I read this article today (David Brooks, New York Times) and appreciated the wisdom about 'being present' in the the suffering of others. It is very appropriate for diaconal ministry and 'being with' those who endure suffering and hard times. Tragedy
has twice visited the Woodiwiss family. In 2008, Anna Woodiwiss, then
27, was working for a service organization in Afghanistan. On April 1,
she went horseback riding and was thrown, dying from her injuries. In
2013, her younger sister Catherine, then 26, was biking to work from her
home in Washington. She was hit by a car and her face was severely
smashed up. She has endured and will continue to endure a series of
operations. For a time, she breathed and ate through a tube, unable to
speak. The recovery is slow.
The victims of trauma,
she writes in a remarkable blog post for Sojourners,
experience days “when you feel like a quivering, cowardly shell of
yourself, when despair yawns as a terrible chasm, when fear paralyzes
any chance for pleasure. This is just a fight that has to be won, over
and over and over again.”
Her
mother, Mary, talks about the deep organic grief that a parent feels
when they have lost one child and seen another badly injured, a pain
felt in bones and fiber.
But
suffering is a teacher. And, among other things, the Woodiwisses drew a
few lessons, which at least apply to their own experience, about how
those of us outside the zone of trauma might better communicate with
those inside the zone. There are no uniformly right responses, but their
collective wisdom, some of it contained in Catherine’s Sojourners
piece, is quite useful:
Do be there.
Some people think that those who experience trauma need space to sort
things through. Assume the opposite. Most people need presence. The
Woodiwisses say they were awed after each tragedy by the number of
people, many of whom had been mere acquaintances, who showed up and
offered love, from across the nation and the continents. They were also
disoriented by a number of close friends who simply weren’t there, who
were afraid or too busy.
Anna
and Catherine’s father, Ashley, says he could detect no pattern to help
predict who would step up and provide the ministry of presence and who
would fumble. Neither age, experience nor personal belief correlated
with sensitivity and love.
Don’t compare, ever.
Don’t say, “I understand what it’s like to lose a child. My dog died,
and that was hard, too.” Even if the comparison seems more germane,
don’t make it. Each trauma should be respected in its uniqueness. Each
story should be heard attentively as its own thing. “From the inside,”
Catherine writes, comparisons “sting as clueless, careless, or just
plain false.”
Do bring soup.
The non-verbal expressions of love are as healing as eloquence. When
Mary was living with Catherine during her recovery, some young friend
noticed she didn’t have a bathmat. He went to Target and got a bathmat.
Mary says she will never forget that.
Do not say “you’ll get over it.”
“There is no such thing as ‘getting over it,’ ” Catherine writes, “A
major disruption leaves a new normal in its wake. There is no ‘back to
the old me.’ ”
Do be a builder.
The Woodiwisses distinguish between firefighters and builders.
Firefighters drop everything and arrive at the moment of crisis.
Builders are there for years and years, walking alongside as the victims
live out in the world. Very few people are capable of performing both
roles.
Don’t say it’s all for the best or try to make sense out of what has happened.
Catherine and her parents speak with astonishing gentleness and quiet
thoughtfulness, but it’s pretty obvious that these tragedies have
stripped away their tolerance for pretense and unrooted optimism.
Ashley
also warned against those who would overinterpret, and try to make
sense of the inexplicable. Even devout Christians, as the Woodiwisses
are, should worry about taking theology beyond its limits. Theology is a
grounding in ultimate hope, not a formula book to explain away each
individual event.
I’d
say that what these experiences call for is a sort of passive activism.
We have a tendency, especially in an achievement-oriented culture, to
want to solve problems and repair brokenness — to propose, plan, fix,
interpret, explain and solve. But what seems to be needed here is the
art of presence — to perform tasks without trying to control or alter
the elemental situation. Allow nature to take its course. Grant the
sufferers the dignity of their own process. Let them define meaning. Sit
simply through moments of pain and uncomfortable darkness. Be
practical, mundane, simple and direct.
Ashley
and Mary went to Afghanistan a few months after Anna’s death. They
remember that as a time out of time. They wept together with Afghan
villagers and felt touched by grace. “That period changed me and opened
my imagination,” Ashley recalls. “This thing called presence and love is
more available than I had thought. It is more ready to be let loose
than I ever imagined.”
