(Originally published at "A Year of Service" 8/22/17)
Grace is one of those concepts I've been exploring lately. Why would an atheist even care about that? Isn't it a religious term? Maybe, but I don't think it has to be.
Lately, I have been drawn to this concept as a way to frame experiences. It is part of a broader attempt to reconsider realities and experiences that are larger than facts. Love is one such experience. It cannot be subjected to scientific testing, but I doubt anyone who experiences love would say it isn't real or consequential. Like love, grace is abstract, not something to be proven or disproven. It exists, or doesn't, in the experience of the individual. If we accept that love or truth or community are concepts open to consideration by an atheist, why not grace?
So, what do I think grace is about? It's a tough call and I've had a hard time locking it down but when I find myself unexpectedly in a very meaningful situation that produces dramatic, positive, long-term changes in my life and psyche, my experience of that whole process feels like it could be called grace. One of the most important examples of this for me in the past few years was standing in the street at Shaw and Klemm, in front of Vonderitt's mother, as she cried over the loss of her son. I had no business being there. They are not my family, the shooting was not on my block. My motivations for going were vague. I could have seen her on television, as most St. Louisans did, but the effect would have been quite different. Experiencing her grief, not as an image on a screen, but in a community of strangers, all grieving, was heart-rending to me. The chain of events that followed, and to which I opened myself, is still playing out and it has carried me deeper into a love of us all and into a greater desire to find a just world.
What was positive about that experience? Obviously, not the death or grief. Vonderitt and his family paid a terrible price. It was a hideous and wasteful thing that happened. Rather, the key for me is that in the middle of that terribleness, I opened myself up and that act of opening allowed other things to follow. If that is grace, then grace is not easy. It does not arrive on the doorstep one day, gift wrapped as a happy cosmic surprise. Grace is a process that comes with struggle and pain. I've lost a lot of people I thought had been friends since that night in the street - people who couldn't go with me into the new places I was heading. Sleepless nights, worry, conversational struggles, deep self-questioning, all have been part of the process.
But through all of that communal pain and personal struggle, I found opportunities to uncover truths previously hidden from me. Opportunities for love, learning, gratitude, emerging from the absolute worst situations. I have found a more whole version of myself and I am deeply grateful for that. Maybe this reaching towards grace is our species' salvation - our choices, our work.
I do not think grace is inevitable. I opened myself up this time, but I witnessed so many others close themselves a little tighter. The opportunities for grace are fleeting and, if not seized immediately, they may slip away forever.
A man who attends my church passed away recently after a long illness. His memorial service at the church was attended by his male life partner of many years, our church family, and many non-religious members of the LGBTQ community. During the memorial service, a conservative brother of the deceased made a brutal anti-gay speech. Apparently, this was a continuation of years of abusive behavior directed at the deceased and his partner. The diatribe derailed the memorial, angering and demoralizing the entire audience. Many of the people present, both church members and general public, had previously experienced family and religious disinheritances around queer identities. This foolish man did a lot of damage and re-opened old wounds for many.
Sadly, he had already missed years of opportunities to experience the grace embodied by his gay brother. Perhaps the dark side of human relationships, our constant propensity to separate ourselves from others, is the opposite of grace. What if, instead of tormenting his relative for all those years, he could have seen in his brother the image of the marginalized Christ? What if instead of making his last months more difficult, he had responded to his brother's suffering in light of the suffering of Christ? How sad to claim to be a Christian and to have missed that Christ's suffering was the suffering of relationships, the exclusion from those he considered to be his people.
A moment of grace, or a lifetime of moments of grace, was missed. No matter how hard the work is, I hope I never let that happen to me.
Lately, I have been drawn to this concept as a way to frame experiences. It is part of a broader attempt to reconsider realities and experiences that are larger than facts. Love is one such experience. It cannot be subjected to scientific testing, but I doubt anyone who experiences love would say it isn't real or consequential. Like love, grace is abstract, not something to be proven or disproven. It exists, or doesn't, in the experience of the individual. If we accept that love or truth or community are concepts open to consideration by an atheist, why not grace?
So, what do I think grace is about? It's a tough call and I've had a hard time locking it down but when I find myself unexpectedly in a very meaningful situation that produces dramatic, positive, long-term changes in my life and psyche, my experience of that whole process feels like it could be called grace. One of the most important examples of this for me in the past few years was standing in the street at Shaw and Klemm, in front of Vonderitt's mother, as she cried over the loss of her son. I had no business being there. They are not my family, the shooting was not on my block. My motivations for going were vague. I could have seen her on television, as most St. Louisans did, but the effect would have been quite different. Experiencing her grief, not as an image on a screen, but in a community of strangers, all grieving, was heart-rending to me. The chain of events that followed, and to which I opened myself, is still playing out and it has carried me deeper into a love of us all and into a greater desire to find a just world.
What was positive about that experience? Obviously, not the death or grief. Vonderitt and his family paid a terrible price. It was a hideous and wasteful thing that happened. Rather, the key for me is that in the middle of that terribleness, I opened myself up and that act of opening allowed other things to follow. If that is grace, then grace is not easy. It does not arrive on the doorstep one day, gift wrapped as a happy cosmic surprise. Grace is a process that comes with struggle and pain. I've lost a lot of people I thought had been friends since that night in the street - people who couldn't go with me into the new places I was heading. Sleepless nights, worry, conversational struggles, deep self-questioning, all have been part of the process.
But through all of that communal pain and personal struggle, I found opportunities to uncover truths previously hidden from me. Opportunities for love, learning, gratitude, emerging from the absolute worst situations. I have found a more whole version of myself and I am deeply grateful for that. Maybe this reaching towards grace is our species' salvation - our choices, our work.
I do not think grace is inevitable. I opened myself up this time, but I witnessed so many others close themselves a little tighter. The opportunities for grace are fleeting and, if not seized immediately, they may slip away forever.
A man who attends my church passed away recently after a long illness. His memorial service at the church was attended by his male life partner of many years, our church family, and many non-religious members of the LGBTQ community. During the memorial service, a conservative brother of the deceased made a brutal anti-gay speech. Apparently, this was a continuation of years of abusive behavior directed at the deceased and his partner. The diatribe derailed the memorial, angering and demoralizing the entire audience. Many of the people present, both church members and general public, had previously experienced family and religious disinheritances around queer identities. This foolish man did a lot of damage and re-opened old wounds for many.
Sadly, he had already missed years of opportunities to experience the grace embodied by his gay brother. Perhaps the dark side of human relationships, our constant propensity to separate ourselves from others, is the opposite of grace. What if, instead of tormenting his relative for all those years, he could have seen in his brother the image of the marginalized Christ? What if instead of making his last months more difficult, he had responded to his brother's suffering in light of the suffering of Christ? How sad to claim to be a Christian and to have missed that Christ's suffering was the suffering of relationships, the exclusion from those he considered to be his people.
A moment of grace, or a lifetime of moments of grace, was missed. No matter how hard the work is, I hope I never let that happen to me.
