Tag Archives: lament

Daily Riches: Screening Out Those Who Suffer (Daniel Hill, Brenda Salter McNeil, Soong-Chan Rah & James Baldwin)

Posted on by under Embracing Losses and Limits, Emotions and Spirituality, Insiders and Outsiders, Loving Listening, Nationalism and Patriotism, The Poor and Disenfranchised, truth and illusion

“There are so many ways of being despicable that it quite makes one’s head spin. But the way to be really despicable is to be contemptuous of other people’s pain.” James Baldwin

“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” J. Baldwin

“Lament in the Bible is a liturgical response to the reality of suffering and engages God in the context of pain and trouble. . . . [In his book, Soong-Chan Rah] contended that the modern American church has over-elevated praise, which he called triumphalistic. Churches that are triumphalistic . . . elevate stories of success, gravitate toward narratives of exceptionalism . . . , emphasize problem solving, and are marked by a can-do attitude backed by a belief that human effort and positive thinking can conquer the big problems we face. Though there are some redemptive themes in the triumphalistic approach, its dark side is its inability to grasp lament. . . . American culture tends to hide the stories of guilt and shame and seeks to elevate stories of success . . . which results in amnesia about a tainted history. The reality of a shameful history undermines the narrative of exceptionalism, so it must remain hidden. . . . Suffering, tragedy, oppression, and pain are everyday realities for most of the earth’s citizens, and an inability to cry out and grasp for the presence of God in the midst of that suffering is a recipe for hollow spirituality. . . . Without a theology to support lament, we become paralyzed in the search for balance [between praise and lament] and often turn back to the triumphalist narrative as a crutch. . . . We’re conditioned to celebrate those who experience success and triumph while screening out the message of those who suffer. We too often become ‘one who sings songs to a heavy heart’ (Proverbs 25:20). We’ve been groomed to search for quick and easy answers to complex problems, and we rarely have the ability to appreciate the act of crying out to God in brokenness and pain.” Daniel Hill (discussing Soong-Chan Rah’s book Prophetic Lament)

Moving From Head to Heart

*Imagine how it feels to have your voice screened out when you’re hurting. . . . perhaps at your own church. . . . in the very country where you live.

*Did you ever imagine during worship, that you might be increasing the pain of others by “singing songs to a heavy heart?”

*Can you allow your history books, family stories, and local/denominational church histories to give an honest account of your nation’s story? Is part of you refusing to grieve that story?

O Lord, teach me to weep with those who weep.

For More: White Awake by Daniel Hill and Brenda Salter McNeil

Thanks for reading my blog! Please extend my reach by reposting on your social media platforms. If you like these topics and this approach, you’ll like my book Wisdom From the Margins.

Daily Riches: ‘Please Don’t Mention the Dysfunction’ (Walter Brueggemann)

Posted on by under Emotions and Spirituality, Social Justice

“The second loss caused by the absence of lament is the stifling of the question of theodicy …the capacity to raise and legitimate questions of justice in terms of social goods, social access, and social power. …It is now noticed and voiced that life is not as it was promised to be. The utterance of this awareness is an exceedingly dangerous moment at the throne. It is as dangerous as Lech Walesa or Rosa Parks asserting with their bodies that the system has broken down and will no longer be honored. For the managers of the system – political, economic, religious, moral – there is always a hope that the troubled folks will not notice the dysfunction or that a tolerance of a certain degree of dysfunction can be accepted as normal and necessary, even if unpleasant. Lament occurs when the dysfunction reaches an unacceptable level, when the injustice is intolerable and change is insisted upon. …The lament/complaint can then go in two different directions. …the complaint can be addressed to God against neighbor [or] addressed to God against God. …the issue is justice. …the petitioner accepts no guilt or responsibility for the dysfunction but holds the other party responsible. …The claims and rights of the speaker are asserted to God in the face of a system that does not deliver … with the passionate conviction that it can, must, and will be changed. …When the lament form is censured, justice questions cannot be asked and eventually become invisible and illegitimate. …A community of faith that negates laments soon concludes that the hard issues of justice are improper questions to pose at the throne, because the throne seems to be only a place of praise. I believe it thus follows that if justice questions are improper questions at the throne … they soon appear to be improper questions in public places, in schools, in hospitals, with the government, and eventually even in the courts. Justice questions disappear into civility and docility. The order of the day comes to seem absolute, beyond question, and we are left with only grim obedience and eventually despair.” Walter Brueggemann

“ justice is perverted”
Habakkuk 1:4

Moving From Head to Heart

  • Do you believe “the system has broken down?”
  • Are justice issues “improper … at the throne?”
  • Have you settled for “civility and docility?”
  • Do you believe things “can, must, and will be changed?”

More: The Psalms, Patrick Miller, editor

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”