Yesterday morning, I sat in the second pew from the front of the sanctuary, near the aisle, where I normally sit. Except, once again, I sat down with the keen awareness that while I was doing what is “normal” for me to do on a Sunday morning, countless people were waking up to a new normal- the new normal of a life that has been devastated by gun-violence.
As worship started, the choir sang the opening song of “Come and fill our hearts with Your Peace”- a taize worship song. As they sang, I began to quietly weep. I wept with sadness, with heartbreak, and with anger.
The truth is, I have prayed for peace for as long as I can remember, and for as long as I can remember, I have continued to hear stories on the news of people killing people. We have been at war for most of, if not all of, my lifetime. And now, with a rise in hateful, racist, discriminatory rhetoric coming from our “leader”, it seems that division and violence are condoned.
My sister was born with developmental and physical limitations- and throughout her life, she has been diagnosed with a variety of mental illnesses. I have seen first hand what mental illness looks like when it is un-medicated, mis-medicated, or wrongly diagnosed. I have experienced first hand how dangerous of a partnership anger and mental illness can be, and I can only imagine how different my life would be if my sister, at any point in her life, had been given access to a gun.
Now, before folks get all bent out of shape- let me clarify some things. I am NOT saying that all people with mental-illness are violent, and I am not saying that all people who own guns kill people. What I am saying, is this: in our country, we have a mental health problem, and we have a gun problem. And based on the statistics I have seen, we are seeing the consequences of our choices to not deal with either.
My sister, thanks be to God, has had advocates, care-givers, state-funded systems, and loving family behind her for her whole life. She has been nurtured and cared for in ways that many in her situation aren’t, and I am keenly aware that if it weren’t for the ways my parents have worked to take care of and protect her, it is likely that my sister would be over-medicated, locked away somewhere, and could have done immeasurable harm to herself or others.
Mental illness can be brutal, and it can make the most outrageous lie seem like a valid, Gospel truth. It can send sweet, passive people into unrecognizable rages. And mental illness thrives in silence…it thrives on the shame that is created when a diagnosis disrupts our idea of “perfection” and “normalcy”…and it thrives on the isolation that comes from people feeling cast aside by a culture that values success over balance, money over happiness, and competition over contentment.
The truth is, I don’t have an answer to all of this- but just as my sister has struggled with her own mental illness on top of her development disabilities, I have struggled. I have struggled with PTSD, anxiety, and depression for the better part of 18 years, and in so many ways, I have lived with that silently. Why? Shame, silence, perfection. ( I could write a whole different blog about toxic masculinity on this issue….)
I am clear that my struggles with mental illness are minor in the face of so many others, but when I think to my worst days, when my illness had firm grip on my mind, and my sense of reality, I am so grateful that I did not have a gun- because honestly, there have been moments in my life where had I had a gun, I would have used it.
Those words are painful for me to type- and painful for me to admit- and I am sure they are shocking and painful to read. But I have to name it.
I am not a violent person, and I love others deeply- but there were days when I believed the lies that my illness was telling me, and days when I couldn’t recognize the good in myself, let alone the good in the world.
Thankfully, my story gets to be different. My story doesn’t end in tragedy because I had resources to mental health support and experts, because I had people in my life who saw me and wouldn’t let me be isolated or cast out, and because I had access to health care, my story gets to be different.
Our world has stigmatized mental-illness in dangerous and toxic ways, and at the same time, it continues to glorify killing, hate, white-nationalism, sexism, division and prejudice. We need to confront this reality, and then, we need to do something about it.
Guns on their own are not the problem, I know plenty of responsible gun owners. Mental illness on it’s own is not the problem. I know countless people who are living full, peace-filled, lives as they navigate life with mental illness. But the rising number of shootings, and the rising number of lives lost…. those numbers are telling us that we have a mental illness problem, and a gun problem- and that both of them need to be addressed- separately and together.
I pray for God to come and fill our hearts with God’s peace- we are in desperate need of it. But I also pray for need policy change, because we need that, too. We also need to end the stigma around mental-illness, we need to speak out against rhetoric of hate, rhetoric of racism and sexism. We need to speak up for each other, to remember that we belong to one another, and that life is precious and fragile.
Together we can help each other live well with mental-illness, together, we can help put an end to gun-violence….but, we have to do it together.
If you want to get involved in ending gun-violence, or are looking for ways to take action, I encourage you to visit Presbyterian Peace Fellowship to find ways you can get involved. If you want to have a conversation with someone who is doing this work in real ways, I will introduce you to Rev. Deanna Hollas, my friend who was just ordained specifically to work in the area of Gun Violence Prevention. And please know, while these resources are specifically Presbyterian, you don’t need to be Presbyterian to use them 😉
If you need mental health resources, I encourage you to visit SAMHSA, or reach out to someone you trust to help you. And if you are reading this in the midst of your own struggle, know that you are not alone, you are loved, and the world needs you here. If you need a safe space, I will be one, or I will help you find one.
May you be filled with peace from the Creator, and may we all find ways to take action to move our world toward peace.
I leave you with the words of my friend and colleague Holly Clark- Porter, who, with her wife, has just started a new call as a Co-Pastor in El Paso, Tx. She charged all of us to prayer, and to action, and calls all of us to work together:
With all of this, let our hearts beat together.
Beat to the love.
Beat to the joy.
Beat to the courage.
Beat to the story.
Beat to the hope.
Beat to the help.
To beat to the change You’re calling us to be.
With one heart, all God’s people said, Amen.
Amen, and Amen.
pjp
Where water meets land- connection. 