Reflection: Seeing the bigger picture

I do the same kinds of things every day at Kalighat: help serve meals and chai tea, massage the women, assist Susan with wound care, help with laundry, or just sit with the women. This day I walked back toward the back of the women's ward to say hello to the aforementioned Bed 29 woman. Today she was different: she wasn't chanting or chatting unintelligibly or rocking or laughing. She was on her side rolled up into a ball, weeping. Instead of ignoring her, which I considered doing and sometimes do with some of the women, I walked over and touched her on the shoulder. She continued wailing. I sat her upright; she was still clutching her knees to her tiny little chest. I rubbed her back a little; she continued her cries. I couldn't ask her what was wrong because we spoke different languages. Her eyes were filled with big, heavy tears. Was she scared? Did she feel alone? Was she in pain? But I couldn't ask, I couldn't know, I couldn't fix her. Here's the interesting thing: I didn't want to try and fix her. And that's my nature: got a problem, let's fix it. At that moment I just wanted . . . to be sad with her. So I wrapped my arms around her, cradled her head on my shoulder and just hugged her. As I stroked her hair and her back, I began to cry too. Not for the injustice of poverty, not for the loneliness of abandonment, not for the ugliness of the streets, not for the pain of disease. I cried because I was just sad, simply walking through the raw emotion along side this little bit of a poor woman. Her heart was hurting, and I was just plain sad.

Maybe Jesus is like this. His heart is hurting because our hearts are hurting. He's sad because Bed 29 is sad, or because I am sad. "You don't see the big picture, Denise," I can hear Him say. "You don't see what's on the other side of this issue, and you can't imagine how much I love you. Sit with me and let me just hold you."

In Henri Nouwen's book The Return of the Prodigal Son, the author describes his reaction to the Rembrandt painting of the same name. The painting depicting the biblical story of The Prodigal Son captures him, it transfixes him. He sees that "the tender embrace of father and son expressed everything (he) desired at that moment. Now I desired only to rest safely in a place where I could feel a sense of belonging, a place where I could feel at home." Nouwen goes on to say that "coming home meant, for me, walking step by step toward the One who awaits me with open arms and wants to hold me in an eternal embrace . . . had I, myself, really ever dared to step into the center, kneel down and let myself be held by a forgiving God?"

I have never really dared to step into that center. I'm in control, you see, and I can work things out. If it is to be, it is up to me, as the saying goes. I want to "keep some control over my journey, to remain able to predict at least part of the outcome . . . that relinquishing the security of observer with control" for the vulnerability and unknown of a broken, powerless prodigal son seems close to impossible for me.

But things are quite clearly not in my control. Calcutta throws that in my face every day, every hour, as if to mock the image I fancy of myself. And when I see that I want to be that "son" who dares to let God hold him and love him, I don't know how.

I feel as if sometimes I just need a good smack across the face or a swift kick in the ass. "Wake up!" Jesus should say. That's what I deserve for being so stubborn, such a rotten lazy person sometimes. Why doesn't God just compel me to believe? Why doesn't he just overwhelm me and force me to listen and follow? Look at those words: smack, kick, compel, force. The description of the father in the Prodigal Son story uses very different words: open arms, moved with pity, rest, home.

I'm still trying to understand this idea: the embrace of a loving Father who is sad with me, who wants to give me rest at "home." By this exchange today the concept begins to have meaning for me.

FYI, Bed 29 eventually calmed down. She smiled, whispered something unintelligible in my ear, and moments later began rocking back and forth chatting away.