Benediction: Inviting Mourning

Well.  It has been quite a year this last month. 

When I began Lent this year I thought that I was going to practice a Lenten discipline of mourning.  I suspected I needed it because when I talked about the possibility my voice caught and cracked and I had to gulp to finish my sentence.

There's been a lot to mourn lately.  The world and the World are in terrible shape.  Even before the reality of COVID-19 hit us, I've had a lot of losses this last year and now we are in the process of selling our house and leaving our current community.  I have particularly been mourning the reality of leaving our church family, a group of people I love dearly.

But I didn't practice mourning, at least not in any tangible, meaningful way, and it has caught up with me. My eyes start to leak at odd times and places.  I welcome the fact that I can't go out into the world.  I'm not depressed.  I've been depressed and I know what that looks and feels like.  But I am sad and I need to mourn.

Mourning is discouraged in our culture.  We are encouraged to wear yellow and pink to funerals, to celebrate the life of the departed.  Poems are read that tell us not to be sad because the deceased are so much better off now.  We're told we have to remember that things are only going to get better. 

But we NEED to mourn.  We need to acknowledge loss and pain, we need to learn from them and we need to remember that they are part of what motivates us to grow, to change when appropriate.  Mourning and grief are natural consequences of loving.  We only mourn what we have loved and lost.  And when we DON'T mourn it builds up inside of us.  It can certainly become depression.  I believe it can make us physically ill.  I know it tries to self-medicate in all kinds of unhealthy ways.  Sometimes it leaks out in tears or explodes in emotion that looks like anger to those on the receiving end. 

The worst is when religious people tell you that mourning is a lack of faith.  Listen, when his friend Lazarus died Jesus wept.  If it wasn't a sign of a lack of faith in Jesus, it surely isn't a lack of faith for you!

In these days of uncertainty and discouragement, I know it's tempting and perhaps even necessary to distract ourselves, to watch comedies and bake yummy things and play games.  No judgement.  But don't feel like you have to be happy.  Let yourself feel sadness.  Let yourself mourn.  Read some of the psalms of lament.  They will speak for you and will not leave you in a pit of despair.  Listen to Beethoven  it will knock your feet out from underneath you and then pick you up and set you firmly on the ground.  (I can never remember, is Ode to Joy in the 8th Symphony?  That'll do it for you!).  Watch a movie that you know will make you cry but will leave you feeling filled at the end.  Places in the Heart and What Dreams May Come always do that for me. 

Finally, talk with someone who will honor your mourning and who will not leave you there indefinitely.  Someone who loves you enough to ask if you might need professional help; medication, therapy, or both.  It's okay.