"I'm here for you in whatever capacity you need me"
"God is on your side"
"God didn't want this to happen to you, and neither did I"
"The devil is a monstrous evil, and with God's help we're going to find some way to get out of this mess he caused"
"I cannot feel exactly what you are feeling, but I have some idea, and I'm here to do my best to feel your pain with you"
"Nobody else can truly know how you feel, but God does. God is here, now feeling it with you. You may feel alone, but you are not, not even in this terrible pain."
(Silence)
"Why did this happen? Sometimes there is no why. Sometimes bad things happen and God doesn't have anything to do with it, at all. But God, and I, will do all we can to help you face this evil and make it into something good."
Thank you for stating what should not be said to the suffering. Your list is spot on. I've wanted to deck a few people for saying those same phrases to me in times of trouble. I must confess though that many of the phrases you recommend elicit a similar desire to slap the speaker. Silence is the one notable exception.
ReplyDelete"God is on you side" is probably the worst. Whatever help is that? As one who's been in pain and trouble, unless you are bringing a solution or a balm you are not helping. Stand all the friends and family around the bed but it is still the wretch on the gurney who must live through the suffering. The rest are interested spectators. They get to go home when visiting hours are over.
When I was a kid, I realized that no matter what else is said or done, you alone must live through whatever is happening. You are on your own regardless of who is standing around. There is no comfort in shared suffering. Only in removing suffering or trouble is there any real help. Why would I wish to pass my misery on to another? That only increases the evil and pain in the world, it does not lessen it.
Therefore I find no benefit in shared suffering. Nor do I see the point in claiming God is sharing the suffering. What good is that to me or to anyone?
All I can say, is that the worst part of suffering for me is the loneliness I've felt from it. Knowing I'm not alone in it has helped. The simplest proof that this is a common human experience is that support groups work. People finding people who know what they are going through find healing through that. But I maintain that the only person who REALLY knows what any of us is going through is God. Something similar happens with individuals like Albert Schweitzer or Gandhi. Gandhi gained legitimacy among his people by living like one of them, despite his privileged background. People respond to people, can only really, truly be led at all by people, who know their plight, who live as one of them.
ReplyDeleteI can tell you, too, that this list is not only my own. It comes from 10 years of working with people and discerning what religious responses actually seemed to mean anything to them or help them in any given situation. People are individuals, and each person has to be approached as an individual. It is stupid to talk about God at all, for instance, to an atheist, when suffering. But having asked people later on what, if any, religious responses actually gave them any comfort or help, these are the ones I have found mattered with any consistency.
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