We Who Mourn

"I don't know why a good man will fall
While a wicked one stands
And our lives blow about
Like flags on the land"
 - Flags, by Brooke Fraser

A week after visiting a friend whose aunt is dying, I read an email from my sister telling me that my aunt and cousin had died. Car accident. One of them age 62, one age 8. I was between meetings at Casa Gabriel and sat down to check my email for a minute. I started crying immediately. One of the boys who had been joking around with me a minute ago came and put his arms around me. When I told him what had happened, he whispered against my hair, "Lo siento, lo siento, tranquilo."

You always remember where you were when you receive some terrible news, and how it hits in a way you could never fully expect.

The staff told me to skip the meeting and go home so I could call my family. I did, talking to my sister and my Dad. The facts would slowly come to light that the driver who had hit the car my aunt had been driving at 90 mph in the wrong lane in an attempt to commit suicide. Witnessnes had called in to report the eratic driving and a police officer was in pursuit. He simply didn't get there in time before the man smashed into my aunt's car, spun, and smashed into it again, sending both vehicles up in flames. The man responsible was able to be pulled from the car and recover in a hospital. My aunt and counsin died instantly.

It was a senseless act, selfish through and through. When I found that charges were not yet being pressed and the man had been released, I felt incredulous. I felt outrage. Intentionally speeding, a danger to himself and the cause of death of two others? Such a person needed to be locked up! Such a person needed help!

Help. Yes. Because why else would someone do something so horrible? How much pain must that man have been in, to have been so utterly blind to the consequences of his actions?

The day of the funeral, I wore a black wristband and a white dress. Loss and light. My immediate family had all traveled several hours for the funeral, but when it had to be delayed because of the police investigation, all my brothers had to leave because of work. I felt as though there were some triagle invisibly connecting us all: my family at the funeral, my siblings who couldn't be there, and myself over 2,600 miles away.

 I could go into detail about the dreams my Grandma and another aunt had about funerals, the night before the deaths, or how my aunt and her eight-year-old granddaughter had been on their way to drive my Grandma to a doctor's appointment, and especially how the three of them spent a good deal of time together, my little cousin having a great love for her grandma and great-grandma. I could talk about the loss which is especially awful for the cousin who lost both her daughter and mother in one moment, and the husband who lost his wife and granddaughter. So many people grieving in so many ways. Yet I must go back to the man who caused this grief and say this: I forgive you.

You, driver, who hurt so many lives; I must forgive you. It's not okay. It's not even close. Yet in the midst of pain and anger and wanting justice, I have to think that you must have been going through some kind of hell to lead you to do what you did. A kind of hell that is continuing to scorch you, now that two lives are on your concious. I want you off the streets, I want you to pay for what you did, yet I absolutely do not want you to take your life. I want you to live and know grace. I want you to know mercy. I want you to someday meet my aunt and cousin in heaven, and for them to smile and welcome you. I want you to know Jesus while here on earth so you can tell others, "He forgives even me, even me and what I did."

I'm innately designed to desire something good to come from something terrible. Beauty from ashes. I want this man's story to turn around and be something bold and good. I want the same for my family members who were closest to those who died. I want healing. I want restoration. You can say, "If wishes were fishes we'd all have nets!" laughing or shaking your head at my wants and desires. I think there should be a saying like that but for prayers, such as, "Though prayers have errors let's still have faith."  Would that work?

We all do and say things which hurt other people. "Brilliant fools who wound and kiss", as a Gungor lyric goes. Some things are more momentous than others. At least to our human scale of measurement. There's nothing alright about it, nothing to shrug off and ignore. I never want to do that. Yet I want to realize that in the driver's selfish, terrible act, there must surely be a catalog of pain which preceeded it. It's not an excuse. There's no way to make any of it lighter or better. All I know to do is try, try, try, to understand and forgive. To hold out mercy and not a lashing. I'd rather seek restoration than justice. I believe in hell just as much as I believe in heaven, and while it is comforting to think of my family members surrounded by glory, I also think of the horror of the driver going to hell, and would never wish that. "He who is without blame, cast the first stone," Jesus said. Though prayers have errors I chose to have faith. For the driver, same as for myself and anyone I love, I ask for grace.

"I don't know why the innocents fall
While the monsters still stand
And our lives blow about
Like flags on the land

You who mourn will be comforted
You who hunger will hunger no more
All the last shall be first
Of this I am sure
You who weep now will laugh again
All you lonely, be lonely no more
Yes, the last will be first
Of this I'm sure
I don't know why the innocents fall
While the monsters stand
I don't know why the little ones thirst
But I know the last shall be first
I know the last shall be first
I know the last shall be first"