Struggle

I am watching people I love struggle.
And it is really hard to find my role in it.

Yesterday I spent an hour with Lisa who has breast cancer.
I read Audrey's blog as she struggles with her place in the church as a gay ordained (and gifted!) minister. (www.audreythoughts.blogspot.com)
Kacey and Brett are still in a quandry about their future - whether to stay or move and where to move.
My friend Susan - like others I know - is dealing with issues of parent care.
And that is just a few.
And now I begin the weekly struggle with a text and what is the word for God's people for this week.

Joan Chittister wrote a wonderful book about struggle some years ago after September 11. It is Scarred by Struggle, Transformed by Hope. I know and have experienced some struggles which have defined who I am. And I am unabashedly a woman of hope.

Even yet, I know how easy it is to want to give answers to others as if there is an answer. And to try to superimpose order in the midst of the chaos that is part of the struggle.

And so I know (intellectually, of course) that my role is to be present and to listen and to pray and sometimes to cry. And to wait for their truth to emerge.
As I write this, it seems pretty clear.
But as I live it - it is its own struggle.

I think that when life is really lived - it is harder than we want to admit.
But it is also richer.