Broken Barriers

The last week has been very difficult. We have said goodbye to the expectations and joy that a new life brings. We have said goodbye to a seven-year-old boy who spent nearly four years bravely fighting a disease that stole his expectations but could not touch his joy. I’ve spent more time with my wife than anytime since our honeymoon. We have mourned our loss together and we’ve loved each other deeply. One observation I have made is that when tragic events occur, we know how to be a community. We long to be with each other and when something bad happens to one of us the normal barriers are broken down and we rush into community and compassion. We cry, laugh, hurt, heal, talk and sit in silence together. Community is our natural inclination but we allow everyday life to break down community and we slip into isolation and loneliness. But, as Henri Nouwen says, there is one thing that reminds us that we share a common humanity and that is death.

“How can death create unity instead of separation? Isn’t death the ultimate separation? It is, if we live by the norms of a competitive society always concerned with the question, Who is the strongest? But when we claim our divine childhood and learn to trust that we belonged to God before we were born and will belong to God after we have died, then we experience that all people on this planet are our brothers and sisters, and we are all making the journey together through birth and death to new life. We are not alone; beyond the differences that separate us, we share one common humanity and thus belong to each other. The mystery of life is that we discover this human togetherness not when we are powerful and strong, but when we are vulnerable and weak.” Henri Nouwen in Our Greatest Gift


Reading: Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison

Listening: What Sarah Said, Death Cab for Cutie