I have sat at my computer for a week, writing and rewriting, as I try to find words for the grief that is in my bones. I thought at first that maybe I would go in with some metaphors, and then dive into some theological truths. But I am so tired. How can words be enough to explain the grief that courses through my veins? I am faced with the collective grief of living in a global pandemic, the secondary grief of the weight of the stories I’ve carried as a hospital chaplain, and the quieter grief that has been my companion all along; the grief of loving and slowly losing my grandfather through dementia.
I could tell you that grief is like a marathon, except for the fact that I am a rather slow runner and have no plans of running a marathon. I could tell you that grief feels like I am stuck in a slow-motion video while life around me resumes at a normal speed. I live and breathe words, using the words I write and read from others to make meaning of my faith, life, and this world. Yet, grief has the uncanny ability of knocking the wind right out of me, and the words along with it. As a hospital chaplain this summer, a lot of my work focused on patients and families faced with end-of-life situations. I found that I was able to be an anchor, a presence of peace and calm, for patients and families in impossibly hard situations. I bore witness to pain that was so heavy that at times I thought that my heart might break in two. Yet, it did not break. At the end of the summer, I did not feel broken; I felt alive. One of the things I love the most about chaplaincy work is that we can talk about the Hard, Scary Things. We do not run away from grief, sadness, and suffering; we run towards it. And perhaps that was the biggest gift of this summer, the act of giving myself and others the permission to run towards grief in all its weight and complexity. Except now I am faced with my own grief and there is no running away. I am reminded of this C.S. Lewis quote from A Grief Observed:
“We were promised sufferings. They were part of the program. We were even told, 'Blessed are they that mourn,' and I accept it. I've got nothing that I hadn't bargained for. Of course it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others, and in reality, not imagination.”
A summer of bearing witness to the grief of others means I am familiar with the dance, but I have not had to do this dance in a while for myself. I find myself as a frontline observer as my grandfather enters this liminal space between life and death. The waiting is the cruelest; if only any of us could know when the people we love will leave us. In my work at the hospital, I found that time had a way of feeling suspended, and this is how I feel now. The days blur together, and everything pales in comparison to this current moment.
There is a temptation to theologize this moment. I noticed this at the hospital, in the echoes of “God must have a reason for this pandemic to be happening.” There must be a reason. I would like that, too. I like rhyme and reason, problems that can be solved, stories that resolve. But, as Kate Bowler says, “Life is a chronic condition.” I faced a summer of impossible questions to which I did not hold the answers. “Why is this happening to me?” “I don’t understand.”
I don’t understand either. I do not understand why bad things happen to good people or why diseases like dementia slowly rob you of the people you love. It is a tempting proposition to assign a reason to every bad thing that happens. Yet, I do not believe that everything happens for a reason. I have to believe that some things are just awful enough as they are, and we don’t need an explanation. At times when I feel small or scared, I run through a list of what I know to be true about God, myself, and this world. At the top of my list is this: I feel it in my bones that God is good and loving and kind, and surely God is for us. I have to believe that God does not will our suffering. God is not absent. God is with us and for us, never leaving us nor forsaking us.
This is not a theological treatise or an invitation for debates on theodicy or soteriology, but the thoughts of one who feels the weight of grief in her bones and hopes to make others feel less alone in this dance of grief. God does not need another angel. I do not think “everything happens for a reason.” This is not a trial to test my faith, or to make me a better person or minister. Kate Bowler, author of Everything Happens For a Reason: And Other Lies I’ve Loved, is one of my biggest teachers on grief and faith. In her viral TED Talk, she challenges the idea that “everything happens for a reason” as she lives with a stage IV cancer diagnosis. She says:
“It is a hard thought to accept that we are all a breath away from a problem that could destroy something irreplaceable or alter our lives completely. We know that in life there are befores and afters. I am asked all the time to say that I would never go back, or that I’ve gained so much in perspective. And I tell them no, before was better.”
It sounds so seemingly obvious, that before was better, but those of us encamped on Grief Island need you to know that it is true. No matter how many hard-fought lessons I have learned or theological truths I have gleaned, before was better. Especially in the land of slowly losing someone to dementia, before is better. The before when your loved one was healthy and happy and living life at their fullest capacity.
This is my plea, on behalf of myself and whoever else finds themselves encamped on Grief Island: do not try to explain away my grief, but also, do not leave me here. You will probably say the wrong thing at some point, but we need you. We need to know that we are not alone, that even after the dark night of suffering, joy comes in the morning. I wish that this was a story that resolved, ending with an explanation for grief and suffering wrapped in a pristine, little bow. All I have is my grief, in its rawness and complexity, and this is enough.
I do not know what the coming days or weeks will hold, as my family occupies this liminal space between life and death, before and after. For now, Pa is with us and we are grateful. This is enough.
