May 7: Did God Will That, Trying to Make Sense, Answered Prayers

[Ives r]emembered how Robert [his son], coming home in tears after John F. Kennedy was assassinated, had asked him, "Did God will that?"

Ives struggles with the question of God's will through most of Mr. Ives' Christmas.  So much senseless tragedy befalls him.  Ives doesn't understand why his good son, straight-A student and future priest, is gunned down in the street while his son's murderer is eventually released from prison and starts a family.  Ives can't make sense out of a senseless act, even though he spends years trying to do just that.  He wants a glimpse of God's master plan, if it exists.

I think Ives' dilemma is the dilemma of most thinking Christians.  When faced with immense tragedy (on a personal or global level), how do you continue to believe in God's goodness?  In a world full of tragedies (terrorist acts, tsunamis, earthquakes, wars), where does God fit in?  Why does God allow terrible things to happen?

Today is the one year anniversary of my brother's death.  Needless to say, I've been a little melancholy.  At lunch, I stopped in the medical facility my sister used to supervise.  One of my best friends works there, and I was hoping for a little spiritual uplift.  The employees were cleaning my sister's office out.  Boxing up her belongings.  Sifting through the detritus of an over 20-year career.  It didn't improve my frame of mind.

I don't presume to understand why my brother died or why my sister got sick.  Certainly, the last year or so of my brother's life was not easy.  Crushing headaches.  Constant pain.  As a stroke survivor, he faced challenges every day.  Before my sister's illness, she was under tremendous stress at work.  She was never able to just relax and be happy.

With a year's perspective, I understand that my brother was suffering, and, in some place in my heart, I know that he's in a much better place now.  Whole.  Joyful.  At peace.  That doesn't make the pain of his absence any easier.  From the day my brother had his stroke, I prayed every day for his healing.  As Truman Capote noted, though, "More prayers are shed over answered prayers than unanswered ones."

I pray all the time for my sister now.  For her healing.  It frightens me sometimes to think what form that healing will take.  She's going to be having surgery in Ann Arbor at the end of May.  Then she will have many more months of recovery in the nursing home.  There is going to be no easy solution to my sister's health woes.  Jesus isn't going to show up at her bedside, touch her, and say, "Rise and go to McDonald's."

So, like Ives, I'm a little unmoored tonight.  Sad.  Confused.  But, that's what faith is all about if you're a true believer.  In the face of sadness and confusion, I have to trust in God.  That may sound naive or just plain stupid.  However, trust is the foundation of hope.

And hope is what Saint Marty needs on this day.

Missing you, brother