Grieving the World

On most Saturday mornings, I find myself participating in an online prayer community hosted by Bishop Stephen Charleston. A seminary friend and classmate, Hilary West, first introduced me to his virtual gathering, and I have found him to be a source of spiritual enlightenment.

On Saturdays, he hosts this community gathering where all are welcome to share their prayer petitions and thoughts, knowing that the Bishop and all participants will join in prayer with them, and with you.

I always think of this exercise as a clearing out of all the petitions, prayers, and people in need of prayer that I can bring to mind and heart. I pray for my children, of course, and my family, and I pray always for healing for those I know in need of God's grace and succour: Cindy, dying in the Maryland prison system and unable to go home to her family; those struggling with addiction; the lives and the deaths that arise in the news, in our church, and heard from neighbors. And I pray for the world's suffering: for the children dying of hunger in Gaza and Sudan and Yemen; for those caught in war; for those caught in detention; for Andre - a gay, young man imprisoned in El Salvador and gratefully freed to Venezuela after months of torture and abuse; for the families of the flood victims; for those fleeing the fires burning now in Greece, France, Canada, and Los Angeles. I pray for the images of the week: a mother holding her dying child; a bombed-out tent city; a car carried in the river flood; a decades-old, indigenous woman. I also pray for what I have seen and felt, and my prayers include those whose circumstances I know and grieve for: Ziba's husband and son, who have been waiting so long for an entry visa into the USA - waiting for what may never come, in fact, even as I pray with gratitude for the life she and her sons have made here. I pray for all refugees and migrants, that somehow in some way, Jesus the companion may guide them to safety and home. I pray for those who fight in wars and those who are caught in war zones, losing everything - even their lives - unjustly. I pray for the journalists killed in Gaza for trying to tell the truth, and for those silenced in our country by fear of retribution and punishment by the powers that be. I pray for the creation of God so seemingly neglected and attacked in every way, from parks to mineral drilling to pollution. I pray for the health and well-being of all people, and I lament the system that monetizes medical care and prescription medications. I list my prayers remembering the dead, the losses I still mourn: my husbands, my unborn child, my sister, and my cousins, Jay and Ramon. Each petition triggers a new thought, a new asking, and I keep on writing my long list until, like every child of God, I dare to ask for myself. My prayers are, in a way, a form of repentance for the world in which I play a part.

When I think about what this prayer time means to me each week, I come to believe that, in part, I am grieving the world.

Langston Hughes writes:

I am so tired of waiting,

Aren’t you,

For the world to become good

And beautiful and kind?

Let us take a knife

And cut the world in two –

And see what worms are eating

At the rind.

I write my prayer list, and as I do, there is a lament ringing in my ears that's taken from the musical Godspell :

"When will you save the people? O God of mercy, when? Not states and corporations, but children, women, men! Flowers of your heart, O God, are they...God, save the people!"

I am sure that, in our praying community of faith, many of you are experiencing this 'grieving of the world' as the changes around us happen rapidly, and as journalists and bishops have recently noted, a crueler, less compassionate normal is emerging.

So how do we respond to this grievous world? Perhaps we can take some strength from the prophet Jeremiah, whose words are found in this Sunday's lectionary: I am a God near by and not a God far off. Who can hide in the secret places that I cannot see them? Jeremiah reminds us that even as we witness the heartbreaking news around us, God sees and knows it all. God feels it all. 

Jeremiah himself lived during the midnight hour; he saw his nation transition from the prosperous conditions of the time of Josiah to a state of corruption under Jehoash, Jehoiakim, and Zedekiah. His mission was to convey God's truth, unvarnished and unwelcome, the message of sin and repentance. (7:3, 18:7-10). The Book of Jeremiah is 'a thick response to disaster, to a colossal collapse of a world around him, even a 'cosmic crumbling' (Louis Stalman) where there seems no way forward. "The stories and poetry of the book of Jeremiah create a world in which the ancient people of God can imagine their survival. The book provides clues to contemporary believers in their need to confront the 'rawness' of present reality and to find ways to survive."

Jeremiah calls us, as believers, to tell the truth—not to evade, hide, or distract ourselves — but to confront the reality of injustice, cruelty, and indifference. Malignant policy and greed. Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, Your 'yes' to God requires your 'no' to all injustice, to all evil, to all lies, to all oppression and violation of the weak and the poor. Jeremiah, as well as our faith in Jesus Christ and our baptismal covenant, demands that we see and speak the truth, just as plainly as we see the videos on cable news.

Secondly, Jeremiah didn't run away. He stayed in his place and time and did not abandon his people even in what he saw as evil. We know he was in Judah before the fall of Jerusalem, warning of the impending doom, and through the invasion and deportation of most of his contemporaries, and into his exile in Egypt, literally carried by his prophetic brethren. I believe that is our call. We cannot escape our repentance or our responsibility for the state of our world and lives in this present reality; therefore, we must actively embrace staying in the discomfort that comes with it. Every day, the Episcopal Policy Network posts an action alert, providing an opportunity to sign a petition, write an email to our representatives, make a phone call, or send a flood of postcards to the capital. Every day, there is a plea for donations to World Central Kitchen, the ACLU, or the IRC to support various action initiatives.

My friend Hilary wrote this yesterday:

The world is too dangerous for anything but the truth, and too small for anything but love.

Just as Jeremiah, we continue to do what we can - willingly, kindly, and generously.

Jeremiah's greatest offering to those of us grieving the world is his never-failing message of hope. We are, in Jesus Christ, a saved people. We can all learn how the world needs us and wait in expectation for God to surprise us.

Bishop Charleston writes, Just when you least expect it, that is when the Holy Spirit will surprise you the most, that is when the Spirit will provide. Just when you think you do not have a chance, that is when the Spirit appears with a fresh idea.

With Spirit, you never have to say, "Never."

Mother Marcia+