Internal Bleeding

We live in sad times.

Sometimes, an event unfolds that stops me in my tracks—suspending the sun’s movement for a moment, gripping my heart, sucking the very breath from my lungs. Sometimes, a headline fills me up with the dread of sorrow, the breathlessness of grief, the pain of tragedy. Sometimes, I am overcome with the injustice and incomprehension of this world’s never-ending insanity, paralyzed with the sheer enormity of the loss. On Tuesday - that “sometimes” turned into “today”. Again. In the midst of a news-docket already peppered with war and disease and prejudice and discord, Uvalde burst through the dark fabric of the day, and I was in that place, that dark night of the soul. My prayer at that moment was simply, “Again? Dear God, again?” [2]

It’s tragic when you lose track of the number of violent acts occurring on American soil, never mind those that occur with regularity around the globe.

Yesterday, the New York Times published a tribute - a short, but very personal tribute - to each and every child and adult murdered in Uvalde. Names, birthdays, hobbies, passions, beside a picture of each young life wiped out. I wept as I forced myself to read each one, my heart breaking for the lives lost, the families shattered, the tallying up of yet one more violent act in the unending fabric of violence that makes up the reality of American society. I had to force myself to read these because the pain was hard, sharp, deep, and also because in my own small way, I wanted to be present to the pain of their loss, paying my respects to 19 children and 2 adults, Americans who were yet another group of victims to violence.

During the day, I processed. I meditated and thought about those who died; I prayed for the children and their families. I pondered their lives, and the families and community tragically impacted by these overwhelmingly sad deaths. The NYT article was poignant and moving, though I realized, that in some measure, the article was intended to convey a message from its editors - what newspaper or media outlet doesn’t use news to further its stance on public affairs? But then a thought occurred, unbidden: “Where are the tributes to all the other children lost to violence, to child abuse and neglect? Where are the memorials offered up to the countless men and women who have also been the victims of violence, who have suffered at the hands of spouse, parent, friend?” It was then I realized that Uvalde was - so sadly - simply another notch on our society’s “belt of violence”. One more unbearably tragic slaughter in a deep history of violence in this country.

Of course, Uvalde has reignited the debate over gun control, and we are subjected - once again - to the vicious and exhausting tirades between those who seek greater gun control, and those who worship at the feet of the Second Amendment. And in that dark miasma of words, we forget: we forget that the seed of violence isn’t a gun: the root of violence isn’t a bullet or a trigger. It’s so much deeper than that.

As I looked at the photos of 8, 9 and 10 year old children - the ages of my grandchildren, I mourned not just for them, but for a society that was so focused and self-obsessed with its rights and freedom, it has failed to see how its very brokenness has birthed the violence now raging in our schools, our churches, our streets.

I wish I had an answer, but frankly even if I did, who would listen? We are a society marked by opinions instead of compassion, with a sense of entitlement to freedom instead of responsibility for the other. We don’t talk, we shout. We don’t listen, we pontificate. We go to church, but we really don’t care what happens outside the walls of that church, or outside the confines of our homes. We isolate and count ourselves blessed, while ignoring the victims bleeding in our streets.

This world is bleeding from the inside, an internal bleeding that is slowly draining away our life-force. Sadly, violence is nothing new but that doesn’t mean it must exist, that there is no other way to interact, to exist, to solve our problems. There is another way, but we just don’t want to unclench our fists long enough to grab onto it. We are too afraid to take the chance, too afraid to put down our fists and blades and guns long enough to figure out if the alternative way of peace and love just might work.

Jesus preached on peace and love 2000 years ago to a culture that was struggling with its own violence, prejudice and injustice. And even after 2000+ years, we still don’t get it. We talk of peace and love and mercy, but don’t know how to live that way. We keep our hands fisted tight, our hearts closed blind, and our minds filled with the detritus of work and technology and play. We are excellent at distraction, and horribly inept at dealing with the pain that leads to aggression and violence. We convince ourselves that it is a problem “out there”, when all along, the problem is in our own hearts and minds - we just refuse to see it or believe it. In many ways, we are all equally broken.

How to change things? I’m not sure how, but I have some thoughts:

So long as we refuse to acknowledge the complexities of violence in our midst, it will not go away.

So long as we refuse to look beneath the bleeding and the tears, it will not go away.

So long as we close our hearts off from the pain and woundedness of all those around us, it will not go away.

So long as we fail to staunch the wound, the bleeding will kill us all, from within.

I have no quick answers, but I can be present to the pain of others, and love those around me as best I can. I can pray my way through my pain, through their pain. I can enter into the shared tragedy in prayer and presence. It’s what I can do now, today.

And doing something small today is better than doing nothing at all.

[1] This blog title is taken from a public image on the internet; an internet search revealed no poet credited with the words, and it is not my poem.

[2] For those who read this blog regularly, you know I’ve already titled a blog post “When Headlines Bring Weeping” several weeks ago. It’s hard to think I’m here. Again.