Last fall I performed a wedding in an intensive care unit for the daughter and (now) son-in-law of a terminally ill woman.  
This was during Clinical Pastoral Education, a supervised "on the job" training in chaplaincy that includes both classroom and clinical time.

A couple weeks ago a doctor published an article about that event from his perspective.  I wrote a letter to the editor from my own, which was published on Friday March 28th.  Here's a link to the letter, the second one down on the page.  This link also links you back to the original article.

Letter to the Editor

"To you I lift my soul; show me the way I should go."  (Psalm 143; vs 8).  My last post ended in lamentation due to recent events - bombings and missile launchings, shootings, people with mental illness who lack sufficient support, children dying.  It is hard to stay in that place of lamentation.  This psalm asks where do we take this sense of grief, loss, anger, pain?

My spiritual director recently recommended the Starbridge series of novels by Susan Howatch.  They are about clergy that come up against some sort of crisis they have to work through. The books contain theology and inspiration, and also are somewhat tawdry in places. So like life, basically.  The most recent one I read is Absolute Truths.   It has a phrase from scripture that runs through it, "All things work together for good for them that love God." (Romans 8:28).  This can be particularly difficult to believe at such a point in time.  What to make of it?

At one point a character in the book points out that a better translation is "All things intermingle for good for them that love God."  The good doesn't redeem or end the bad - as though the two are mixed together like cake batter and the good flavor wins out.  Howatch writes, "the good and the bad remain quite distinct.... The bad is really terrible and the good may seem powerless against that terrible reality....." The characters go on to explain that when the good and the bad intermingle (not merge) they form a pattern.  Howatch writes, "The darkness doesn't become less dark, but that pattern which the light makes upon it contains the meaning which makes the darkness endurable."

Where is the good today?  I see it in all those who are helping those parents and families in their time of intense grief, the security guards, the police, the mental health workers, the school psychologists, the clergy, the parents, the children, the teachers in Newtown.  I see it in all those doing whatever they can to prevent such a thing from happening again.   Without that help, the pain would be unendurable but it is there. It is there in all those who are working for peace against all the odds in war-torn places in the world.  It is between and in and even among us.  It is advent, and so we sing, "O come, o come Emmanuel," which means God is with us. O Come, be with us in our time of pain, sorrow, grief, and anger.  Help us lift up our souls. Show us the way out of this.

Years ago at this time of year I wrote this poem which somehow seems to me like an advent poem.

Truth is a Wanderer                                   by Tess Baumberger

Truth is a wanderer disguised as something else entirely.

A tall man walks a narrow path, 
muddy in the rain beneath his feet,
 and red, a sign of clay in the soil, 
against the hills around him green.

He carries a long stick which he, weary, leans upon at times. 
He wears gray clothes tattered 
like the clouds above the hills.

The wind worries them as thoughts concern his brow. 
A hat encloses his head
like a child full of sleep.

He walks with love, and the aging glow of trying, 
trying to love the Earth 
which momentarily embraces 
each foot as it lands.
His shoes bear the evidence.

He has in him a king but his kingliness is a dowdy gift, 
dressed in rags and wandering, 
a hat his only crown, 
a ragged cloak his robe, 
a wooden stick his scepter, 
his ponderous domain 
drawing down his shoulders.

Courage shares a lexicon with grief.

****
May we somehow lift our souls so they can move.  May their good direction become clear.

"We look for peace, but find no good; for a time of healing, but there is terror instead."  Too many people of every age and race, of every nation and religious inclination could say this right now.  Because we often look for peace and find no good, yearn for healing but find only terror, these words seem contemporary.  In fact they are from the ancient prophet Jeremiah (chapter 14, verse 19).

Does the fact that these familiar sentiments are ancient mean the world has gone nowhere - that there has been no progress?  One could argue that position and gain quite a footing in times like this  - times when violence tears at human lives and at the fragile fabric of hope.  If only human goodness received as much air time as human evil, we might not feel so despairing.

At such times as these we want to rail against God, especially if we believe in a powerful God of justice. There is never any justice in acts of violence and terror against innocent beings because such action are evil.  I believe the worst evil lies in justification and that people who call upon God or religion to justify acts of violence and oppression commit sacrilege.  Such acts would be antithetical to the supremely loving nature of the Divine.

Yesterday when I read these words from Jeremiah I wept, as perhaps millions have since those words were first written.  We weep because we recognize wanting healing but feeling terrified, wanting peace but finding no good.  For me, the weeping brought relief.

In my work I meet people in great pain who believe it is wrong to be angry with the Divine.  The fact that you can find outrage towards God in the bible suggests that is not true.  If it were wrong to have and to express such feelings, why would such passages appear in scripture?  The Divine is big enough to handle our outrage. Our Creator knows our nature and how it can react to the world as it is.

"We look for peace, but find no good; for a time of healing, but there is terror instead."  It's hard to sit with such feelings, but to me it would feel artificial to go too soon to the place of redeeming meaning.  So instead, for now, I choose to lament with the ancient prophet. Of course that prophet does not leave things in lamentation but let us not ask too much of ourselves. For now let us mourn.  God is big enough to embrace our laments, our broken hearts.  I believe God weeps with us at such times.  Such actions much break God's heart as well.

"Happy are they whose strength is in you; they have courage to make the pilgrimage!  As they go through the Valley of the Weeper, they make it a place of springs, clothed in generous growth by early rains."  To think I once rejected the bible that contains poetry like this.  The poetry is a little different depending on the translation from ancient Hebrew.  The above translation is from The Psalms Anew: in Inclusive Language.  This is the psalter I use in my morning meditations; it is translated by two Franciscan sisters, Nancy Schreck and Maureen Leach.

Another translation, the New Revised Standard Edition, is somewhat different - "Happy are those whose strength is in you, in whose heart are the highways to Zion. As they go through the valley of Baca they make it a place of springs; the early rain also covers it with pools."  I like the "in whose heart are the highways to Zion."  A note says the valley of Baca probably refers to an arid place on the way to Jerusalem.  Here the translator speaks of early rain covering that valley with pools rather than generous growth.  I imagine the pools reflecting the sun.

Still another translation Tanakh: The Holy Scriptures by the Jewish Publication Society has it this way, "Happy the man who finds refuge in You, whose mind is on the [pilgrim] highways.  They pass through the Valley of Baca, regarding it as a place of springs, as if the early rain had covered it with blessing."  The translators do note that the meaning of the last two phrases is uncertain in Hebrew.

You may not know that before entering the ministry I studied the relationship between thought and language in children, eventually earning a doctorate.  I originally intended to be a professor, to teach and do research in that field at a university.  Now here I am, still interested in language and the differences it can make in how we perceive the world.

See what differences translation can make!  In the first translation the faith of the pilgrims creates springs and verdure.  In the second their faith raises springs and brings early rains, leaving behind pools.  The third is perhaps more comprehensible to modern minds that require rational explanation - the faith of the pilgrims makes them see even a dry valley as a place of springs, as if early rains had covered it with blessing.

How we translate meaning into experience is also important.  The scientist in me leans toward the last translation, but my poet heart loves the first best.  I find the image uplifting and sustaining -  people of faith on pilgrimage who, as they pass through a valley of sorrow, transform it into a living, verdant place.  I like to believe that faith can transform the world, or perhaps I should say that by living our faith we can help transform the world  that is right around us as we journey together.

Years ago I wrote a poem "He Waltzes" with similar imagery, though more of autumn than spring.

He waltzes in sunlight, twirling 
wonder in his arms.

Leaves waltz after him, 
his yellow crimson 
crowned glory
revealing

awe
rising in his footsteps.

This post is an adaptation of the brief homily I shared at our Dia de los Muertos service on Sunday October 30th.....

Why remember those who have died, when sometimes that can be painful more than joyful?  Wouldn’t it be better simply to forget?  A few years ago there was a movie called “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” which was sort of about why it is good to remember what you have lost, even if remembering is painful.

In the movie, people could have a medical procedure that wipes out their memories of someone they had loved and lost.  It is about two people, a man and a woman, who fall in love, but it doesn’t work out – and they both decide to have this procedure to forget the time they had together.

But then during the procedure, the man remembers all that they had shared – not just the sad times when they fought and grew apart, but also the good times, happy memories that have been a part of him.  He remembers them chasing one another around a frozen river.  He realizes that all the good memories have to go with the bad ones.  He ends up struggling with this as the procedure slowly drains them away.  He tries to hide from the procedure in his mind, to protect part of his memory so he can hold onto what was an important part of his life.

I think this is why it is important to remember, even if it hurts. Whatever their faults or how painful the parting, people we loved who have died remain a part of us.  There may be at least some good memories of them, and even if not how could we bear the pain of losing part of what makes us who we are?  Wouldn’t we want people to remember us, despite our own faults?  Remembering the dead is one way of living our Unitarian Universalist principle honoring the worth and dignity of every human being.

So I would like to invite you to remember joyfully those you loved who have died.  Focus on the happy memories and what you learned from those people.  Let me tell you about one person who shaped my life, - my grandmother, Evelyn Hamer Lahr.  My Grandma Lahr was really fun.  She was a flapper during the Roaring 20s, as a young and very pretty girl.  She even played on a girls’ basketball team.  She loved to laugh, joke, and tease.  She taught my brothers and me all kinds of trick that drove my mom crazy, like how to burp.  We'd come home and say, "Guess what Grandma taught us?" and my mom (who was pretty straight-laced) would visibly brace herself.

In the summer I would take my "banana bike" to Grandma's house in town. I would stay with her for a week, riding to the swimming pool while she took her afternoon nap.  I would play with my friends, and ride back when the pool closed.  This was a treat for a farm girl, believe me – being able to see my friends during the summer.

Each night we would watch TV together.  She let me eat in her living room, which was not allowed at home – and we would have ice cream.  My favorite was strawberry, so would give me that and I would dish her up some rainbow sherbet.  I remember watching a Jerry Lewis movie with her, and her gravelly laugh.

She died when I was eleven.  I still have the flannel nightgown that I used to wear when I stayed with her and forgot my own.  It still smells like her.  Marigolds remind me of her, because she always planted them around her vegetable garden.  She brought me laughter and love, and taught me how to have fun.  I love you, Grandma.