Faith – Page 2 – Emptying The Backpack

Boots in the Trunk

Some of the greatest moments in life, I believe, are when you find out you are not the only one who does “that.” You’re not the only kid in class who likes to blow bubbles in her chocolate milk or the only student who questions why you should wear a dress to school on picture day when you hate wearing dresses and no one ever sees your dress because you’re always in the back row for pictures. Once, on a phone interview for a job in Florida, I mentioned that most of my friends “up here in the north” seemed to believe that living in colder climates builds character and people who want to live in warmer places are just lazy. The employer simply said, “Come on down; you’ll find plenty of hardworking folks here; they just happen to like burying their toes in the warm sand.” I remember thinking, “I’ve found my people.”

One of my most affirming moments occurred a few years ago while watching a movie that was set in southern California. A woman was sitting in heavy Los Angeles traffic on her way to work when the road began to shake and seemed to begin rolling. Her first response, once all the motion ceased, was to pop open her trunk and change from her fashionable black pumps into a pair of hiking boots. She evidently kept in her trunk for just such an emergency, or at least the character did. She must have known she’d likely have to walk through streets filled with debris, and the boots were just one of the survival tactics she’d either learned firsthand or been taught. She was prepared.

I remember nothing else now about the movie except that I wondered if she also kept some water and maybe a first aid kit and snacks in her trunk. What I loved was that she wasn’t some hiker out on the Appalachian Trail for weeks; the character must have been created by someone familiar with earthquakes who understood that we never know when or where we’ll need to run for our lives. It would be several years later before I would learn that boots in the trunk was a common response for survivors of trauma and abuse. I don’t know if the woman in the movie was supposed to have grown up with a scoutmaster for a father, or if she was a trauma survivor, but she embraced the boots in the trunk. She didn’t think it was weird.

Boots in the trunk, a “go” bag by the bed…

I was a teen when I realized not everyone slept with a “go bag” next to the bed in case a speedy escape became necessary in the middle of the night. After five decades of being teased by others for it, though, I was especially grateful to finally learn that lots of other trauma survivors sleep with shoes under the bed, a wallet or purse with meds, money and that handy Swiss Army knife by the bed, so that in an emergency, they do not waste precious survival and escape time locating footwear or a flashlight. Finally, I could stop being embarrassed that I preferred to sleep in something I knew I could wear outdoors in case of a fire or an earthquake or tornado. I could stop hiding the fact that I think about not wanting to have to run into the dark barefoot and thus be even more vulnerable in a crisis. My “go bag” has been a reasonable and healthy response to the lessons of my childhood where I was taught to be afraid of the dark and it is also a reflection of a strong instinct to survive. Instead of being embarrassed that I startled so easily, I became proud of my Swiss Army knife and I became grateful for those survival instincts. Plenty of children do not get out.

Escape Artists

I know some people who were abused or whose childhood was traumatic seek vengeance and long to hurt the one hurting them, and even hurt others in an attempt to ease their own pain, but my instinct has always been to escape. When my siblings and I were young, they seemed unaware that following the rules meant escaping the belt or the hair brush. As we grew older and taller, I knew to stay well away from my parents’ and even my siblings’ arguments because they so easily slid into the violent responses we’d seen modeled. I mostly escaped broken bones and stitches by escaping as a child and teen. Later, I applied the same tactics to job losses and failures and broken relationships because I knew when to escape, and how to – most of the time – make an exit before the explosions.

Because I could escape, none of their crazy dust landed on me. I know without a doubt that is one reason I survived and got this far. Too many children who grew up like we did never get very far from the crazy, never get too many steps out the door. Maybe that is because they had not managed to stay arm’s lengths away as children and teens; maybe their scars left them less equipped to walk away when they were old enough; maybe their backpacks were just too heavy to carry another step.

Sadly, few if any adults were able back then to recognize this behavior as a survival technique and, thus, necessary. I once attended a junior high church retreat. Our parents sent us away to every camp and retreat that was offered. My brother and sister hated those camps. In contrast, I eagerly grabbed a bag and hopped into whatever car was taking us away from whatever house we were living in at the time. At that particular junior high retreat, though, the girls’ leader accused me of being like a “wolf.” Because I was being quiet, she accused me of preparing to “pounce, to attack,” when the opportunity arrived. I’m really not sure what kind of attack she thought I was planning. I remember just staring at her while she accused me of cooperating with some kind of evil. She was only half wrong, though, which meant, of course, that she was half right. I wasn’t preparing to pounce, though; I was preparing to escape, trying to figure out when that might be necessary. Sadly, it felt like escape was too often necessary and, after a while, became a way of life.

I wasn’t preparing to pounce, though; I was preparing to escape. Sadly, it felt like escape was too often necessary and, after a while, became a way of life. Photo, 1964.

A counselor once asked me how I had survived the turmoil, upheaval, illnesses and chaos of my home. Since I’d already told her about how often I had simply walked away, I was confused. I know now she wanted me to relate to her how I knew when to get the hell away from my mom or dad or brother or sister or myriad boyfriends. The fact is, in the beginning, I became a girl scout. Well, actually a boy scout. Okay, both. Being a “girl scout” meant being good. Being good meant usually no one noticed me and, if I followed the rules, usually no one would hit me. I would certainly never give them a reason to hit me.

Being a “boy scout” meant being prepared. Since we had moved so many times before I was sixteen, it wasn’t like we didn’t have practice packing. I kept my bag and shoes by the bed because they kept me feeling like I had some power to escape if I needed. I knew when to leave because I was what counselors called “hypervigilant.” I watched folks around me like a hawk. That was what concerned the youth leader at the junior high retreat; she did not recognize the behavior as a survival tactic developed over time in response to threats; it was somehow easier for her to imagine a teen as evil than to consider one of the parents in the church might be a predator, I guess.

Live Like a Refugee

The more I worked to find healing over the years after I finally escaped my family home, the more I found like-minded souls who also seemed to move about more than others. My first husband and I were both nomads when we met. “You Don’t Have to Live Like a Refugee” by Tom Petty was the soundtrack of both of our lives at the time. We had both been traveling quite a bit when we separately landed in a writing class and met; even nomads and escape artists settle down for the odd semester. By then, we’d both traveled all over the US and overseas and had both served in the military. We decided to settle down together, to create an alliance, to have each others’ backs; we might have imagined at the time that we’d be more settled, but we found then there were some things about being nomads we still liked and so we promptly moved to California, then to Japan, then to Tennessee, anywhere but where we grew up. So much for no longer being refugees.

Photos by Jodi McCullah. All rights reserved.

Changing Tactics

There came a time, however, when I no longer had the luxury of escape, of running, because our two sons meant there were others I needed to protect and escaping might mean leaving them behind and that was not going to happen. Needing to protect others complicated escape plans, for sure. We taught our boys never to climb up a play structure if they could not make it down without help, to meet up at the back gate if there was ever a fire and we would not let them sleep upstairs until they were big enough to climb out a second story window onto a porch roof and then jump down to safety. Protecting them changed everything. I’d explain it by talking about driving over the huge bridges spanning the Ohio and Missississippi Rivers. We had to drive over both of them at the confluence of the rivers near Cairo, Illinois, every time we went north. Driving over those bridges was frightening enough for me personally but became hellish when I had children and their safety became most important. For myself, to calm my fears as I drove into the monstrous structures crossing those wide and churning rivers, I had developed a bridge survival plan in case the car somehow went into the water: wait for the car to fill up, open the window to swim up and then try to float on the current until I could get to land. With two small children, however, that plan would no longer work. Suddenly, I would need to take two precious little persons with me through that drill and, well, there was not a good time to try to talk to them about that plan and besides, it would most assuredly traumatize them so I prayed extra hard instead that the bridge engineers had done their jobs well and other drivers would keep their distances as we crossed over those bridges.

I still slept with my shoes next to the bed AND I taught my boys as much as possible about safety, but the reality was that escape to survive was no longer always an option. I often still “see death everywhere” as my ex-husband used to say, meaning I am one of those safety-conscious folks that drive some folks crazy. Loving children has helped me learn to stay connected rather than seek escape, though, to find trustworthy people, to ask for help and to allow trustworthy others to help me. Over the years there were a number of folks who definitely helped me when I needed it; reminding myself of their support and encouragement has helped me trust that I can find others and allow them to help, too, if necessary. I needed to learn to choose relationships with trustworthy people and to develop alliances, to stop just trying to survive. I needed to open myself to the possibility that there might be more.

Getting older helped: I started wearing more sensible shoes all the time so boots in the car weren’t major safety concerns anymore!

Why, though?

Watching my responses over the years, though, I know, has perhaps caused some folks who know me to think I’m just paranoid or hypersensitive for no good reason. This blog is, in part, an attempt to explain that behavior to those who do not understand. Writing about what has been in that backpack for so long is also for my tribe, for all those other folks who also were awakened in the night by a touch that taught us to be afraid of touch. We share this because we know “just in case” has come before.

I still struggle to say I am proud of all of this. I wish we were still innocents. I wish we did not know what we know. I wish we had different stories to tell. The things we feared, though, were real for us and we did not have the luxury of going through a day without being hypervigilant, without knowing firsthand that sometimes the unthinkable does happen. Sometimes, for some people, the darkness IS dangerous. To survive then, sometimes you do what you gotta do for the time being and, once it’s safer, you can work on growing, healing and learning other ways to take care of yourself. I am grateful, then, for all of you with boots in your car and a pack slung over your shoulder. Maybe it wasn’t always pretty, but we made it.

Because we were prepared, and we escaped, we can live into new possibilities; we can embrace the reality that the frightening place we came from is not all there is out there. (Photo by Jodi McCullah, 2023. All rights reserved.)

As I was writing this, I wondered why the photo below spoke to me and now I realize it’s because what’s around that corner in Venice promises to be beautful and hopeful and exciting. I celebrate all those survival skills, including learning over time that we will find what we need, AND learning to let ourselves ask for and accept help. Good news: there ARE others who do “that.” We are not alone and there are those who love us anyway. Embrace your backpack then or your boots until you don’t need them, then thank them for getting you this far and go see what’s around that next corner! You’ve got this!

Venice, Italy, 2022, photo by Jodi McCullah. All rights reserved.

Leave me a comment: what was in your survival kit?

Talking About Death Won’t Kill You.

Pulling death out from the shadows and examining it in the light does not make death happen. In fact, it does just the opposite. Thinking about death, learning about it and accepting it, makes life happen.
Virginia Morris, “Talking About Death Won’t Kill You,” Algonquin Books. Kindle Edition.

Death is a funny thing. And I don’t mean in a dark humor kind of way but, rather, funny as in strange: we all do it, and, these days, we all know we ought to muster up our courage and talk to our loved ones about what we know is coming at some time, and yet few of us do.

Talking about how we want to die and what needs to be done when we do is a gift to our families and friends, kind and considerate; sometimes that’s the last gift we give loved ones. Pastors and health care workers and counselors encourage us to start the conversations early but far too few of us ever get our courage up to start, even though we surely love our families.

We often don’t even talk to our loved ones

AS we (or they) are dying.

The first person I sat with who was dying, died alone in a hospital room while his family waited out in a waiting room. That was thirty years ago. We did not know how to help him not be afraid and nothing we said could ease the fear but no one wanted to name that or claim it either, so we talked around him when we were in the room. We talked about the weather, the dog, the cost of eggs, anything except death and eventually most went back out into the aptly named “waiting” room. I, just starting out as a pastor, stayed in the darkened room with this man who no longer wore his own clothing but rather a hospital-issued and worn cotton gown and asked for some socks that weren’t neon blue or orange and didn’t have those silly dot on them or some salt for the instant potatoes and who was just plain furious. He was angry about sox and pajamas and dying without some damn salt and without any choices: no choices about dying and not even any choices about how he would die. Thus far, as a pastor just starting out, I had read and discussed one book about how to minister to someone who is dying and could remember none of what the damn book said. I drove home that night screaming in my car. I had not signed up for that, and I was unprepared both for his anger and mine and this helplessness we shared. The journey into ministry was going to be rougher than I ever could have imagined.

Once I’d calmed down a bit, a pastor with more experience offered this simple advice: “Next time,” she said, “name it. Fear. Uncertainty. Anger. Questions. Whatever is in front of you while you sit there, name it.” There was a time when I would have discounted such a ridiculously simple suggestion, but it turned out to be great advice. In fact, in any difficult situation, naming whatever is in “in the room,” especially if it is scary, lessens the fear and opens up the space for questions, laments or even the jokes, all ways of sharing.

I buried about a couple of dozen members of that church over the next few years, including a suicide, my 18-year-old communion steward and a couple who had been married for more than 75 years and who died within a week of one another. All of those deaths brought up questions, and I tried to name what I saw and reassure us all that talking about death would not kill us. Most of those folks’ deaths happened fairly quickly, but one member of that first church took almost a year to die after receiving what he called his “death pink slip.” Over that year, David showed an entire church how to die a good death. Diagnosed with metastasized prostate cancer already destroying his back and ribs, the construction engineer who could no longer build houses started building birdhouses. He built hundreds of them in the months he was dying. His mind and his hands still moved well and in sync and he was grateful when his friends’ eyes lit up. He designed bird homes that celebrated the University of Tennessee for a Vols fan, several that looked like our little white country church and one I requested that mimicked a Lincoln Log cabin.

Birdhouses built by a former construction foreman who could not keep building homes for his friends so he started building them for the birds in the area. He built hundreds in the months after he was diagnosed with advanced Prostate cancer.

More importantly, though, as David died, as he dealt with the diagnoses, the treatments and the rapid onslaught of decay and death, he shared. He talked about what was happening to him to everyone who visited him. He taught us what the Hospice folks were teaching him, even describing what death might look like, how he might have some better days right before he died and what to watch for in his breathing as death grew nearer. In short, he did not hide or try to protect us from what was happening. He named all of it and we are grateful for this evidence of his courage and love for us.

Because of David, I also found a great resource and over the years referred to it both for personal help and also to preach and teach. In, “Talking About Death,” Virginia Morris addresses so much of what keeps us from these important discussions. First of all, she says, “Pulling death out from the shadows and examining it in the light does not make death happen. In fact, it does just the opposite. Thinking about death, learning about it and accepting it, makes life happen.”

When I started this project a friend of mine called me, all upset. She felt that this endeavor was not only morbid, but dangerous. By studying death, she said, I might make it happen. A friend of hers had died of cancer while studying Portuguese death rituals. I, too, might be on a suicide mission. This subject was better left untouched. Her concerns may seem a bit odd at first, but they are not unusual. Death is the boogeyman, hiding in the shadows of our bedrooms, arousing all sorts of anxieties and fears—some valid, some silly, some we don’t readily admit even to ourselves. Most of us can’t imagine the end of our existence as we know it. We dread the process of dying, the pain and disability. We panic at the thought of leaving loved ones, or having them leave us.

Morris, Virginia. Talking About Death (p. 7). Algonquin Books. Kindle Edition.

What Did COVID teach us?

So many died during COVID alone and unable to be comforted by family or friends and we are more aware now than ever of the importance of being there for one another.

NEVERTHELESS, we struggle with starting the conversations before we are ill, before we are hospitalized, before we need hospice care.

Part of the issue is that we simply don’t have to talk about death much anymore. We simply do not talk about death, not even in churches even though a church seems like the best place to talk about death.

Wartrace United Methodist Church, est. 1849. Homecoming suppers were “on the grounds.” For most smaller Methodist churches, the cemetery often surrounded the church building.

In so many of those little churches we attended, all of the “Saints” who’d gone before were buried all around the church in the cemetery just outside the doors. Every few months, we would have “supper” on the grounds, meaning we spread our biscuits and fried chicken legs and pickles on platters on old checked table cloths on top of the graves of our ancestors, who were buried all around us.

There was no pretending they weren’t there with us, bodies underneath and souls swirling overhead, whispering in our ears, reminding us all they’d taught us and all they’d done, good, bad or just human. Don’t slouch. Eat your greens, too. Wipe your fingers on that napkin and not on your shirt, young man. These were the folks who’d walked through those cemetery gates and into that old wooden sanctuary each week and they had taught us how to follow those 10 rules Moses brought down from the mountain AND to turn that other cheek. Still, they didn’t have to create a moment to talk about death because they reminded us of it every Sunday and during revivals as we entered that sacred space.

Today we don’t have those reminders. We do not see the cycle of life and death firsthand on a daily basis now. We do not wring the chickens’ necks and pluck them ourselves; few of rely on butchering hogs to have food for the winter, and we no longer prepare loved ones’ bodies for burial ourselves. We have people called to and trained to do these tasks and so the majority of us will never touch any dead body, never be faced with the need to handle a lifeless body, never have to be reminded we too will die, never find an occasion to talk about our deaths.

Easy for You to Say.

You might be thinking that as a retired pastor, of course, I have lots of experience sitting with people who are dying, sitting with the family and friends of someone who has died and just talking about death in general. That is true, but all that professional experience did not make it any easier to start the discussions with my own family or to begin the work personally. In fact, I am embarrassed to say that it was a neighbor who suggested the book that started me on the process for myself and my family, by suggesting the book she’d found: “I’m Dead, Now What?” (See below.)

I want to offer some suggestions, then, some topics and some resources to help you do what is one of the most loving things you can for your family: discuss with them, prepare and plan so they are not left with the burden when you are gone or can no longer help. We can do this.

Excellent planner to provide peace of mind for those who need to settle your affairs. Helps organize your information, from pet needs to email and social medea to banking. Available on Amazon. By Peter Pauper Press

Start with the easier stuff.

If talking about death at all is just difficult for you, start with putting your papers in order and maybe your mind will become more used to the idea of realizing there will be a day when you (posthumously) say, “I’m Dead. Now What?” When you are gone, will your papers be in order? Will whomever is left to pay the bills, deal with property, take care of Fido or make other decisions know where to find what they need? Thankfully, there are wonderful resources for that as well. Starting here will often help us begin the many conversations we need to have around our own deaths.

Passwords, please. Can I get an amen?

If nothing else, safely providing a list of the seemingly thousands of passwords we all have now is one of the greatest gifts you can give these days. Don’t forget to tell them what the site is for the password; you know how you have spent hours trying to get back into your Netflix account. Think about how that’s going to work when it’s time to close out the account and stop the automatic draft for that times about fifty or a hundred, depending on how many apps and accounts you have.

Talk About How You Want to Die

We all hope to die at a certain way if we are honest and think about it for a moment and sharing that with one another around a kitchen table is a way to learn about one another.

Some of us want to die quickly, instantly. Some of us only hope for no pain. Many of us in my culture hope to die at home in our own beds surrounded by family and friends. Some of us hope to die with a silk parachute inflating overhead one last time; others of us hope to die in in satin ballroom shoes, our hips responding to the beat on the congas as a Latin band plays a cha-cha. Still others of us would love to take our last breaths in the arms of a lover. Some of the sweetest couples I’ve known debate who should go first: some do not want to be left alone after a longterm companion goes but most are more concerned about their sweetheart and hope that the other will go first so they are not left alone to grieve. They would take that grief upon themselves.

Consider doing a bit of research, then sharing.

In Japan, at least thirty years ago when I lived there, everyone in the neighborhood chips in to help pay for the costs of a neighbor’s funeral knowing that everyone else will do the same when their own time comes.

Funeral traditions there offered us a number of occasions to talk about dying and our own deaths. Once, a neighbor came to visit after her father had died and shared with me about the funeral since I had not been in town on the day of the funeral. I remember trying to put my finger on what was wrong as we sat and looked at a picture album of the funeral gathering and ceremonies until I realized that what was strange for me was that there was a photo album of the event. I had never known anyone to photograph a funeral.

There’s some fascinating and/or disturbing historical examples of cultural differences around death, such as mummifying and burying with everything you’d need to survive in the afterlife, including, sadly, your pets, and others we pray have been banned forever such as the Hindu custom of a wife immolating herself on the funeral pyre of her dead husband.

Write down your information first, then your wishes.

Think about what you want for a service, write down your wishes and share them with a family member and a pastor or another family friend who can help when the time comes. What are your wishes around being kept alive? Wishes around resusitation, extreme measures and even feeding tubes are much more difficult for family members if they are not aware of your wishes.

Do you want certain songs included in your service? Have a favorite verse? Talk about what you want and need or don’t want. Tell a pastor or trusted friend who can help you when you need to let your loved one die the way they’ve chosen, whether that means no , no on every possible intervention, i.e., their choices as best can be honored.

Clean up after before yourself.

In some societies, sorting through all your belongings, “death cleaning” is an established tradition. They are aware of the stress and pain of leaving all our “stuff” behind for our family to have to sort and clear and give away or sell or keep.

“Death cleaning,” or “döstädning” is a Swedish term that refers the process of downsizing before you die. Death Cleaning, explained in “The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning” is an gift you give your family. Sorting through, clearing out, giving away or selling all the “stuff” we can accumulate throughout our lives is an indication, the author writes, that you love your family enough to clear our unnecessary things and make your home nice and orderly well before you think the time is coming closer for you to leave the planet. The idea is that our spouses and children or grandchildren are not burdened with what can become a beast of a process, yet another source of pain for those grieving us when we’re gone, yet another indication that we didn’t want to talk about death.

(Magnusson, Margareta. The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter (The Swedish Art of Living & Dying Series) (p. 2). Scribner. Kindle Edition.) Also available on Amazon.

Start the conversation any way you can.

We all face it; people all over the world face it, but not always in the same manner, using the same customs, so, I’m thinking maybe talking about cultural differences around death and dying might be a way to start a conversation.

Did you know that those death masks, usually made by taking a cast of a person’s face after their death, were often kept as mementoes or used for the creation of a portrait or perhaps a scupture after the person had died and been buried. That could open a conversation. A lock of hair often is kept, a tradition started by Queen Victoria after the death of her husband. Tiny brooches might hold cremation ashes. Do you want to be cremated? This is the time to make sure a loved one knows that.

Just start.

Finally, to start the conversation, if none of the suggestions above have spurred you to sit down with your spouse or children or companion or pastor or priest yet, here is a poem I wrote after sitting with a man at my last church who was dying. Perhaps you can start simply by sharing this poem over a cup of tea, a pint of beer or some lovely scones your neighbor dropped by to share. “Hey,” you can say, “I read this poem about death and dying today and it made me think. Can I read it to you and you tell me what you think?” You get a yes and maybe some discussion will follow. Have some questions ready. Maybe a version of “Would you rather…?” Would you rather be buried at sea or on a mountain? Would you rather have everyone sing happy songs at your funeral or maybe tell their favorite joke?

Every time I have spent time with someone who is close to death, I recognize I am closer to my own death and my own fears and though both death and the fear of dying creep ever closer, neither seem to crowd out the peace I have found in talking about, in naming, what is before me, even death. It’s pretty much the one thing we all have in common. Let’s talk!

Sitting with the Dying

I used to think sitting with someone who's dying took courage.
Now I think it is much more selfish than I might ever want to admit.
It is an act of hope, yes.
If I am honest, though,
the hope is that someone else will sit with me when I'm the one who's dying.
There is prayer
but the prayer is that someone who knows me will wipe the drool
from my chin when the time comes.
There is the seeking of promises, guarantees, bartering if
necessary,
so that someone whose face I used to recognize will
cup my face in the palm of their hands when I cry like a baby, or
pluck the hairs from my upper lip because even a dying woman
deserves to feel pretty.
The first time I sat with someone who was dying, I went into that dark room because no one else would and because I couldn't bear
anyone dying alone.
Except now I know we too often do anyway.
Still, if there's any comfort to be offered there, I will selfishly offer warm, gentle and soft touches if only because I know I want the return.
I confess then that sitting with someone who's dying
is a selfish act for me.
It is my way. A way to make the world the place I want it to be,
where no one dies alone
if only because I cannot bear to live in a world where we do.

~Jodi McCullah 2022

4 responses to “Talking About Death Won’t Kill You.”

Anne Culver

February 27, 2023

Thank you for these reflections, Jodi. As a hospital chaplain, I’ve found that many people who’ve been told “some bad news” (that they’re dying), desperately need someone willing to help them work through just what that might mean for them and their loved ones in our culture in which even thinking about death seems to be taboo.

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A. Getty

February 27, 2023

Thank you for sharing. We have been having more of these conversations lately and your reading suggestions are helpful.

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Earnie L

February 28, 2023

I was raised with grandparents who took me to their church’s dinner on the grounds. One of my favorite places to photograph is a cemetery. I imagine all of the lovely lives and interesting people there. And, my Mother taught me that there are far worse things in this life than dying. Thanks for the lovely article.

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Joan Butler

March 1, 2023

Jodi, thanks so much for these thought provoking words. We’ve started the process, but need to go deeper.

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Be the pebble. One answer to the unimaginable.

For several months last year, I was invited to join a group of women from all over western and middle Tennessee, some clergywomen, some lay leaders in their churches. We gathered virtually because we shared a sad truth: a colleague and friend had been taken from us suddenly, shot in her own driveway during a carjacking.

I had not known any of these women before this group convened, but I am so very grateful that they all agreed to convene for those few months – and to invite me – to share our grief and pain and try to make some, any, if possible, sense of this tragedy. Some of the participants had known this woman for years; others of us had only known her a short while, but we all grieved what felt like a future filled with hope and ministry. She was likely going to be a Bishop some day, not because she was someone who was well-loved but because she was someone who loved well. That future was denied suddenly not by someone who had judged her ministry or intentions or love as lacking, but by a total stranger, someone who never had and now never would feel the love she had to offer him.

Within just a few weeks following her murder, we stepped into a virtual room, and invoked the words so many of us had shared in the funerals we had presided over. We affirmed that we had come together in our grief, acknowledging our human loss and praying that God would grant us grace. We also prayed that, in our pain we may find comfort, and in our sorrow, we might find hope. We especially, collectively, wanted to find ways to honor our friend.

It’s not necessarily a new idea to say we are called to honor those who are now gone who’ve loved, nurtured, forgiven or supported and encouraged us by doing the same. It just may be a bit tougher to process our emotions after the loss is a shock or especially an act of violence, because violence always leaves in its wake more victims than are seen by the naked eye. Be assured, most of us could acknowledge our privilege in not facing this kind of loss before; we also recognized what a gift it was that we could take the needed time to grieve and to find some guidance and companions for this process. Plenty of folks do not share that luxury, we knew.

Nevertheless, to say the sheer aggression and randomness of this event knocked us down is insufficient. We all know that bad things happen to even the best of people, but somehow some of us thought – hoped – there was a line the people of God would not cross. I mean, if you’re willing to kill a preacher, who stands a chance? We were shaken individually and collectively and so I am grateful that our colleague’s legacy brought us together. A few of the women realized that, if our friend had been the one left in shock and pain, this is what she’d do. She would gather us all in. She was all about sharing, listening, reflecting and holding hands in our fear and our pain. Over the next few months, then, we talked about how this trauma affected us, mentally, spiritually, emotionally and theologically. We seemed to know that she would encourage us to ask our questions, something most of us in this world have been conditioned to avoid, even if we do have the time. Through our theological and faith journeys, though, through pursuing our callings, many of us in the group had been exposed to and become somewhat practiced in reflection, in the art of asking questions, and, perhaps most importantly, in sitting with questions that are not accompanied by satisfying answers.

Aggressive, blunt, unanswered and unanswerable questions most definitely were part of these group meetings; they sat next to us, sometimes gently nudging us, sometimes poking us with bony fingers, often angering and annoying us, always taking up space and reminding us they were not going away. So, we chose to embrace them, to welcome them into our space, albeit a bit begrudgingly, buoyed by the fact that we were not alone.

“After all these years I have begun to wonder if the secret of living well is not in having all the answers but in pursuing unanswerable questions in good company.”
Remen, Rachel Naomi. My Grandfather’s Blessings: Stories of Strength, Refuge, and Belonging . Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

We shared from various resources: prayers, poems, stories, theological pieces and we asked ourselves, How then shall we live?

To get there, we shared questions about our colleague like: How can one person be someone whom everyone felt like they knew? This woman saw you. I could easily spend the rest of my life trying to see every person that I encounter as well as she did; it is a spiritual practice that I will likely never master but one that she embodied. She saw each of us and even if you only met her once, you left her presence knowing she still somehow held you as tightly and lovingly as she did everyone she saw. I would have liked to ask her more about this; how did she manage it? Did she consciously focus only on who was right in front of her? How was she able to tune out the rest of the world so successfully as to make you feel like not so much the center of the universe but seen. And heard. She saw you. Most of us go through life not feeling truly seen or heard and yet, sadly, that is often all we want. Many an argument or estrangement likely would be quelled or mended if each participant were able to take a turn seeing and hearing the other fully. She seemed to know that.

How Then Shall We Live?

Throughout the sessions over last fall, I found myself counting how many people who were now missing from my life after this year: friends, colleagues, family members.

Sadly, I am grateful that a couple of them are no longer here to harm others. I spent a great deal of my life learning how NOT to follow in those footsteps. I also, though, came to recognize them as human beings, not monsters, and to acknowledge I have my own failings. I hate knowing that. I hate knowing I am capable of being ugly and of wounding others. I hate knowing that too often what annoys me in others is what annoys me about myself. All of that knowledge means I must go forward with self-assessment that is as rigorous as my judgment of others AND I must offer grace that is as unearned as the grace I receive. The question there was what did I learn about myself from that person?

I am grateful though to declare that most of those whom I have lost have blessed me. All of those I lost this past twelve months, including my colleague, I now realize, left me with the question on my life: how will I live going forward so as to reflect how I have been changed by their influence on my life? How, then, will I live now in light of what they taught me, whether it be because I want to honor them or because I want to never fall into their footsteps: what gift will I give the world now that they are no longer here?

Questions, then, I thought, might be the answer, if that’s possible. I shared with the group one of the understandings of a Scripture passage that another colleague had helped me to see differently years ago. The Scripture was about the widow and the judge in Luke 18:1-8. The story is often interpreted that the judge is God and the widow has to badger God – the judge – to get heard and to receive justice. Another colleague years ago saw the story differently and preached that the widow in the story instead was God and God (the widow) would continue to beseech the powers that be (the judges) in our world to do the right thing. God would continue to be the pebble in the shoe, she preached, that made us stop in our tracks and take care of that annoying pain that we feel every step we take. God will continue to try to make us stop long enough perhaps to think, to listen, to pray, to see one another. The story when I read it now reminds me, calls me, to be the pebble, to keep the hard, stony, annoying truths in front of folks I know.

God calls us to BE the pebble. Ask – lovingly – the difficult questions. Keep the hard, stony, annoying truths in front of the folks we know.

We lamented that there was no going back to our blissful ignorance, no chance now we could pretend we or those whom we loved were safe. One thing that is certain about hatred, ugliness, violence, is that once you know, you can’t “unknow.” Most of us in our world today learn at such early ages that violence and meanness and the ability to harm others is part of our world but being the target or even knowing the target of someone else’s violent behavior, even and maybe especially if that target appears random, moves us into darker places emotionally, spiritually, mentally.

One of the toughest conversations was, no surprise, about guns and gun violence. I do not believe I am breaking confidence to say that we were keenly aware of the difficulty we live into everyday in our country of how to deal with what has become an epidemic.

He was just a child still himself who pulled the trigger and took this life. In light of how much gun violence has become part of so many children’s lives, I offered the image of our society as a body where this bullet’s wound was not the only injury or illness that needed to be addressed in this tragedy. The image of a body with multiple system failures came to mind for me as we talked about how we had failed this child as well, the child who had murdered her, lamenting how he had gotten to that place, into that car, with that gun. The questions became: What had gotten him to the point where another human being was worth less than that car? Don’t we need to know that process? Where in his young life was he ever seen?

The questions we all needed to ask ourselves and one another became: What had gotten him to the point where another human being was worth less than a car? Don’t we need to know that process? Where in his young life was he ever seen?

For help with tough questions, I suggested this resource: “When Thoughts and Prayers Aren’t Enough: A Shooting Survivor’s Journey into the Realities of Gun Violence,” by Taylor Schumann, a victim of gun violence, a Christian and a strong advocate for the right to own and bear arms. Her offering in this book is as honest a discussion of faith and firearms as I have seen thus far and it is a true gift to those who do not know what to say but feel called to participate in reflection and discussion. We put seatbelts in our cars to help protect our children when auto accidents were the number one killer; we need to stop the yelling and figure this out for our children’s sake. Schumann offers intelligent, faith-led, personal and compelling points to add to the discussion, pebbles, if you will, that we can cast into our collective path.

Moving Forward

How then would we go forward was the overarching question. How we each had thought we would be going forward in our lives was mostly changed but not canceled, we realized, but this sudden loss. I grieved having postponed working together until after my retirement. I had so many questions I was looking forward to asking her when we would be working together. Each of us was challenged to ask ourselves, “How will I live now?” We realized we had already started moving forward and had chosen to live differently by simply inviting and agreeing to meet over the course of those months, by sharing and holding one another in grief, by sharing resources that inspired us (and often which we hoped might answer some of those pesky questions). Already we were living with intention, living in response to this trauma and tragedy, living in a way that would honor her (and more importantly we knew to her,) living in a way that recognized the power and gift of connecting. We would commit each of us to continue using our platforms (sermons, Bible studies, book clubs) to replicate these conversations, to offer them to others, to hold hands with, to sit with, to see each person who came before us and to ask the questions.

For myself, I believe my beloved colleague would encourage me this Christmas and every Christmas going forward to seek to “Be that pebble in the shoes of those who are in power and ask the questions that need asking.” No question, my friend saw me or you like she saw everyone, it seemed; she made each of us feel seen. Spending time in her presence, though, also meant you had to keep stooping down to remove the occasional pebble from your shoe because it was either that or limp forever. She did this lovingly and you knew as you stooped down to scoop out that pebble that she meant to be loving to you and to everyone else who might be affected. “It’s all right,” she seemed to be saying in a loving and gentle way, “I’ll wait while you tend to that.”

Who knew that a handful of pebbles could be such a sacred Christmas gift?

Wrestling with God

People often assume that, because I am a pastor, my relationship with God must be bucolic, nurturing, all green pastures and peaceful waters. They are surprised then when I tell them that my relationship with God, in fact, more closely mirrors the story of Jacob wrestling with the angel. (See Genesis 32, or better, go back and read the whole story of this trickster who became the father of the 12 tribes of Israel.)

I refer them to this story because while I would love to say God and I are just great buddies and I, like Mary, sister of Martha, spend my days sitting at God’s feet listening and learning, the reality is much more that I wrestle with God and often, the wrestling feels like a life and death struggle.

Rapids

About five years ago, my two sons and I went kayaking on the Harpeth River on a rainy 4th of July. We were the last group of people allowed to get in the water because the rain had been coming down so long that the river was starting to rise. Those who ran the kayaking and canoeing outfitters were concerned and so they stopped letting other people get in the water. It was still manageable when we got in, and all three of us have a lot of experience with canoeing and kayaking, so we felt quite comfortable–even if we were soaking wet.

Almost immediately though, really before we could even get settled in our kayaks, we had to make a quick decision at a split in the water – a stretch of rapids either way but we had no time to think and no time to weigh the two and find the safest. My youngest son went right and my oldest and I went left. Within seconds, I watched in horror as my oldest son was sucked underneath a pile of brush that had collected on the side and then, almost as quickly, only had time enough to take a breath before I also got sucked under the pile of brush myself.

I remember being clear I did not want to be carried any further under that brush pile, because, well, there did not appear to be a way out on the other side. I, of course, immediately lost my paddle and kayak and just focussed on not being pulled any further under. I did know which way was up and managed to grab onto a branch, but I was not strong enough to pull myself to the surface. I remember that I kept holding onto the branch and was especially grateful when I realized it was living and attached to the riverbank. I could not find any way, though, to push myself up and get my head out of the water. I remember kicking and kicking and holding on until quite suddenly I found a foothold and pushed up until my head came out of the water and I felt a hand grabbing mine.

I was not underwater for a long time, but the time that I was underwater went by slowly while I was struggling, and I remember two thoughts as I was kicking and searching for a foothold and trying to push myself up: the first thing that I was thinking was I didn’t know where my oldest son was and I was really scared he was underneath the brush; and the second thing I was thinking was honestly that I might not get out of this alive. I was under water and struggling long enough to have time to think I might not make it.

As it turns out, I was not the only one thinking that, though, because I found out a bit later that my youngest son — the outdoorsman and most experienced of the three of us, the one who has survived several brushes with death that mom doesn’t want to know about, that son apparently had enough time to stop trying to retrieve my paddles, to yell to his brother, “Mom is not coming back up” and to start sprinting for where he’d seen me go under.

Apparently, though, his brother, who I’m so grateful as able to quickly surface, was already trying to reach me and when I finally found a submerged log with my foot and was able to push up and reach up, that son grabbed my hand and pulled me on up and out. And that all happened in five minutes or less of putting our kayaks into the water! My heart still races just thinking about it!

Praying, Not Praying….

Now you might hope that, in the midst of chaos and a frightening situation, that a preacher would be praying, right!? And, I’d really like to say that I was praying but I don’t remember that. I do remember being calm, even when I thought I might not make it. I remember being focused and I remember doing what I knew to do, focus on finding a foothold to push myself out of the rushing water. I remember being fully present in each moment. I remember pushing again and again and I remember hoping it would work. I remember that I kept trying and that I kept reaching. And when I felt that hand grab mine, when my sons pulled me out of the water, absolutely soaking wet, I remember taking a really deep breath.

Afterwards, once I felt the relief of seeing both boys safe and sound, I think I felt worse for my oldest son who — Poor guy — had just given up cigarettes a few weeks earlier. He looked like he needed one. As for my younger son, well, he got a taste of what Mom had felt so many times with him and his brushes with danger and death. I remember registering that it must have been serious because it was highly unusual for him to be worried but he was so worried, he ran!

I remember being grateful that my oldest son was above the surface trying to get to me the whole time and grateful to see his face when he pulled me out. Quietly, with little conversation at first, we set about trying to retrieve our paddles and whatever gear we had. Much was washed down the river and gone. We found what we could see in the rain, secured that gear to the kayaks and got back on the water because, as drenched and drained as we might have felt, there was no going back up the river – there was only one way home.

I remember we floated in silence for a bit until my youngest son turned to me and asked, “Don’t you just feel so alive right now, Mom?”

Well, yes.

And No.

I was far more exhausted than I normally would have been, considering we really had only been on the water for a few minutes. But I also could say I could not remember many times in my life when I have felt that present, and that much in the moment, and that keenly aware of and focussed on what I needed to be doing.

I felt quite shaken, I told him, but grateful though I was very clear that it never needed to happen again!!

All that is to say, I felt like most people do in a terrifying situation. While scary movies are quite popular with many of us, most of us do not actually like being in danger. In fact, we have a high need to control that kind of chaos; we certainly do not like it. As far as most of us are concerned, it is God’s job to make the chaos stop and God’s job to restore safety and help us feel comfortable again.

Wrestling is Biblical, Turns Out.

In Gospel Medicine, Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor says, we think that’s how we can tell when God is present–when the danger has been avoided. When your heart stops pounding and you can breathe normally again? That’s when God is present, right? We believe we know that God is there when we’re not afraid anymore. “It is an appealing idea,” says Taylor, “but unfortunately the Bible will not back it up. As much as we’d like to think God is in the ‘keeping us from danger and chaos’ business,” in fact, she says, “much of God’s best work takes place in total chaos, while we are scared half out of our wits.” (Taylor, Rev. Barbara Brown, Gospel Medicine, 107-8.) Great.

In the Genesis saga where Jacob is wrestling with an angel, Jacob certainly did not want to be fighting for his life. But this story is where he does exactly that. When we find Jacob there, it is twenty years after Jacob left his family because he cheated his older brother, and lied to his father, and took his older brother’s birthright, inheritance, AND blessing and then had to flee.

“Likely he only knows which end is up because he can feel the dirt on his back or the gravel in his face as they roll and tumble and cling to one another all night, apparently evenly matched. We know he felt afraid for his life, thought he was likely going to die, in fact, which means he was keenly present and aware of every moment and every move because the next move, the next moment, the wrong move, could mean the end of his life on this earth.” (Taylor, Ibid. )

Jacob refuses to let go of the angel until the angel gives him a blessing and the angel changes his name to Israel, which, of course, will be hugely important, but also leaves Jacob wounded, limping for the rest of his life, which means always vulnerable in that day and time.

This story is perhaps my favorite story in the Bible. In fact, when folks ask me to explain my relationship with God, I tell them this story because while I would love to say God and I are just buddies and I, like Mary sister of Martha, spend my days sitting at God’s feet listening and learning, the reality is much more that I wrestle with God. Sometimes I question God, sometimes I get angry with God, sometimes I am grateful and feel blessed. But it is not usually a serene and peaceful relationship. I also love this story because it describes so well how so many of us experience life: crises, and relationship troubles, and illnesses, and accidents, seem to pounce on us when we are not looking. and all we can do is hold on tightly and try to come up for air when we can.

Faith, For Me, is Holding On, Ever Hoping.

Rachel Naomi Remen, an oncologist and author who struggled all of her life with her own Crohn’s Disease, and who has endured lasting, debilitating pain and multiple surgeries, talks about Jacob and striving with God in her book, My Grandfather’s Blessings. First, because she was a child when her grandfather told her this story, she says she was puzzled and wondered how anyone could confuse an angel with an enemy. Her grandfather pointed out, though, that the wrestling was not the important part of the story. The important part, he told her, is that everything has a blessing for us, and we can receive blessings even–and perhaps especially–in the times when we are clear we are not in control. Our task is to keep striving as best we can to understand, keep striving to learn, and maybe even, like Jacob, keep negotiating but we keep holding on.

Rachel Remen says, “How tempting to let the enemy go and flee. To put the struggle behind you as quickly as possible and get on with your life. In fact, though, it turns out that very often the struggle IS your real life and all the time we spend quietly, serenely, calmly is just the quiet before the storm that is our life. Perhaps,” says Remen, “the wisdom lies in engaging the life you have been given as fully and as courageously as possible and not letting go until you find the unknown blessing that is in everything.” (Remen, Dr. Rachel Naomi, My Grandfather’s Blessings, 27. )

This kind of wrestling is not pretty, though. Most of us shy away from this kind of struggle because it is so embarrassing to be so clearly overwhelmed by our lives. I am sorry to say I have struggled a great deal in my life, sometimes because of tragedy or trauma and sadly, just as often because I have allowed trauma to set the rules and too often closed myself off from healing or relationships.

When I do struggle, and it seems that I do nearly every time there’s a change I need to make, I have found it necessary to forget about how I look or how I present to others, as much about whether or not my eyes are swollen and red as about whether what I say makes sense to someone else. I have learned not to expect myself to sound rational or even be able to defend what I am feeling or thinking, only to hold on and not worry about frogs in my pockets or mud on my forehead or if anyone else understands right now. Every attempt, every time I push or grasp for words to explain what feels life-giving and what doesn’t, every move is more proof I am alive and I do care and still hope and, God willing, will reap a blessing from the effort.

As my sons and I floated down the river that day, I’d love to say I felt somehow triumphant, that I had gleaned some grand lesson the world would want to hear, that God had spoken to me and sent me back the land of the living to share some great wisdom that would make all of our lives better or more meaningful or help us cure cancer.

Instead, I was drenched, defeated and deflated but that didn’t matter because I was just grateful to be near enough my boys to touch them, to call to them, and to hear them call back to me for another day.

We Do All Have A Story

Part of unpacking the backpack I’ve carried now for more than six decades is recognizing that there are so many stories. Yours. Theirs. Ours. Everyone’s. We all do have a story and much of my life has been about sharing stories. One of my favorite jobs revolved around being assigned to interview a wide variety of people whose stories I was then tasked with telling.

This image is from a card created to benefit Room In The Inn in Nashville (roomintheinn.org.)

(So many of my favorite books, by the way, have been short story compilations or books about stories. As I unpack this backpack, the books I’ve held onto, often referred to and found worth rereading will be topics of entries. Below is one of my long time favorites. Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D., shares wonderful stories and I have quoted her more than a few times in sermons.)

My Grandfather’s Blessings: Stories of Strength, Refuge, and Belonging, by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D., (Riverhead Books, New York, 2000) has long been a favorite, in part because she not only tells wonderful stories, but she also encourages and celebrates us all recognizing our blessings in hearing one another’s stories and in telling our own.
As you can see, this copy has been well-used.

I love stories.

Stories about trying to grow disease-free strands of chestnut trees, trees that have their own stories, by the way! (They used to grow in the south to be massive but now can only manage to sprout bushes. Grow, little trees, grow!)

Stories about small town festivals and cowbirds and killdeer who protect their young by pretending to be injured to draw predators away from nests.

Stories about how you refused to let anyone else tell you how to live your life, stories about first loves, stories about sitting with dying.

As, I unpack my backpack here, I’ll tell those and others, stories about travel to Japanese temples in caves or about stumbling over statues intentionally left lying in the middle of bridges in Rome.

Stories about Lazarus stumbling out of the tomb and how that image helped us find ways to help our friends and neighbors who have stumbled as they tried to come back from combat and wars.

Songwriters and poets are some my favorite storytellers, often as much for what they leave out and let us fill in ourselves. The embroidery below I did years ago and, if you’re a John Prine fan, you know that is a line from one of his songs, “Everybody,” where he sings that: “Everybody needs somebody that they can talk to, someone to open up their ears and let that trouble through….”

Some stories are more compelling but none is more important than another, only more important to me or you and only in a certain time and place. All of our stories need to and deserve to be told. Even the ones we regret. To be sure, some are more fun to tell than other and some are the kind of story that, while you’re in the midst of the story itself, you know this is gonna be epic…if we survive.

One benefit of hearing and then telling your stories is how your stories spur me to remember and tell my own, whether they were stories about nearly drowning or stories about all the mythology around pregnancies (and the tendency people have to warn you or tell you about the worse-case scenario when they see you sporting a swelling belly) or some of my earliest stories, which were about running away from home or trying to make sense of chaos using a child’s vocabulary and point of view.

Stories. We all have them, we all need to hear them and we all need to tell them. I’ve got lots so this is just the beginning. Might want to sit down. This could take a while. You go first.

Tag: Faith