July 20, 2024

We all know the expression, hurt people hurt people, but do we ever think about how this pattern of pain gets interrupted?  The escape artists, tender of soul and overwhelmed with the grief of trauma, spend their lives in comfortable hideaways that keep them at a safe distance from those who have done them harm, hoping that their wounds will magically disappear.  The self-help gurus say that we just need to finally make up our minds to establish a good boundary with the transgressor and let our “no mean no,” then they spend the rest of their lives anxiously holding the line.  The mystics, unsurprisingly, offer us a middle way: between that island of safety and the impenetrable wall of contempt, there is a tiny window of vulnerability, through which the actions of others are desperately trying to speak.  Indeed, the hurt they give is an awkward attempt at communion which only a listening ear and interpreting heart can identify and transform.  Lord Jesus, teach me to befriend the other at the place where it hurts the most, trusting that by my attentiveness to another person’s wounds mine will be healed.  Ave Crux, Spes Unica.