I've also had an awful lot of doubt and anger towards God over the past few years... a long story which can be summed up in roughly these words: "If you're there and you're good, why the FUCK did you make the world as it is? Why do good and innocent people suffer? Why does everyone die? Whatever plan you had in mind for making us into better creatures, why not just make us good to begin with? You have all the time and all the power there is, and THIS is the best world you could come up with? And if this whole Jesus thing is true: Who the hell asked you to come suffer and die? We want you to STOP suffering and death, not join us in experiencing them! Drowning people don't need you to jump into the water and start drowning with them, they need you to get them the fuck OUT of the water! Or better still, don't fucking throw them into the water to begin with! How can omniscience be such a dumb-ass? How can ultimate Good be such a bastard?"
So, basically, my prayers often sound like half the Psalms. Or the book of Job, or Ecclesiastes, or several of the prophets, or Christ's haunting cry "My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?" I figure if the people who were closest to God can say those things to God right there in the Bible without being smitten by lightning - if even God says that to God, on the cross - that must mean that God's a big boy and He can take it. Or, if He's not okay with us complaining about His creating a world where we suffer and we don't understand why, then He deserves all the verbal abuse I can throw at Him. So either way, I'll go on praying like that when I need to.
I still believe, mind you. Not sure exactly WHAT I believe these days, but I still believe, and I still pray, and go to church, and do my poor best to follow Christ... and that still seems to meet a need which nothing else can.
Now, as the parent of a toddler, I know that they need to know what to expect in advance, and therefore I told her a couple days ago "We'll be going to church a lot this week." She asked "Why?", of course, so I told her, "Well, this week we celebrate Easter. We celebrate because Jesus did something very special." Naturally she asked "What?", so I jumped into the part of the story I hadn't actually thought about how to explain to her. I said "He died and came back to life! No one had ever done that before!" She said "I'm not EVER gonna die!" I then made another jump without thinking first about where things might go from there and said "Well, everyone does eventually. But Jesus came back to tell us that it's gonna be okay."
She seemed to take it in and then moved on to talking about her day, asking for music, and other normal stuff.
Then tonight, at the Maundy Thursday mass, she was asking a lot about what was going on. My wife told her we were remembering that Jesus had a meal with His friends, and He was sad because He knew He was going to be hurt and lonely. My toddler then asked "Is He gonna DIE?" My wife was blind-sided a bit by that, but soldiered on and said "Yes, but He came back alive afterwards". The kid then asked why all the candles were being taken off the altar, and my wife explained it this way: "Well, we use that table to remember the table where Jesus ate with His friends. All the bread and cups and candles are being taken away to show that Jesus went away for a while". The little one was a bit upset, saying "I don't WANT the candles to be taken away!", but seemed to handle it pretty well.
During the ride home, there were more questions:
"Why did Jesus die?" [parents try to explain that he said things some strong people did not like]
"What did he say?" [parents stammer about being nice to people and giving our things to help them even if we don't like them or we think they're gross.]
"I won't be nice to people I don't like. I won't do what Jesus said."
[parents empathize, ruefully... then talk about how she already has done some of the things Jesus said, like taking care of small people who can't protect themselves, and being kind to people even when she was angry at them - and Jesus was right, things work better when we do that]
"Where did Jesus go?"
"What does come alive mean?"
"I don't like sad parts, can we have Easter now instead?"
and finally:
"...I don't want to die."
Damn.
Now she's hit the part that NO one knows how to answer.
I deflected by saying, "Well, you're not going to for a very long time." When she's older she can be angry about living in a world where death happens; for now, she's three and she needs reassurance that she's safe and okay. She seemed to take that.
When we got home and got her into her bath, she thoughtfully said, "Sometimes, sad things happen". Not a sad tone, just in the tone of someone processing and accepting a reality.
And then, I finally knew what to say, both for her and for me:
"Y'know, Jesus talked about how sad things happen, but sad and scary things can be turned into good things. Like in your book about the caterpillar becoming a butterfly - remember the caterpillar was scared and sad about going into the cocoon, but then came out more alive than ever? And how happy she was to be a butterfly? That's kind of like what Jesus was talking about."
And then she visibly cheered up, and went on to tell stories about her Thomas the Train toys.
We already know all about bad news - we see it around us every day. We see abused children grow up to abuse children. We see bad people hurt and destroy good people. We see monsters turn people, vampire-fashion, into monsters like themselves. We see people get old, and sick, and weak, and their brains deteriorate, their SELVES deteriorate. We see them die. We know our turn is coming, and we know there's not a damn thing we can do to stop it. And part of parenting is to try and somehow prepare kids to become adults who can cope with that, without despair.
We know about the bad news. We need some Good News.
And that's the power of the Gospel. That's why I'm still a Christian, despite my vast misgivings. That's why I still think Christianity has something worthwhile to say to humanity. It's because we all know damn well that sad, and scary, and just fucking WRONG things happen, to everyone; and we need to believe that those things can, in some way too deep for us to understand, be harnessed and transformed for good. We need to believe that there's something more to the story after "Life sucks then you die" - that suffering and death can be redemptive, that there is a reason for them, and that whatever the reason is, it was so important that God chose to endure them too.
We don't know why. Maybe the reason is that nothing and no one can grow up without suffering. Look at the maturity level of spoiled rich kids who grow up getting everything they want and are miserable, vs. the maturity level of kids who grow up having to deal with hard things and make it work. Maybe we all suffer and die because that's what will force us all to grow up. Maybe God Himself had to grow up, and Calvary was His coming of age. But despite our finite brains' inability to grasp the answers to the infinite questions (or even, perhaps, grasp the real questions), the Gospel gives us a place to begin, a hint that there IS Good News to follow the bad, and that the bad not only isn't as powerful as the good but is even compelled to bring about good despite itself.
If it be so, then so be it.
©
John M. Munzer
