“All that is holding us together [is] stories and compassion.”
-Anne Lamott quoting Barry Lopez, Stitches, 23
This last month has been dark for a myriad of reasons. Holding on to hope sometimes feels like trying to hang tight to a fraying rope in a monsoon. Compassion—those moments that remind me that I am not alone—will always be the act that keeps me holding on. When I talk with my wife or get a phone call from a family member or a hug from someone I run into in town, it’s a needed reminder that this too shall pass.
The inverse is also true. When you are in a troubled time and you feel alone then it seems like you will be falling in the abyss forever. Which is tough because none of us can experience that reassuring compassion all the time. Loved ones can’t check on you constantly; they work, they have lives. Friends may not know what to say. Thank God, then, for stories which are the other thing that I have found to have held me together these last few weeks.
When I was a kid, Superman comics were a refuge for me. I didn’t really fit in at school. I had friends, but there was a pervasive sense of unbelonging. It’s that not too uncommon adolescent feeling that you don’t matter. Yet when I journeyed to Metropolis via my local comic book store, I was transported to a world where good always triumphed over evil. A place where the most powerful individual was also the most humble and kind. It was a world in which the every person and even a cat up a tree mattered. I wanted that world to be true. I still want that world to be true.
When one needs to, they can find refuge in all sorts of stories. You can venture to a world that is a little better for a little while. I know in this last month plus, I have found relief in everything from novels like The City We Became and The House on the Cerulean Sea to TV shows like The Mandalorian and Ted Lasso to those continuing Superman comics that were a lifeline to me when I was younger. They are worlds where things are still dark, but people come together, try their best, and something good happens.
The stories that hold us together don’t even have to be ones that transport us to another world; it’s probably better when they’re rooted here. The flesh and blood testimonies around us can speak to a better world just underneath the surface ready to break through.
When I went to one of the rallies at the state capitol after Covenant school shooting, I was in a sea of living stories. Children and teenagers chanting, holding signs, and giving public witness to a world where there’s less of a chance that a place of learning be shattered by violence. I find hope in the prophetic witness of people like the Tennessee Three, who speak out even when they are silenced. I find hope in stories of people acting in compassion for those who are in need.
And I find hope in the beautiful collision of story and compassion that we remember this day.
Before we went to an outdoor Stations of the Cross, one of my sons asked me why we find Good Friday so important. He understood why we celebrated the resurrection on Sunday, but why the violent death of Jesus? I thought for a moment as gray morning light shined in the room. I looked at my son who in the last month has lost a church. He had a friend in that school who was physically unharmed, but is going through hurt that my son knows but can’t fully imagine. He has lost some innocence about how the world works. He wants things to go back to normal and is learning that hard lesson we all do that normal is a fleeting thing.
We remember today for many reasons. Yet what I told my son is that we remember that Jesus experienced the worst that this life can throw at a person. He experienced all the pain and broke him body and heart. And even though we want to rush past the horror of this day, we need to linger here for a bit because we can’t rush past the pain in our own lives. Jesus, God with Us, experienced the utter darkness and so we remember this day in part to remember that God is with us in the darkest times. When stories and compassion are barely holding us together, we are still not alone. God is with us.
(One of the Stations later that morning brought up a similar point. I pointed it out and my son was simultaneously annoyed and impressed. I’m sure having a dad who is in the ministry is both a blessing and a pain; I know that all too well recently.)
It is going to sound incredibly hokey, but I think Jesus is what still holds me together at the end of the day. When I truly sit down and reflect on his life that radiates love, grace, and compassion, it gives me hope. And maybe that’s why I am still hanging on to a fraying rope in a monsoon. Despite the hurt, despite the ways this world can breathe violence, despite the ways in which we seem to be stuck in an endless cycle of the same tragedies again and again and again, Jesus is here with us pointing to a better way. Laying down his very life as an expression of God’s great love for us. And he asks us to do the same. To sacrifice, to be with each other, to love, to do justice, to get our hands dirty, to stand with those who need others by their side, to be a light in the utter darkness.
Sunday is coming I know. I am beyond grateful for the promise that it brings. Yet right now, I am truly thankful for this Friday; the life-giving story and compassion of God with us in the mess.