MOTHERS IN MEMORY

We all have or had at least one. “To be” is to “have been born” into this world in the body of one. We had a birth mother.  We had those who bore us physically and then we had one or more “mothers” who birthed our soul’s song. We have had and have women in our lives who have hidden us in their womb of grace and nourished our fragile and vulnerable selves.

This season we celebrate these women. Some of us celebrate them by inviting them into our presence for dinner or throwing a grandkid party. But, others of us can only celebrate them by inviting their spirit into our memory. These women who have born us and borne our burdens with us are no longer physically with us. We can only remember.

And there is so much to remember. Mothers have dared to confront our dangerous behavior and we remember not liking them very much. We also remember times when we were sick and they sat beside our bed deep into the night. We remember their lack of patience on some occasions and we remember how they kept showing up, year after year, to support us in our uneven growth into self-agency.  Those of us who have parented children can’t help but marvel at how much self-doubt is present in the heart of a parent as we try to do the best thing for these little ones. And then we think of how much our mothers might have struggled to figure out the best way to help us in our emotional rollercoaster of maturing. We remember their persistent presence even when their bodies were rebelling and their hearts were broken. 

This season I remember and celebrate both the courage of my mother to do the tough work of discipline as well as the thousands of tender mercies that were showered on me —most of which I took for granted. I know my memory is faulty but I am choosing to remember with gratitude the mother who gave me breath and who taught my heart to sing.

CHEMO

He sat at the table describing his experience with chemotherapy a couple of years ago.  “I have a different perspective now on the phrase, ‘Living in the moment.’” 

I asked, “What do you mean?”

He said, “Depression and despair is so great when at nine o’clock in the morning you can’t stand to think about the relief of going to sleep at nine o’clock in the evening.”

He went on to say, “Most of our lives we live in the space between something that we remember and something that we anticipate. Like when we visited our friend last weekend and when we are going to have dinner with another friend tomorrow.  Most of the time we think about what has happened, reveling in it or regretting it, and then what might happen that will be pleasant or that we dread.”

“But,” he said, “when your world shrinks into the compressed moment of feeling so terrible that you can’t even imagine the next hour, all you can stand to do is “live in the moment.’”

I had never thought about the suffering of some people that way. Pain and nausea can be so claustrophobic. The walls of pain can block our future and blind our memory.

I don’t know what his might mean. But, it does help me see why it is hard to know how to be with people in that kind of situation. And it helps explain why one of the best things we can do in the midst of suffering is simply “be with” another. There is no way that I can know what it is like to suffer that way. So, my words will be inadequate or empty. But, maybe quiet companionship in the squeezed-in box of pain and suffering can be helpful.

CHEWING PAPER

As an executive coach I hear lots of stories. I work with pastors and hear of the joys and struggles of leading congregations.  Sometimes the stories are deeply moving.

The pastor received a call from a stranger. “Does your church take communion to people at the nursing home?”  

“Yes, we do.”

“We moved my mother here so she could be closer to us. She misses her church back home. Would it be possible to take her communion when you go there?”

“Certainly!  We would be happy to.”

The pastor and a couple from the church went to see the woman on a Saturday after they had had a workday cleaning up the property. The woman welcomed them into her room.  They served her communion and tears began running down her cheek.  Through sobs she thanked them for coming and sharing the Lord’s Supper with her.  She then told them this story:

“On Easter I was watching a worship service on TV and the minister said that we could take communion wherever we were.  Since I eat in the dining hall for all my meals, I didn’t have any bread for communion.  So, I tore off a piece of paper and chewed it. I then took some water (I remember that Jesus turned water into wine) and I took a drink of water.”

Oh, our longing to be connected!!  The mother who was now exiled from her home and living in a refugee camp for the aged longed to be connected to her community of faith. She wept tears of joy because members of her Christian community came to welcome her to a new home with them. She could not only receive the gifts of bread and cup from the hands of another, but she didn’t have to eat alone. Chewing paper is a poor substitute for the touch of a human hand that offer us symbols of God’s love.

LOVE OF ENEMY

A poster on my desk.

LOVE OF ENEMY

I have been thinking about freedom and integrity lately.  How do we sustain a sense of our own values when others around us seem to be threatening them? How do we live as people of faith who have been taught to love our enemies when those who threaten us hurt us with their actions or inactions?

Jesus advice was to love our enemies—to pray for those who persecute us. To pray for those who seem to wish us ill-will is not easy. To love those who would hurt us seems counter-intuitive. We are inclined to strike back, to wish ill for those who hurt us.

But, when I let other’s behavior determine my behavior, do I lose my freedom to be myself? I do not like myself when I am a hating person. I do not like myself when all I can do is respond in kind to those whose actions hurt me. When we do unto others what they do to us, we are not free. We are controlled by them.

So, praying for those who hurt us keeps me centered in what I care about—spreading kindness and love. To love those who hurt me is to pay attention to them as humans—as people who may be hurting me out of their own hurt—to see them as complex and maybe even confused—to see them as people who are unable to see my hurt and pain.

But, I want to maintain my integrity—my freedom to define who I am and how I will act. And when I pray instead of pout, when I love instead of lash out, I am able to continue to define who I am and work to be who I want to be.

SILENT SERMON

As we sat in church this morning listening to a beautiful violin solo, a young mother came in with her young son and sat beside us. He was cute and around two years old.

He did really well throughout the service, whispering “shhhh” during the lengthy silence we have as prayer during Lent, making his Star Wars figure chase a horse across the back of  the pew, and staring entranced when the modern dancers bore witness to welcoming all people, regardless of how different they may be from us.

Toward the end of the service this little learner was hunched down on the floor between the pews and when he rose up, he hit the lip on the back of the pew in front of us with his head.  His eyes got big, he whimpered and began to cry. His mother leaned down, kissed his head and wrapped her arms around him and pulled him onto her lap.  She held him as he cried, soothing him. In just a minute, he settled down and was ready to move on playing.

How often is this arm-wrapping, lap-sitting, head-kissing the only sermon we really need to hear? How often are our hearts weeping silently over wounds too deep for words and all we need is someone to just hold us? So many times there are no words to heal. Only a gentle touch of empathy will do. All we need to know is that someone else understands how bad it hurts. Sometimes all we need is for someone we who loves us to kiss our “ouch" and remind us that we do not suffer alone.

When we feel that silent sermon, then we can relax, open our eyes, and delight in the singing, the dancing and the loving that is going on around us.