Refugees......

Refugees....

Welcome the alien and stranger among you.....

I have been awake since the early hours with a heavy heart at Australia's current response to refugees... it is inhumane, lacking in compassion and dignity and down right wrong....

How can I respond.  I have already written to the Prime Minister... I follow the Centre for Asylum Seekers Facebook page and keep up with the information...

However, I've been thinking this morning that I need to turn off my 'like' to that page - and to other feeds that come from people opposing our extreme right wing government - because the knowledge of these issues cause me such grief and anxiety...

I know the knowledge can lead me to pray and call out to God, which I was and have been doing this morning - but other times I feel like I have enough anxiety and grief to carry in my own life and those of my friends that world issues seem too hard..

To find a way to be informed and compassionate - without carrying the load?????

It is so hard for me to do...

Oh that there will be a rising up from ordinary Australians to cry out for compassion for these people fleeing war and terror and torture, in no small way caused by wars we have been involved in or started....

My spirit groans within me....

Grief

This week has been another week when I have been experiencing real and profound grief....

What do you do with the ache in your heart and body, that is just with you day and night?

What do you do with the hopeless thoughts that come?

What do you do with the tears, and wracking sobs... that don't seem to stop forever?

What do you do, when life still goes on around you, and the washing, the showering, the teeth, the food, and the driving still needs to be done?

What do you do when connection is so very essential... and people offer the ocnnection they can, which is gratefully received... and some balm... and the ache remains as you walk away....

How do you explain to the doctor the grief that sounds like it is 'such a ittle thing'?... when for you it isn't?

How do you cope when there is grief upon grief ... and then others you know nothing about... yet... but your body knows?

How do you sit with the essential existential loneliness of that grief - and not become burdened by others' grief over the same loss?

Why do you sit in the counsellor's room and talk simply and unemotionally about how the week has been - like your mouth is cut off from your heart?

Is it true that movement towards acceptance of the loss is possible?  Is it true that movement itself is possible?

People leave, and others can't take their place - and it is just a reminder in my body of all the abandoments of forever.....

What to do when no amount of care is enough.... and the energy to do the things that could bring life... like swimming... is so lacking?

Sleep evades... heart aches.... composure is contained....

Saying hello

Be still and know that I am God...

 God is God of my church which is in turmoil...
 He/she is God of my pastor, who may be sacked this weekend....
 She/he is God of me... whose support structures are all in flux just now.....

 I was just sitting here thinking on these things and realised that often letting go comes before saying hello...
 There are many things that I seem to be 'losing' all at once...
 Especially in terms of the structures of my supports because of changes in these people's lives...

 The challenge is to 'let go'.....  and have open hands to 'say hello' to whatever new things may be out there for me... without being overcome by the anxiety, loneliness and grief that is part of the process....

 We get used to things being 'as they have been'
 It hurts when they change....
 ..... like when they took the comfy chairs out of the op shop cafe where I used to hang out more...
 .....like when I had conflict with one of my 4 best friends...
 ..... like when a significant support person lost her son, and may lose her job....
 ..... like when another significant support person may lose his job - and for both of these that means much more limited access to them on a 'drop-in for 5 minutes' basis...

 It hasn't happened yet  ... and as a wise friend said to me yesterday... it isn't my decision...

 Be still and Know that I am God!