Yesterday, I was working on a memorial project for an upcoming high school reunion. In the fifty one years since they graduated, they’ve lost close to fifty of their classmates. As I scanned pictures and typed their names, I wondered how long they lived. What was their experience? Did they pass soon after graduation? Had they been ill later in life?
That’s when I first heard the news.
I’m sick of hearing the news.
And I know there is so much in the world that is not right. Many people, young and old, suffer through injustice. They face trials most of us cannot imagine. Their lives are in danger. They are sick. They die without news coverage or public outrage.
I get that.
I pray God continues to reveal my blind spots. The pain people know that I hide from or convince myself there’s nothing I can do about.
Yesterday, though, was different.
Again.
There was no imaging how those children and those with them died. They were terror-stricken.
I wanted to write something online as a response. That’s my impulse now. It’s half because of my role as a spiritual leader and half because it helps me process what has happened. I paused my project and wrote a few sentences. Then I read the death toll increased. What I wrote seemed so insignificant. So, I deleted it.
I refrained from posting what I really wanted to share.
You probably know my favorite TV show is Good Times. There’s so much I loved about that show growing up. I’ll watch it when I see it’s showing now. For as many times as I laughed watching that show, I also learned something about pain.
Florence Evans had just lost her husband. She and her family were grief stricken. The funeral was behind them and life was supposed to move on. As she put away the dishes, her anguish hits her. I know it’s TV, but it’s also a real feeling. As she slammed a punch bowl to the ground, she gave me words that speak more than they say: Damn! Damn! Damn!
After another day like yesterday, damn, damn, damn anything that permits this to happen over and over again.
