Curious by nature, seeing myself as a constant “seeker”, I follow many Christian website. This week, “A Sanctified Art” is asking the question “Where Does It Hurt?”
The unmarked graves of the 215 indigenous children forced into the Government and Church sanctioned Residential School System (read systemic racism) has brought to light a well known “dirty little secret”. We, as a people who profess to follow Jesus, are now blinded by the light of an undeniable truth which has been dismissed and denied for far too long.
Our Scriptures have many stories of both personal and shared community pain, to name just a few:
Genesis 11:30 – Sarah’s inability to conceive
1 Samuel 1:1-18 - Hannah’s pain
Mark 5:21-43 - The healing of a hemorrhaging woman and Jarius’ daughter
John 9 – the story of a man blind from birth
The question “Where Does It Hurt?” implies that all of us have known pain and suffering. From the words of Rev. Brittany Fiscus-van Rossum, a contributor to A Sanctified Art, writes:
“In order to cultivate connection, we must first get curious about the pain others carry and the pain we carry ourselves. Before we can act, we must first acknowledge and believe the pain is real, for bearing witness to each other’s pain helps us cultivate compassion”.
In Genesis 11, Sarah’s disappointment and sadness result in her hand maid Hagar conceiving a child, Ishmael, with Abraham.
In 1 Samuel, Hannah’s pain is ignored, diminished, and mocked. Yet, Hannah vulnerably and courageously bears all of herself before God, which transforms Eli’s perspective. She finds release by being fully seen and known by God.
In John 9 the miracle of healing the man born blind and destined for a life of pity and begging.
Mark 5 -In the dual healing story of the hemorrhaging woman and Jairus’ daughter, we acknowledge those who suffer chronically and in isolation.
“By telling these stories, we hope to bear witness to the particular and very common struggles faced through out our history,” Fiscus-van Rossum continues. “Additionally, we must confess the harm done in neglecting the emotional, physical, individual, historical, and systemic wounds that exist among us”.
I truly hope that the events of this past week, the countless videos of communities offering shoes and boots and toys in memory of these innocents, the drumming and singing of men and women who have carried this pain from generation to generation will not be in vain.
Shared hereunder is the prayer our UCC Moderator, Richard Bott, offered on Sunday:
O God, we are grieving. O God, we are shocked. O God, we are horrified.
But, God, if we truly listened, we can’t be surprised.
The Elders and the Communities had already told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, told the governments and the world, the stories of the children, dead and buried, unnoted by the settler systems,
but never ever forgotten by their siblings, their parents, their communities.
We grieve for the Indigenous children, taken from their homes and parents by the government, handed over to the responsibility of the Christian church, the children who died under its care, never to be held by their families, never to be returned to their communities –
Not only the 215 children of the Tk'emlups te Secwepemc and other Indigenous communities along the west coast and interior whose bodies have now been found on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School grounds, but all of those children whose bodies have not yet been found, who died in any of Indian Residential Schools.
We grieve for the survivors of the Indian Residential Schools, the children who did come home, but were changed by their experience, the children who grew up, and have the trauma of remembering, again, what happened to them.
Even as we give thanks for their families and communities who hold the stories of the children, who have kept searching, who keep searching, we grieve that that search is even necessary, that even one child was taken, that even one child died, that even one child’s death went unnoted by the system.
Help us to stop, to sit in silence, to remember the names we do not know.
May their spirits have peace, and their bodies be brought home to their lands.
And God? help us to take this grief, this shock, this horror, and turn it into right action – action that works for right relations – action that works for healing and justice and hope.
And, please, don’t let those of us who are settlers and descendants of settlers, newcomers to this land, let the horror, the shock, and the grief, just be an outpouring of words, or tears, or ineffectual hand-wringing.
Let this be a moment that changes, a moment that transforms the brokenness, that we might walk in right relations, for the good of your children, for the good of your world.
Please, God. These things we pray, in the name of the one who brought Creation into being, in the name of Jesus, our teacher and friend, in the name of the Holy Spirit,
whose wings spread across the sky.
Amen and amen.
Pastor Beryl DLM