Social Pain: Quick Fixes

An absolutely agonizing letter raises the importance of…. Tylenol? Well, yes.

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Book of Otter: The Purpose Of Pain

“Why,” asked the Raven, “did God make us to suffer, to ache, long, and to go hungry as orphans while we watch our siblings eat bread?”

 The Otter whittled a piece of grass into nothing and said, “So we should learn to love beauty when we see it, and to make us friends with death when the time comes.”

 The Raven smiled, and said, “Idiot,” and poured the tea.

On Creativity and Narcissism

A close friend and reader tells me this: 

I hate it that you have to be in so much pain to be so creative.

Like a lot of creative people, I can be a tremendous narcissist.

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"The Unbelieving Husband" and the Christian Wife

A RipChurch reader writes about a long-time source of frustration, living as a theist with an atheist husband and children.  This much is published with permission.

From the Mailbag:

I am constantly told that theism is for the brainless.  I’m called stupid even by my own children.   I don’t want to stop believing but I can’t argue with them.  I cry every day and don’t feel even loved a little.  When I get ready for church I feel sick and small.  I have mild OCD and this is so bad for my episodes.   Please help me: I hate to live with atheists anymore, but I can’t really go anywhere else.  I feel under attack from the devil and I don’t know where to turn.  The Bible says not to divorce an unbelieving spouse.  [1 Corinthians 7:10-16]

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Recommended Reading: Suffering and Chaplaincy

My friend Rachel, ace marathon runner, culinary wizard, sometime-professor of Old Testament, and Hebraicist, introduced me to this excellent blog post by Kerry Eagan.  If you’ve ever felt sick to your stomach when people spiritualize your suffering, check this out.

Money Quote That Pays The Bill And Elevates The Post Above Ordinary Intertwaddle:

And if you were to ask me the same question - What do people who are sick and dying talk about with the chaplain?  – I, without hesitation or uncertainty, would give you the same answer. Mostly, they talk about their families: about their mothers and fathers, their sons and daughters.

They talk about the love they felt, and the love they gave.  Often they talk about love they did not receive, or the love they did not know how to offer, the love they withheld, or maybe never felt for the ones they should have loved unconditionally.

They talk about how they learned what love is, and what it is not.    And sometimes, when they are actively dying, fluid gurgling in their throats, they reach their hands out to things I cannot see and they call out to their parents:  Mama, Daddy, Mother…

This crucible of love is where we start to ask those big spiritual questions, and ultimately where they end.

As Bad As A Hospital Sometimes...

During much of my mother’s illness the neighbors have run drills and saws to renovate their pool-deck. Progress does not respect suffering.

— Riparian Church (@RiparianChurch) January 12, 2012

Suffering and The Book of Job

A REFLECTION:

I should like to meet the person who originally suggested that the Book of Job is good reading for those who suffer.

I should like to tie a rock around his neck and drop him in the nearest pond and then fish him out so I can dance on his grave.

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Suffering With Cancer

"It seems that the mind and the body do not part company easily, that to calm the raging of the flesh stills also the lightening strikes of the mind that make up the self..."

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C'mon, Irene....

John Fugelsang at Twitter tweets, "I'm waiting for Pat Robertson to say that Hurricane Irene hitting Va Beach is God's punishment for Pat Robertson."

Pat Robertson on Haiti; Pat Robertson on New Orleans.

Uncle's Advice

My Georgia pine-woods doctor-uncle to his sister the cancer patient:

"Lie down, take it easy, put your feet up, say 'damn' if you have to."