Community Grief

Early one morning this week, in the midst of some casual exchanges among a few friends in a small group text, dear Jessica suddenly dropped this: “Since we are awake and communicating, can I ask you to pray for me? Tomorrow is my brother’s 2^nd birthday in heaven, so to speak. I am sitting in my kitchen weeping.”

And of course, the sisters stopped to pray. By text. (This is the new world we live in.) JoAnne (a widow well-versed in grief) typed an eloquent plea to our Father for peace and comfort, which we all Amen’d. We committed to pray for our dear friend and her family this week. 

And Maureen said, “Thank you for inviting us into your grief.”

Those words hung with me for the rest of the morning.

Thank you. Thank you for inviting us into your grief, for trusting us with your heart. Thank you for pulling us into your sadness so we can carry it with you. It is an honor and a privilege and a blessing. Really – it is.

A recent episode of The Chosen reminded me that in New Testament times, Jews hired mourners when a family member died. They were paid to wail and cry because wailing and crying is expected when death happens and is something of an offering in such a time. The practice seemed a bit bizarre to me as I watched it on the screen . . . I suspect it was one of those things the Pharisees came up with and magnified out of proportion. But the basic principle behind it is solid, I think. Families are not supposed to suffer alone in the passing of a loved one. We have funerals. We take meals. We publish obituaries in the local newspaper. Grief is a community thing.

I’ve written before about how difficult it can be when you’re suffering long-term emotional pain to share that with others. You feel like a burden, a useless weight on the world. Part of the struggle is feeling unworthy of anyone’s effort. Some of us feel that way all the time, sadly, but even more so when the ground we’re standing on suddenly caves in beneath us -- I mean, nobody deserves to be dragged down in tandem just because they were kind enough to stop to help.

But Maureen’s sentiment was on target. I’m grateful that our friend opened up to us. I value the opportunity to be the hands and feet (and comforting arms and ready shoulder) of Christ in someone’s life. I’m also grateful to have the reassurance that I’m not the only one grieving . . . still grieving . . . always grieving something at some level, it seems . . .

Grief is a regular part of life because loss is a regular part of life. We lose people, jobs, homes, opportunities, familiarities . . . heck, I had to throw out a favorite pair of shoes a while back and it was hard. I’ve experienced a whole lot of heavy losses in the last few years (so many that I was a bit stunned when I started to list them and decided to spare you the recitation). There are seasons like that, full of tremendous loss. And this is why I am grateful for my friend sharing her pain with me. I need role models for how to grieve, and then I need to role model for others how to grieve. I need to carry people’s sadness just as others helped me carry mine. Grief is a community thing.

Because life is a community thing. From the birthing room to the death bed, from the mountaintops to the pits of despair. A solitary existence is an incomplete one. Our lives are a gift we share with others so that all lives are whole.

Thank you, sister, for making me more whole.