Can We Pause

What I’ve written is a personal remix of Chuck DeGroat’s words in a blog.

Oh dear child of God, can you hold two things at once?

Are you even expected to do so?

Will you bear the weight of unshaped grief . . .

the kind that holds cultural complexity,

refusing to demonize your tribe but not the other

but also refuses to ignore the pain of the other?

Could you pause long enough to weep

for anyone lost to gun violence,

without bringing up a party to blame,

for all the ones whose names

you’ll never know

in nearby neighborhoods and over there lands,

torn apart by war?

Can you remember a tragedy

from fifty years ago,

its ache still lingering in the body of communities of color,

while weeping over the relentless violence

that arrives new each day -

names scrolling across screens,

names never mentioned,

faces broadcasted for pointed anger and

those who hardly ever get that treatment,

fresh wounds layered on the old ones?

Can you honor the death

of someone else’s lionized hero,

even if they were never yours?

Oh dear little child,

won’t you ache for immigrants

separated from families and futures

without closing yourself off to those

who cannot see their God given humanity?

Can you let grief be like the wind

to resist being forced into a single story,

willing enough to lean into empathy

even when others question its legitimacy online?

Can you be present

without numbing yourself with cynicism

or hardening your heart in blame?

Oh dear little one,

choose love and curiosity,

even when it hurts,

even when it would be easier

to turn away.

For this is holy work -

the slow, soul work of

mourning and maturation

in a broken world:

to hold many evils at once,

past and present,

and still keep your heart open.