The Big Why

I'm up on vacation and the local grocery chain is named "Big Y". Funny how my mind works sometimes, but it struck me that I've spent a lot of time in my life wondering about big "why's". I'm certain you have as well. Seems to me that our whole lives are wrapped up in a search for meaning - why I am here, what am I to do with my life, what legacy do I leave behind, etc. The word "why" plays a key role in our search for meaning and thus our search for wholeness.

The word why can also lead one down a rabbit hole of questioning without answers and that often results in more brokenness rather than healing and wholeness. My wife had a good friend who was murdered in a foreign land exactly one year ago today. All of the close friends and family have spent the last year wondering why. The local police have charged a person with the crime and he is in jail, but the why's continue. It appears that those questions will never be adequately answered - no closure will come from repeated questioning. So my wife and her friends are left adrift, each in their own grief, each with their unanswered questions, each at a loss as to how to move forward.

This is not a unique situation. I've seen it hundreds of times in my work in the intensive care unit. Major illness, injury and significant diagnoses bring with them questions - often questions of why (especially "why me?"). The word why becomes all encompassing and people can not find their way out of the morass of needing to know. They go further down and down and find themselves slaves to "why" instead of dealing with the issues at hand and living in the moment.

Mystics (persons with an ongoing relationship with God) show us the way beyond why. People like Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Thomas Merton, and many others re-cast the big questions of life, and do not ask why. They know that life is not ruled by questions and answers - and that for some questions, there are no answers. Thus they develop a relationship with unknowing - the ability to hold the tension of wanting to know with trusting that all shall be well (in the words of Julian of Norwich). Holding that tension allows one to move forward in a situation that has no ready answers. It allows one to find the healing that is waiting - it is forward movement that "why" doesn't alow.

For your healing this week, discover the writings of one of the mystics. Spend time with the wisdom of trust and faith. Set yourself free from the tyranny of "why" and from needing to know. You will discover a peace beyond all understanding.

Peace and grace,
Dan