If you are reading this and feel sad, angry, hopeless, and maybe even guilty, I see you and I am writing for you.
Since the beginning of the year, I have been struggling with my own feelings, waking up at 3 in the morning crying, wondering what the heck I can do about the mess we seem to find ourselves in.
“Has there ever been a time so awful?” I hear people asking.
Probably. It’s just that we’re living in this one, the one that is currently the most awful time.
When I begin to feel overwhelmed by these feelings of hopelessness and grief, I remind myself of these things:
God is present. I believe that.
God is not present in an aloof or disappointed way.
God is present in a “with us” way.
God is weeping too.
And I think God is inviting us to step into a role in this world of pain.
I’m learning from the Marys, that we are invited to bear witness.
Like Mary, the mother of Jesus did.
She stood at the foot of the cross while Jesus was bleeding out from the torture he was receiving and the love he was pouring out.
She did not turn away from his pain. She watched. She stayed. She witnessed.
How is it even possible to watch your child die?
Can we stay and watch and witness the senseless wars taking place in the world, (there are currently 21), the endless ways we discriminate against precious human beings, and the free-for-all gunning down of innocents shopping, praying, and learning with friends?
When I say this, I do not mean watch and do nothing.
I don’t mean watch and become fearful or use escapism while pretending it could never happen to us.
I mean, can we stay with the victims, can we be present to these horrors and cry and lament?
Even if we might not directly know the ones suffering, can we be with them in the way we live our lives and hold ourselves? Can we refuse to turn away or become numb to their pain? Can we bear witness?
This bearing witness is the work of compassion.
There are those who are practiced in the work of compassion.
They’ve already memorized grief so there are deep grooves smoothed with their tears where mine are being freshly plowed.
They maintain a broken heart so that when floods of pain rise up, the cracks allow the sorrow to flow in and out with ease.
Their knees are already leather and their backs already bent so they fall easily to that position of both prayer and lament.
Instead of hiding, they answer the knock of darkness at the door, and instead of being afraid, they invite darkness in - to drink tea and talk.
They are practicing what we are being invited to.
(As I write this, it feels like this is a space that isn’t really explainable or even teachable. It is lived.)
This is our invitation.
To stand at the foot of the cross with Mary.
To see God present in this terrible place. To back up, away from the small piece of the picture we’re clinging to.
Jesus asked Mary Magdalene not to cling to him because she was clinging to the past and he wanted her to move into a future of faith that would grow her, and deepen her.
He asked her to stand without clinging and learn how to see in the dark.
Friends, we need to learn how to see in the dark.
How to be present with the pain,
and not withhold our hearts from compassion.
We’re called to go deeper.
A deeper place calls for a deeper Yes.
Yes to bearing witness.