It is difficult to pray for people with whom you want no contact - those who you might consider vile - those who you would rather sidestep and be with others - those who have the ability to suck the air out of a room. I suppose I may be that kind of person to some folks. Therefore, I realized it might be difficult for you to pray for me. Having said this, I must turn to our new President - Donald Trump.
I was listening to the song "Lost Boys" as I was driving yesterday. It is about someone who becomes one of Peter Pan's lost boys. Within that whimsical piece in mind, I thought of President Trump - a lost boy. In the midst of his wealth and bigger-than-life persona and bombastic defensive self, there is a lost boy. That is not bad. That is the reason for my prayers. I would say all of us are lost and attempting to make it through life in the midst of the world around us. We all do that differently. Sometime being lost enables people to become gentle, kind, and aware of the needs of others. Sometimes being lost helps people live with eyes wide open to any who may appear to be lost and those who definitely are quite lost. Most of that which I am referring to here has to do with feeling lost in the midst of the crowd. But today, I felt compelled to pray for President Trump because he appears to be lost within himself.
Just so I'm not dumped on too heavily here, let me make a note as to how I see this predicament and how I am drawn to comment on it. I try to understand the common confessional words that say, 'we have all sinned and fall short of the Glory of God.' That is so us. People falling for the temporary. People falling for the divisions of the world. People tripping over our privilege by not being able to see it. People so self-concerned we cannot be concerned about anyone but those in our own world. In other words - people falling short of what it is to live and breathe as the Beloved of God. For as we stumble and fall we, too easily put on armor we think will keep us save - preserve us - make us victorious soldiers in a brutal world. That armor - as much as we think it saves us and protects us - actually accentuates the degree of our lost and damaged lives.
It is painful to see people who have been crushed by the experience of being lost. Not only do they withdraw into the depths of being lost, they often experience being pushed more deeply into their lostness - by others. Little do those lost ones realize that those who are doing the pushing may be just as lost or even more lost. Being lost can be a brutal experience. It is brutal for those being pushed out to the fringe or out beyond the boundaries or simply down into the pit. It is also brutal for those who somehow sense that they must push others out because they themselves are lost and afraid of becoming more and more lost - isolated - powerless.
Then again, those who know what it is to be lost and left out and not sure how the day will go for them can also be the ones who become more vulnerable for the sake of others who they find to be lost. It is an act of solidarity. It is an act of healing. The lost who become vulnerable to others are healed of the temptation to crush others. The lost who are embraced by other lost ones begin to sense of light of worth being ignited within them. So, being lost may be seen as the beginning of the healing of the world. Thus the importance of self-examination and communities of truthfulness.
Unfortunately, it is my experience that when we are lost - we lose our ability to be creative. Rather, we merely attempt to create everything in our own image. Maybe we do this in the hope that we will not have to feel the pain of being lost. Maybe we let ourselves trust an illusion that says 'when the world in which I live is created my way - I will be safe'. At that point, we relinquish the gift of creativity that is ours from the creation story that is meant to instill in each of us an immutable character of worth. When we have to find or develop or make up our stories of worth - we are simply lost no matter how we make ourselves appear to the world. We become more deeply turned-in-on-ourselves. Therefore even as we appear to thrive and succeed we become more deeply possessed by our own image. Maybe that is part of what it is to suffer from a narcissistic personality (which infects all of us when we live as ones turned-in-on ourselves).
As the Trump children were walking out to the dais for the inauguration I could have wept. At the very end of the group was Barron Trump - by himself. A 10 year old boy, left behind - looking lost. At one point his older brother turned to him and seemed to tell him to stay back a few more feet. When one realizes what it is to be a lost person, that person will turn to others who are lost and pull them forward into the group. Oh how I wanted Barron to be pulled forward and embraced. It would have been a touching moment for all of us. And yet, when we are lost and do not realized that we are, we don't really know how to bend and bow and serve and take on the condition of the lostness of others.
Someone once told me always to try and picture the bastards and beasts and hard-hearted ones around us as a three or four-year-old child. What a vulnerable age. What a time in which it is so easy to be crushed and pushed down. What a time to feel and believe that we are lost. Maybe then, we will sacrifice ourselves for their well-being - their healing. To be able to see the innocence in the other may give us the ability to see how wounded and lost this child in front of us has become. Lost is the bright smile - the fun-loving spirit - the twinkle of hopefulness - the peace that passes all understanding -the eagerness to share - the thrill of what might be next - the hope for that which there is no present evidence at all.
President Trump is a lost boy. He may never be able to see it. He may never be able to name it. He may never know that there is any other kind of life. He may never be able to see a life of worth outside the one he has created for himself. He may never be able to stop trying to build an empire and settle for being a part of the beloved Community with all God's Beloved. For in that Community no one need be lost for we have been claimed and made whole - in the image of God's creativity that wraps us all within the blessed assurance of our worth.
It may be that this lost boy will continue to spiral downward into the self-consuming lifestyle that is treasured in so much of the world of power and might. I pray that he will instead be led by a vision of healing and wholeness that sees the worth of all others. That has to be part of my praying in the next years. That has to be the way I act to help this lost boy experience new life. Sometimes that may be through resistance and sometimes that may be with words of encouragement. That may be how this lost boy holds the hand of another lost boy.
TRRR
No comments:
Post a Comment