Green Blades Preaching Roundtable

Grief is not easy. While on the face of it, this may seem like an obvious statement, my experience in pastoral care has shown me that many people have a rather narrow definition of what grief is and how it appears in their lives. Grief is often associated for the months following the death of a loved one, but we grieve much smaller things than the loss of a life, and much larger things as well.

In our texts this week, we are given several accounts of deep grief from a variety of authors. Psalm 22 is one of the most profound laments in scripture, and the John text presents a prolonged, visceral account not just of Jesus’ bodily suffering, but the spiritual and emotional pain and trauma that comes with such violence.

Good Friday is similarly difficult. Church is often a place where we can count on hope’s presence, even in the darkest of times. Good Friday seems to be one of the few exceptions. Where pain and suffering are often overshadowed in the Church’s proclamation by God’s powerful hand of grace and comfort, Good Friday places pain and suffering front and center. There is no escape from the doom and gloom of the Good Friday story.

And that seems to be the point.

Grief is never easy, but when (not if) we come on hard times, grief is necessary. We cannot leap to the joy of resurrection before walking through the pain of death. Good Friday must come before Easter, like darkness before dawn.

So how, then, do we grieve for creation? Jesus himself is described in Isaiah as a tender shoot bursting through the dry ground, only to be torn up and used to keep the fires of empire burning. Similarly, as we watch God’s creation wither and die, burn and freeze, grief is a natural response.

I was born in 1995, so while I have seen incredible leaps forward in human innovation and technology, I have also seen the rapid acceleration of climate change. More than that, I have seen those who control the levers of power across the world be noncommittal and outright hostile, to actions which would reverse course on the damage we have done. I have seen governments prioritize corporate profit over the world my generation will is inheriting. I have watched as the natural world I reveled in as a child slip further and further away. Essentially, hope for the planet has never been especially present for me, and I am not alone. Climate doom is more prevalent than ever, and more and more people are submitting to despair and leaving any shred of hope behind.

As I’ve attended climate change conferences and EcoFaith summits, I have heard a great deal of commentary on how to combat climate doom. As I sit with this Good Friday text, however, I wonder if pushing against climate doom is the right course in the first place. This is not a particularly hopeful message, but Good Friday is not a particularly hopeful day. Hope is necessary in this ongoing fight, I would not deny that. The reality of climate change is grim, though, and I wonder if we’ve spent enough time with the grief of it all.

When I ran a grief group on the East Side of Saint Paul, a common refrain was, “You can do this on your terms, or on grief’s terms, and grief’s terms are a whole lot less pleasant.”  When we avoid grief, push it down and turn immediately to hope, grief only rears its ugly head later, and in a much worse fashion. When we focus solely on hope as a balm to climate doom, we do that very same thing. We jump to the joy of Easter without taking the time to live in the pain of Good Friday. When Jesus is still in the tomb, hope can feel disingenuous and can push grief into despair.

This Good Friday, take the time to live in the pain of this beloved Earth creation suffering on the cross of human power and exploitation. Face the reality of this existential threat to our world, frightening though it is. Grieve and mourn right alongside Mary and the disciples.

Beating back the worst effects of climate change will not happen overnight. This is a battle, not of months or years, but of decades. To do this, we need, not a momentary reprieve, but a hope that sustains. Hope in the face of something like climate change comes not through feel-good articles or denial of the real harm being done. Hope that can stand up to a problem this big is found in wading through the waters of grief toward the other side of grief. The renewing, revitalizing, enduring hope we have as Easter people cannot be had without the scandal, suffering, and hardship of Good Friday.

So, grieve. Live in the uncertainty and the dread. Walk this difficult path so that when (not if) the Easter of our world comes to fruition we can stand together on the solid rock of God’s enduring hope.

Amen.