other work, Beckett draws explicitly on Christian concepts to demonstrate the plight of humanity. The radio-play 'All that Fall' concerns a frail, hapless couple who are journeying along a country road through a dark landscape. As the title conveys, the characters are unable to stay on their feet during this gruelling journey - however, as the word 'fall' indicates, the author is playing with the Christian concept of the universal moral 'fall' of mankind, to give his work extra layers of meaning.

The characters in Beckett's plays are often paralysed by their humanity. In 'Happy Days' a woman is up to her neck in an ever-growing pile of soil - a stark reminder of her inevitable mortality. In another play the spotlight outlines a single mouth, which utters a stream of words. In the work entitled 'Krapp's Last Tape', a man is alone with a tape recording of his own voice. It is as if communication has been shorn of meaning in a world in which there is no God to address or from whom to receive a reply. Words are a desperate outcry in a cosmos without 'The Word'. All that is left is stoicism of the will and absurdist humour of the heart.

Beckett's world finds its echoes in Scripture. In the Old Testament, writers cry out with the desolation of their lot. In Ecclesiastes, stricken by a sense of impermanence, the author says - 'the fate of humans and the fate of animals is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, …for all is vanity …all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again' (Ecc. 3:19-20). In the Psalms, the writer utters a weary and God-forsaken cry - 'my days pass away like smoke, and my bones burn like a furnace. My heart is stricken and withered like grass; I am too wasted to eat my bread …my days are like an evening shadow' (Ps. 102:3-11). And in Job, we learn of the writer's spiritual desperation - 'If I go forward, he is not there; or backward, I cannot perceive him' (see Job 23:8-17).

In connecting with the moral and existential plight of modern human beings who are seeking spiritual light amidst the darkness of the 21st century, in addition to the much more well-known passages from the New Testament, with which evangelicals so often meet their queries, we would do well to study once again these three Old Testament books and have their wisdom at our finger-tips.

Philip Orr

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Centre for Contemporary Christianity in Ireland - Summer School
Listening Post - Rediscovering God, ourselves and the world
31 May - 3 June, 2006
For further information visit: www.contemporarychristianity.org/events