Faith and grief

 About two weeks ago, I started jotting down, mostly daily, notes about my day. I have kept a diary for forty odd years, but the accounts in my diaries just give a very brief report of what I did each day. My new notebook is different, as the things I write in it are primarily about my emotions and what has triggered positive or negative feelings. I started doing this on the basis that I wanted to look at the positive things that happened, as well as the sad things, to see if this would help me move forward. I have found that I do sometimes just splurge, but I have also found that venting my thoughts and feelings by writing them down can be helpful. I do wonder whether I would have started this notebook if we hadn’t been in lockdown, but it has been a constructive exercise.

Interestingly, in his sermon this week, our minister referred to the practice of Examen, a process of reflection to help us find God in the everyday. He pointed out that how we encounter God isn’t necessarily in the places or at the times we expect, in the holy places or sanctified moments, but in the mystery of the everyday. Examen is about the daily “rummaging for God” (I love that phrase!). Perhaps, this is what I have been trying to do in my jottings. I can see God in the sun, the spring flowers, the Easter cards I received, video and phone calls with family and friends, visits with my bubble. I also know that God is there when I am ambushed by my grief.

I don’t believe B’s death was willed by God, it’s just one of those things – we all have to die sometime. B himself said that he felt privileged to have had such a long and happy life. Yes, of course, it would have been good if he had had longer, but so be it. We knew that is was likely he would die before me, but that doesn’t help.

If I’m honest, I haven’t felt that my faith has been a help in my grieving, but neither has it been a hindrance. It is just there, a part of me. I know that God is love. I know that God is holding me, and I know B is with God but that doesn’t take away the great chasm, the void I am now facing. B is gone from me and I grieve.

Perhaps one thing, though, that I haven’t been taking from the practice of Examen is the looking forward to tomorrow. I’m not sure that this will be easy, but it is something I shall, or at least try to, do; asking God’s help to face the challenges to come.