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July 2009 The Road to Daybreak A Spiritual Journey by Henri J M Nouwen |
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Continue from ...... Feeling the Pain My dear friend Rose just called from Oakland, California, to tell me that her son John died yesterday morning at 9.30am. Her voice was full of pain and desolation. "It is so hard, so hard, so hard to keep believing in the midst of all this," she said. "I feel more lost and in anguish than when Dan (her husband) died." I heard her cries, her deep feeling of aloneness, her desperation. But she also spoke words of consolation: "Oh, Henri, the people of the hospice were so good, loving, and caring. Many are gay or lesbian, and few are part of any church or believe in God, but their love for Johnny was so beautiful, so deep, so generous. Many give up their jobs just to be with their dying brothers and sisters ... Johnny has been loved to the end ... I just want you to know." Her words were like drops of hope in a sea of despair, inklings of gratitude in the midst of an overwhelming feeling of loss, flashes of light in a deep darkness. I said, "Johnny loved you so much and he told me how much your love for him meant to him. Hold on to that. Your pain is deep because you suffered that long journey toward death with him. You and he were so open with each other. You didn't hide anything from each other. You saw and felt his struggle and he saw and felt yours ... It will be hard for you ... very hard ... but I know your love is strong and beautiful. I didn't know John very well, but a few years ago when I was in San Francisco, Rose introduced me to him and we spent some time together. John told me about his homosexuality and his life in the San Francisco gay community. He did not try to defend his way of living or apologize for it. I remember his great compassion for the people he spoke about, but also his critical remarks about snobbism and capitalism in the San Francisco gay community. He himself was extremely generous. He gave much of his time, money, and energy to people in need and asked very little for himself. Seldom have I known anyone who was so eager to have me understand and learn. He was so non-judgemental, self-possessed, and honesty that I came to think of him as an example of a just man. Last February, Rose called me in Cambridge to tell me that John was very sick with AIDS. I immediately flew to San Francisco and spent a day with Rose at her home and with John and his friend Mike in the hospital. John asked me to read the Twenty-third Psalm with him. It was the psalm he remembered, the psalm his father had prayed with him. It was a psalm that gave him peace. We prayed the words together several times: there is nothing I shall want. Fresh and green are the pastures where he gives me repose. Near restful waters he leads me to revive my drooping spirit. | |
- To Be Continued - © Copyright Shalom 2009. All rights reserved. | |