Dear friends,
During this season of Advent, I’ve been thinking a lot about “hope.” What is hope anyway? What does it look like? What color is it?
I posed this question to a group of folks and received this response.
What is hope? The past few weeks have been very difficult for me. Just as my MS has caused my legs to be nonfunctional, it is also threatening to do the same with my large intestine. Without “too much information” let me just say that I have been in a lot of pain and have had to go into the hospital to be “cleaned out” twice. For some reason, this inside pain also seems to mess with my mind. I find it hard to concentrate on other activities, and frankly I’m learning about hope through its scarcity. That’s not all that bad. Sometimes the best way to appreciate something is to notice it when it’s gone (didn’t Joni Mitchell sing a song “don’t it always go to show? You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone).
For me, Hope is directing our thoughts to a future more attuned to the will of God. A funny thing happened while I was typing the last sentence. a few hours ago, when I was feeling especially blue, I called a friend that I haven’t talked to for over a year. Although I knew she was a nurse,I had forgotten that she had worked for years with a gastroenterologist. She just called back, and listened to my symptoms and my recent problems, and offered some great suggestions for how to proceed. It’s a funny thing: my pain is still there, but it no longer is dictating my future….
I had a dream the other night that gave me hope. good friends and family, both living and dead surrounded me. I was laying back on a large blue blanket and they were all holding the edge of the blanket. They told me to lean back and let them carry me.
hope is a pregnant woman with new life growing inside of her.
Hope is a flower bulb buried in frozen soil beneath the snow silent and still, yet waiting and ready
Hope is Jesus Christ who unfailingly and unflinchingly and unconditionally keeps on loving us.
What is hope to you? [dt]
3 Comments
It is important to discern feelings of hopelessness from depression which must be discerned from disability fatique (DF).
DF is normal and occurs because there are no breaks from disability,and all that entails (medical, logistical, relational, access, attitudes of others,
etc.) It is tiring and depleting and we’re entitled to time out to feel bad, acknowledge the hurt, grief, etc., and then to nurture ourselves in some life-giving
way so we can
return to life as it is.
The recurring cycle of grief also has to be acknowledged. We grieve whenever there is a change in our condition for loss of ability–real, perceived or
hoped for;
loss of work, dreams, hopes, plans, etc. If we recognize and honor each loss,
we will soon recognize grief and move through it as part of our lives. Likewise, depression is a common experience of living with disability. Unacknowledged
it can lead to hopelessness. If we dialogue with depression, it will tell us what it wants and aid us in our spiritual
journey.
Like you, I have found that God uses me as I am, not as I might have hoped or planned. I am always humbled by those experiences where people say they were
touched by my simply doing what I do as a priest–as I am. God has spoken through my disability more often than not. I’m sure everyone of us has experienced
God using our “weaknesses” in ways that power cannot and will not witness to God.
Christmas reminds us that God came to earth as a vulnerable baby, in a lowly manager, born to parents without power or riches. Jesus power to heal came
not from worldly power but from a life grounded in God and prayer, and a willingness to endure suffering and betrayal, while also forgiving and repeatedly
letting go of anger, hurt, temptation, and judging others. He also demonstrated that new life follows crucifixion and death. Therein lies our deepest
hope and perhaps our greatest gift to others.
Each of us has most likely experienced many crucifixions in living with disability. Yet we rise each day and witness to others God’s presence, strength
and grace as we live and work with disability or illness. We’ll never know all the people who saw or heard God Incarnate in us teaching them how to face
life and go forward. Thanks be to God for God’s gift of grace enabling each of us to love and serve God as we are, in the image of God.
Hope is believing that I, who am not disabled, can make a difference for my children, who are.
Hope is believing that my children will become self-reliant, grow confident, and be able to get along in society however that manifests itself for them.
Hope is believing that someday I will be called to serve a church again, and that my children will be welcomed with open arms by that church.
Hope is believing that someday I can share my faith in God with my children and they will understand what I am talking about even if they don’t agree with me.
Hope is believing that Jesus meant it when he said that children are the kingdom of heaven because my children will probably always be children no matter what age they reach.
Hope is not letting depression get in the way of doing what needs to be done.
Hope is many things to parents of special needs children. Most of all, we hope our children grow up.
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