Acknowledge the Grief - Even Once We Rejoice Again
They sang responsively, praising and giving thanks to the Lord, “For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever toward Israel.” And all the people responded with a great shout when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. Ezra 3:11
The scene is Jerusalem. The exiles have returned from Babylon after seventy long years of captivity. They stand in the rubble of the temple, demolished those long years ago. It is time to rebuild.
This month’s writer of Forward Day by Day has been remembering Hurricane Katrina. And today’s lesson calls to my own mind a photo from the aftermath. It was of a church, or where a church used to be. Not even rubble, really. The place had been erased by the storm. All that remained was the footprint.
So somebody set up a table. Somebody brought a cup and a plate. Somebody scrounged some candles. Under the open sky, they were ready to offer the sacrifice of the Holy Eucharist. They would rebuild and begin again.
On the day that the builders laid the foundations for the new temple in Jerusalem, the priests sang the psalm above. Then all the people shouted, most of them for joy. The very oldest among them shouted their grief. They remembered what they had lost.
I imagine that joy and grief mingled on the grounds of that church, the first Sunday after Katrina.
For us, we are still watching what is precious coming down. Later, we will rejoice as we rebuild. People in the U.S. are not good at the grieving part. We prefer to leave it behind. I wonder how much of the mess we are in today is on account of grief not acknowledged. Over and over, grief ignored, substituting anger and resentment.
Maybe let’s take a beat to acknowledge our own grief, and the grief of the other.