Return the Unutterable

Walker Percy uses imagery in describing Alli's greenhouse that seems to build a cathedral in its glory, not an overgrown, abandoned garden.

"The sun behind him was reflected from a bank of windows...
A steep copper hood, verdigrised green-brown, shaded the front door like a cathedral porch...
Iron spoikes and fleurs-de-lis sprouted from the roof peek..."

Inside the greenhouse, Percy is depicting a moment of holiness that breaks away from the game of golf and pretending to enjoy spending time with people Will Barrett really cannot stand. Hidden away from the clean-cut, manicured, controlled environment of Will's world, he stumbles upon Allie's home: a place of wildness, growth, and words that do not seem to make sense. The truest things said in The Second Coming are the words of the girl who has forgotten everything, does not understand much, and cannot speak well. In Allie's forgetfulness, Will finds remembrance...and so should we.

Percy's Christianity is hearkening back to the days of the Medieval; of cathedrals, wildness, mystery, and fewer words found in the awe of the Supernatural. Explanations are not given, for they are not always necessary. Crossing the bridge backwards from the Enlightenment to the Medieval, we discover something that we have lost.

Allie's eyes see things differently. "Her gaze was steady and unfocused. Either she was not seeing him...or else she was seeing all of him because all at once he became aware of himself..."
Allie speaks differently. "She spoke slowly and carefully as if she were reading the words on his face..."
Allie lives differently.
Allie is different. She is the opposite of the Enlightenment - of Modernity. When she speaks, her words are neither expected nor always completely understood; they are mysterious, but they are sincere. They are true. Near the end of the novel, Will discovers his deep love for her. He also discovers that she has a beautiful voice, and he asks her why she has not sung before. I didn't feel like it. I stopped...because I thought I had to sing. Will then asks her if she will sing in the future. Yes...because I don't have to.
Allie is not rational. She is wild, and she continues to confound Will every minute he is with her. He cannot comprehend her; but he understands what she says. He translates her to the world. She holds him tight and lifts him up.
In the cathedral of the greenhouse, Will encounters the mystery of Allie. He cannot explain her, but he does not need to. In his unanswered questions lies his love for her. In awe of who she is - without rational reasons of why she is so - Will is saved from the society that was suffocating him. He remembers...his modernity is succeeded by her simplicity and complexity. They are "concealed" - held safe by each other. Allie "hoists" Will as he continues to fall; Will interprets Allie when no one understands her. They are "revealed" - they find love as they bare their hearts to each other.

In the cathedral, we remember the days when we entered in, not with demands for explanations, but with a heart overwhelmed by a Power so much greater than us. In the inexplicable we found peace, comfort, and purpose. In the mysterious, we found Truth. We embraced Love. We surrendered. We believed that words would never be enough...we relied on the "groanings that cannot be uttered." We were dependent on a relationship that could not exist by our lives alone, but on the life of Another in communion with our own. When we fell, He lifted us. When we could not speak, He interceded for us. Why do we not return?