2025: Pain has a Purpose

1.        Pain has a purpose: It reveals how much you care.

 The train pulled into Paddington station and I deboarded. The London crowds rushed past me on the platform like a wave as I tried to catch it. But I couldn’t. I stopped dead in my tracks as the sea of commuters intuitively parted and converged around me. I keeled over gripping my stomach in agonising pain. In my hot pink blazer and with my new briefcase-folio (that I purchased specially for this conference), I was not the strong, confident business woman I set out to be this Friday morning.

You see, I had been in pain since Wednesday. On Thursday, 111 offered to send me an ambulance and my GP said to get myself to A&E. But I was determined to make it to this conference. It was my first networking event of 2025, and an important one at that. The connections I made there could be the golden ticket for my business. I was meant to meet partners, close deals, perform market research, and generate new leads. Not to mention, I am due to exhibit at this event next year so I needed to get a feel for it so I could plan accordingly. I needed this event to go well this year. I needed my business to go well this year. So I told myself to push through the pain, attend the event, and then go to A&E.

2.        Pain has a purpose: It forces you to change.

I walked slowly, hunched over like a turtle down the station platform, still gripping my stomach. I just had to sit. I made it to the Wasabi restaurant inside the station and ordered miso soup–my favourite comfort food. I sat down and had a couple sips. It hurt. I tried to chew a piece of seaweed and I was almost sick, coughing and gagging, eyes watering. I had an online meeting that was meant to start one minute ago so I opened my laptop and took a deep breath. The meeting was labelled in the calendar:

Introducing Inspiring Changemakers

I was scheduled to introduce two of the UK’s leading female CEOs known for their work in social impact through business ventures. As a female founder myself, they saw something in me and have started working with me on mutual events and opportunities. While I listened to them speak the same language of futurism and action and resilience, I weighed my options: Do I continue to ignore my own pain? Or do I change my conference plans and go straight to A&E?

3.        Pain has a purpose: It signals to others that you need help.

My new colleague and friend, Esther, met me at Paddington station shortly after my meeting. I told her my situation and I asked her to get me codeine from the Boots next store so that I could get through this conference on two feet. She didn’t think the codeine was a good idea and she took a moment to pray for me. I then suggested she could go to the conference without me while I went back on a train to Oxford and get a cab to John Radcliffe Hospital. She insisted that she wouldn’t leave me and that we could go back together. I thought about how much this conference, this business meant to me, and I decided we will just go for an hour then get back on the train home so I can go to the hospital.

We started walking to the Elizabeth Line. I made it about 20 steps before I couldn’t walk anymore. The conference was just one tube ride away. We were so close. I was sweating and frustrated. Esther remained sweet and suggested we go to the toilet. I managed to get there, very slowly. In the stall I looked at my stomach and saw redness and that it was quite swollen. My worry and my will were battling it out while I heard Esther on the other side of the stall door, “Bri… I got a first aid responder here.” I came out and showed him my stomach. He told me there was a hospital right next to the train station and he can take me there in a wheel chair. I began to cry as I succumbed to defeat and graciously accepted their help.

4.        Pain has a purpose: It brings people together.

There are few places in the world that is as diverse as a London hospital. No matter what class, skin colour, gender, nationality, mental fitness, or physical fitness you are in––there is a place for you to sit and be tended to.

Richard is a Pastor-Comedian. He wore a t-shirt that said “REVIVAL. REVIVAL. REVIVAL.” Everything he said sounded like a punchline, even if there wasn’t one. He walked around A&E cheering people up with jokes. I met him at 12pm, and by 8pm I realised he was walking around with no shoes on and that he had two security guards following him. In hindsight, the security guards had always been there. I just thought they were patrolling the halls. But they were patrolling him. He shouted through the night and kept me awake until I was moved to the Acute Medical Unit where I finally got a proper bed at 6am.

Karen was the sweetest roomie. Her belly was swollen like she was 38 weeks pregnant at 81 years old. We exchanged names, then she said, “Don’t drink.” I thought she meant the water that we were just given. Is she another patient with mental issues? Then it clicked. “Oh you mean alcohol?” She said that’s what got her in here and referenced her liver. She started to ask what brought me in, then stopped herself and apologised as if there was an unspoken rule that you’re not supposed to ask what brought people in, like we were in prison or something. By the time I said goodbye they had drained 5 litres of fluid and her belly went back down to size.

Tiny had the most visitors. She didn’t speak but her guests seemed full of life.

There was a man down the hall. I noticed him when he was speaking a bit rudely to the nurse at the nurse’s station. She was explaining something and he interrupted her with a direct “Why?” He was wearing a leather jacket and had great hair. I watched him as he returned to sit next to an old woman who I had only gotten glimpses of before they pulled the curtain to cover her. But I could still see him next to her bed all day and night, talking. He went back to the nurses station and advocated for the nurse to give his mother more medication, “She’s in a lot of pain.” He was kinder this time. “I think her urine needs draining as well.” He spoke calmly but when he returned to sit, his leg became restless.

5.        Pain has a purpose: It is the gateway to healing.

If there is a place called “Healing”, then there must be guides who lead you there. Salu, Alphons, Mark, are just a few of the names of my nightingales. The Nurse in Charge, Finda, remembered me from her previous shift when I was checked into the AMU. She was kind and powerful. Her turban matched her navy blue scrubs.

Finda pushed me and my bed to the Douglas Ward by herself as we couldn’t find any porters. It was a bumpy and amusing ride. Then Olu was my new nurse. I guessed she was Nigerian. Guessing which country a person is from can be risky, especially as a white person. I told her my business partner, Will, was Nigerian and I knew by her name and accent. I showed her the story of Drone City and our Nigerian and Nigerian-British protagonists. I told her that I had been researching Nigerian culture and accents and I bounced what I had learned off her, which made her laugh that familiar belly laugh that elevates the entire room. I told her about how Will and I’s goal was to raise aspirations in young people through educational storytelling and make aerospace and AI careers more accessible to underrepresented groups. She told me I was changing the world. She repeated it with her full chest. It healed something in me.

6.        Pain has a purpose: Despite the original cause often remaining unknown.

I originally thought it was cramps from a stomach flu. Then I thought I had damaged my stomach lining from all the ibuprofen I took. Then the doctors told me it was likely my appendix. Then they told me it was gastroenteritis. Then they told me peritonitis. I worry as Crohn’s disease and diverticulitis run in my family. Perhaps it was just an unidentified, aggressive bug that got the better of me.

At the end of the day, pain can feel senseless and inconvenient. At least to me it does. I know it has a purpose, but we often just ignore it, don’t we? Hope it goes away on its own. Perhaps if we just hook ourselves up to 18 sets of antibiotics, it’ll be on its way and we can be on ours. I remember my first heartbreak was like that. I was 29. I hated the physical and mental pain. I just wanted to kick it out, but it couldn’t fit through the door. I had to wait and wait and allow time to soften it and calm it down into a size where, finally, it was small enough to leave. Nowadays it just sits out in the back garden reading a book, giving the occasional nod and wave through the kitchen window while I’m washing the dishes at the sink.

For 2025, my resolution is to stop ignoring my pain, physical and mental, and try to listen to its purpose, allow it to guide me to where I need to go. Away from what isn’t meant for me, toward what is meant for me, or perhaps it will guide me to stop. Rest. Look around. Forage the dirt for smiles and flowers. Listen to the music of birds falling in love. Say hello to Mother Gaia and feel her gentle kiss on my forehead. Pray for my loved ones and send them blessings from the depths of my spirit. Remember how connected I am to all things, earth, water, sky, interstellar, through our interwoven loving and breaking and birthing and dying. The tapestry is always changing but our memories are still firm to the touch. Remember how the poetry of atoms are always reciting new verses about old things. If I just stop to listen, even from this hospital bed, I could hear the truth that has been chasing me for so long:

Remember who you are.

The Picture of Dorian Grey: Hidden in Plain Sight

Is anything truly selfless? Altruism, they say, is self-serving—an act performed not out of pure concern for others, but to feel good about oneself. To hold up a mirror and see oneself reflected as noble. I’ve committed myself to the cause of healing men, driven by a mission that feels, at first glance, like altruism. But no—there’s nothing selfless about it. I speak in whiskey circles, churches, secondary schools, post secondary schools, planting compassion in susceptible boys and broken men. I orchestrate men’s support groups in which my gender excludes me from participating. I do all this in a desperate attempt that there may be one more man in the world who is good—who sees women as human. Not for society’s sake. Not for abstract justice. But for the selfish reason that maybe, then, I will feel safer in the world. Maybe then, I can breathe a little easier.

How did we get here?

To this state of things?

I am reading The Picture of Dorian Grey, and the pseudo-intellectual banter between Harry and the protagonist ring eerily suspicious in the subtlety of its satire. The egregious belief that women are but shallow actors, soulless in substance, it is terrifyingly familiar. They speak with the same oily conviction of modern manosphere podcasts. It’s disturbing to realize that this mirror of reality we call fiction is still reflecting modern life with such clarity, even a century later. Their contempt, dressed up as sophistication. To them, women are “charmingly artificial”, puppets for male pleasure.  Men like Harry, like Dorian, are still walking among us, nodding along to podcasts that tell them they are superior, that women exist only as mirrors for their own egos, ready to be picked up and put down as they please. That women crave male approval, and men are the arbiters of worth.

How did we get here?

And it’s true, women are taught to crave male approval. As Margaret Atwood once wrote: “You are a woman with a man inside watching a woman.” The male gaze lives within us. And the cruelest part of this, what makes it so insidious, is that women have internalised this gaze as truth. This objectifying gaze that robs the subject of their humanity. Even after 134 years, the misogyny that degrades Dorian Gray’s portrait is still received by some modern men and pick me women with a nod, the point lost on them. For who wants to admit that while women may despair for male approval, a man’s sense of self is often precariously balanced on his perceived dominance over women?

How did we get here?

To this miserable state of things?

Awareness does nothing to free us from our patriarchal curses. I can identify the male gaze, but I cannot escape it. Men can realise their prejudice, but still perpetuate it. The Lord Henrys of the world, the Jordan Petersons and Elon Musks, insist that these dynamics are natural—dominance for men, submission for women—this is the order of things, they say. They warn that challenging it means unraveling civilization itself. But what is civilization if not a persistent reenactment of a deeply ingrained hypnosis? One that says men must dominate and women must be subjugated? This isn’t nature. It’s a story. And like all stories, it can be rewritten. Yet, here we are, clinging to it like drunks to their bottles, poisoning ourselves slowly. The patriarchal poison works its way through our veins, and we are complicit in the slow death of our own souls.

How did we get here?

They call us agents of chaos. Soulless actors. Emotional wrecks. Harbingers of hysteria. As I type this, there are hoards of men nodding in agreeance, a sea of bobble heads. These words—this rhetoric—has been re-popularised by the messiahs of the manosphere, men who proclaim to know the truth about women. Even if these sexist labels had a kernel of truth to them, that women were dramatic in emotion and shallow in thought, what result would you expect of a human denied their humanity? Trained to deny themselves for the favour of a man?

Meanwhile, when men are exposed for their own bobble-headed behavior—for eagerly parroting these myths about women—their humanity is left unscathed. Feminists often soften their criticisms of men, blaming the irresistible power of the patriarchal waters we are swimming in. Yet still, the mantrum that follows the harsh light shone upon their fragile egos translates directly into violence against women.

How did we get here? To this state of things?

In 2024, France and Britain have had no choice but to classify violence against women as domestic terrorism. Violence has escalated to such a degree that governments are finally acknowledging what women have long known—that we are living under public threat. Gender-based violence is not random; it is deliberate. It is an act of control and subjugation, committed by men who see themselves as rightful rulers of women’s bodies and lives.

There are men, of course, who have stopped bobbing their heads. Men who have had their moments of reckoning, who have seen through the veil of lies and realized that women, indeed, have souls. There are even those who have carried this knowledge all their lives. But they are few, scattered like stars in a dark sky. For so many others, enlightenment still waits. Many women are still awaiting their own enlightenment, with white knuckles, gripping the keys to their own prison cell, shouting, “Everything’s fine! We are equal now!” As 72/104 men accepted invitations to rape Gisèle Pelicot, and the other 32 remained in protective silence.

I sometimes find myself hanging on to my soul by a thread.

I don’t know how we got here, but here we are.

This is the state of things

My soulless flesh is his to take pleasure in. But the beat that compels my impertinent fingers to type, that is my own. The force that vibrates in my throat as I herald in a chaos that liberates, that is my soul fighting for its life.

2024: Changing Faces

In the lonely dawn of my thirties,

I confront the mirror

and see my changing face,

my humanity, exposed to the world.

My eyes, the windows to my troubled soul.

My mouth, the gateway to my tangled mind. 

My lines etched with the stories of youth.

My age spots, the mark of my mortality.

Within my scars it is written

what has been taken from me.

My skin affirms the resurrection,

daily offering its Hail Marys,

like the stars in the sky,

destroying and birthing new worlds.

Death and rebirth.

Death and rebirth.

A little more cream, a little more birth.

A little more peel, a little more death.

A nightly baptism in red light to ensure

these pregnant cells don’t miscarry.

Because I’m not ready to let go.

I don’t know how to be a middle-aged woman,

without a marriage, children, a career.

What do you call a middle-aged woman

who is not a wife or a mother or a boss?

Nothing?

I am single and confused,

stuck in this limbo between the two halves of life,

neither young nor old,

neither ma’am nor miss.

Neither career woman nor homemaker?

I am without definition.

If I remain as I am for another decade or so,

I will be an elder, a patron,

the village auntie, then the town granny.

A truly lovely thought.

Handing out clippings from my herb garden to the patrons in the local library.

But what until then?

I used to be a wide-eyed dreamer,

on a journey of self-discovery.

Nostalgic to behold, inspiring to witness.

Now I’m half blind, dress torn and sullied,

feeling my way through this garden of lost hopes and dreams,

searching for that magical blue flower before its last petal falls.

I long to belong.

From within.

My worth inherent,

even with nothing to show for it.

No award-winning book,

no impressive bank account,

no charming house or husband or children.

Just myself, my soul, and the space I occupy.

Is that enough?

In the quiet dawn of my thirties,

I greet the mirror.

My eyes, the windows to the divinity of my soul,

not just troubled but profound, full of depth and wonder.

My mouth, the gateway through which my mind untangles

its tapestries of mysterious truths.

My lines etched with the beauty of my survival.

My age spots, not just marks, but medals of resilience.

My scars, a testament to the battles that shaped me.

My skin still sings the hymn of resurrection,

daily whispering its Hail Marys,

like the stars surrounding me.

Death and rebirth.

Death and rebirth.

Each cream, a prayer for renewal.

Each peel, a shedding of the old.

Nightly baptisms in red light nurture my cells

for there is still life within me to cherish.

I learn to embrace the limbo,

this space between the two halves of life.

I find myself, defined not by societal expectations.

I am a seeker, a dreamer still,

but also a sage in the making,

acquiring the taste of silent uncertainty.

The blue flower is not lost;

it blooms within me, vibrant and eternal.

I belong.

From within.

My worth inherent,

not measured by achievements

but by the depth of my soul

and the love that overflows from it

onto those who share the space we find ourselves in.

I am enough.

In this mirror, I will find peace.

My eyes reflect the treasure of who I was

and prophesy to the miracle I am becoming.

This is 31.

2023: Fur and Bone

This New Years reflection has two parts. The first is a reflection I wrote six months ago which serves as a beautiful insight, or introduction, in how I will be embodying the call to be a prophet this year. The second is myself coming to that realization.

“August 10th, 2022

I’ve always felt like something was wrong with me when I drove by roadkill.

I’m too sensitive.
I’m too dramatic.
Toughen up.
Don’t be such a cry baby.

Because every time I see that collection of blood and fur, something in me dies a little. Suck it up. But I want to cry. But I know it’s not sustainable to live like this, pulling over and crying on the side of the road every time I see another innocent victim of human industrialism. So I suck it up.

Except for tonight.

Tonight, after seeing a deer laying on the side of the road, where someone moved it out of the way from traffic, head outstretched as if calling out to the stars, I pulled over. I hesitated for a kilometre, but I eventually stopped suppressing my just reaction and pulled over to pay my respects.

Unceremonious.

That’s the word that came to mind. That’s the revelation that lead me to, for the first time in my life, take a moment on the side of the road to honour a deceased animal.

Unceremonious.

How unceremoniously we discard their bodies, still on display, bones rattling with every passerby at 60mph. How unceremoniously we hurl our vehicles past the sacred spot where life was lost, where it’s soul-vessel remains on display. How scarcely we acknowledge our fellow mammals, with whom we share this sacred land with. We plow them over as if they did not breathe the same air we do, as if they do not see with the same eyes as we do, as if they do not feel physical pain as we do. We are made of the same flesh and bone and sinew and muscle.

This deer has ancestors, trickling through the millennia, bringing them here to this moment where we crossed paths. Did my ancestors ever crossed paths with theirs?

Life is ceremony.

Life deserves respect. Life deserves burial. Life deserves a moment. So I pulled over and now I am letting myself feel what I’ve always been ashamed of feeling. Grief for the deer discarded on the side of the road. A moment of silence. A deep breath. A heavy heart.

As soon as I began to let myself mourn the life and unceremonious death of that deer, I had a prophetic vision. I pictured the spiritual roadkill of society. All of the discarded tragedies in plain view which we hurtle by on a daily basis and suppress our compassion for because life is already too much and we are too busy. Ads for the crisis in Yemen, news of the war in Ukraine, reports of school and mass shootings in America, murdered and missing indigenous women in Canada, the climate crisis, LGBTQ+ suicide rates, nurses having mental breakdowns, people begging in the street. And all of these people are moved just far enough off the road so that we don’t have to stop.

What are we sacrificing when we suppress our compassion?

Our humanity?

What would it cost to stop the apathy?

Our sanity? Our joy?

What would happen if we took a moment, pulled over, and let ourselves grieve instead of driving on as if nothing happened?

What would happen if we stopped unceremoniously discarding our love in the heap of fur and bone?

Tonight, the answer is that the full moon will nod, rise a little higher, and the night won’t seem as dark.

My joy was not robbed, and neither was my soul.”

January 3rd, 2023

For eight years I’ve been called a heretic, and I’ve worn it as a badge of honour: “One who challenges religious power.” I’ve been full of fire and righteous anger, ministering to those healing from religious trauma and being a voice for those suffering, unapologetically correcting the hypocrisy that ravages the spiritual and emotional lives of so many. In doing so, I accumulated more religious trauma, labelled an enemy of the church for trying to heal it.

I’ve recently realized how a prophet and a heretic share some similarities. Both are loud. Both disrupt hierarchies. Both go against social consensus. Both breed discomfort. Both solicit persecution and violence. Both threaten those in power who are unwilling to change. Both are outnumbered. The difference is that “heretic” is the label the powerful use to silence the dissenters, while “prophet” is a label one inherits in the hindsight of truth and justice being achieved.

Most importantly I’ve realized how the prophet is a lamenter, the heretic is a fighter. The prophet resigns themselves to the turmoil of truly witnessing the suffering they are destined to help heal. The prophet weeps, the heretic shouts. Both stand in solidarity with the suffering of the world, both carry healing in their steps and in their voice. But there is a subtle distinction of grief and anger between these two different sides of the same coin.

I will still be called a heretic, but this year I am adopting the calling of a prophet. Not in the sense that I believe I am superior, anointed, or set apart, nor do I plan on making grand predictions or announcing doom; all the things the word ‘prophet’ has been reduced to. Instead, I am leaning into the hard work and gift of being a compassionate witness to the suffering around me and no longer turning away in avoidance and fear. I am re-melding my spirit to my soul. This year I will be intentionally testifying to the ceremony of life and death. I will lament with those who lament, mourn with those who mourn, and in the divine love that pulses in shared suffering, hopefully witness healing and restoration take place in our collective soul.

This year I will no longer dissuade myself from pulling over to the side of the road to lament with the universe.

2022: New Year, New Existential Crisis

I’ve been contemplating what to write my New Year’s essay about. My life has been tumultuous the past two years and I’ve been feeling uninspired to write something hopeful. Hope has been more evasive than it’s been in a long time.

I am in a chronic state of anticipation. Waiting for a Work Visa to be approved or rejected so I can return to Oxford. Waiting for my book to be accepted or rejected by an agent. Waiting to see if my romantic relationship will overcome its struggles. There are so many question marks, it’s hard to bear them all at once.

I turned to my old writing for inspiration. I found an essay I wrote on ‘fear’ from six years ago. Last year, my New Years essay was also drawn from this essay, and I entitled it “Redeeming Fear”. Naturally I thought that I could use this old essay again for inspiration.

The original essay spoke to me, but I was so different six years ago. I was so sure of myself and my opinions. My writing style in this essay was pastoral. I was teaching about the paradox of fear and how to engage with it. Reading it now, I felt something was missing from my little sermon. I was writing an answer to a question. The problem was that I didn’t give the question room to breathe.

I read it and cried because the answer it gave to fear is still profound and full of truth and healing (I will share shortly). The lead up to the answer reminded me of Paul the Apostle, C.S. Lewis, G.K. Chesterton, and other literary writers that have heavily influenced my style. It’s purposeful, mechanical, experienced, structured, confident. That is a part of who I am, but to have my first piece of writing published in 2022 to be in this style—to start off this New Year highlighting that part of me— it seems disingenuous because that part of me is currently dormant.

I started writing this not knowing where it was going. I thought I would let the destination come naturally and hope it turns out okay, maybe have a little stroke of genius near the end. My technique here is not unlike what I am doing in life right now: Going through the motions, waiting for things to turn out okay. The destination open-ended.

I know that this resonates with many others. We are two years into a pandemic which has turned most of our lives upside-down, and there is still no end in sight. We thought the vaccines were going to enable us to socialize and work and travel again, but here we still are. Waiting, anticipating, exhausted, hope dwindling, lives falling apart. This essay is for those, like me, who have lost more than they’ve gained and are too scared to hope that maybe, this year, it will be different.

The last time I had lost everything was six years ago, not long before I wrote that essay I mentioned. I had all my dreams come true only to have them snatched away. Back then it was my career, this time it was my engagement. Back then, all I had left was the book I had just started writing. Still, after everything I’ve lost these past two years, this book continues to be all I have. This story.

Then last week, this crazy thing happened. I suddenly got over 7000 followers on social media, each of them believing in this book, in me. I’m still processing it. This started to make me think that maybe this year will be different. Not because of some fate or chance, but because I’m not alone. I have a handful of strangers who are cheering me on, and it’s a familiar feeling. It feels like hope.

The answer to fear in that old essay I wrote was this:

We are not alone.

We are not alone in our fear, our grief, our disappointments, our failures, our waiting.

I find comfort in believing in the ancient promise that God is with me. What I have grown to realize since I wrote that essay is that the divine is in each person I meet. Each person who offers me help. Each connection formed is where the Great Spirit abides.

When we suffer together.
When we overcome together.
When we celebrate together.

When we help each other.

I don’t know if this year I will have more to celebrate. I’m not even going to try to convince myself that it will be different.

I am just going to remind myself:

1. I’m not alone.

2. There is something bigger than me, something glimpsed in every act of love that I give, receive, and witness.

3. That in itself is cause for hope.

““When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze.””

— Isaiah 43:2

Wounded and Resurrected

My new logo has the original bee I drew four years ago when I first changed my pen name to B. C. Clare, but now with a broken wing. This bee represents female leadership, my ADHD nature (ever working and moving), community, mundane miracles, and my affinity for smelling flowers. The broken wing adds the additional meaning of sacred woundedness—this is what I’d like to expound upon this Easter Sunday.

I thought of how the broken wing may come across to some, as if I’m playing the victim. How in a society of winners and losers, this symbolism looks weak and self-pitying. This is why I must write this piece, for my own processing of what this means (which, to be honest, is why I write anything), and for the permission this might give to others in embracing their sacred woundedness.

I first saw myself as broken when my parent’s divorced and became the child of a broken home. Then when I was physically and sexually abused, then when I was bullied, then when I was severely depressed with undiagnosed ADHD and Bipolar disorder. I got cracks tattooed on my back to symbolize cracked clay when I was 18. It spoke to how, according to Scripture, I am a jar of clay that holds the divine, but I am a cracked jar of clay. My spirit and body were broken. Yet I was still here and I stilled housed the divine in my body (2 Cor. 4:7-10).

I used to be the unassigned spokesperson for the Christian teaching that we are all unclean, wretched, and undone. As I say this, I empathize with all those who have been harmed by this teaching. It is in itself a very harmful teaching. The reason I would argue it is so effective is because it is the best kind of lie. The best lies are simply twisted truths.

The prophet Isaiah writes:

“We have all become like one who is unclean,
and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment.
We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind,
take us away.”

— Isaiah 64:6

Isaiah is speaking of leprosy when he says “like one who is unclean,” and again when he refers to their “polluted garments”. Lepers were banished and cast out from their communities. At this time the Israelites were living in exile so Isaiah was making the apt comparison. Scarcely any one thing in all the levitical law takes up so much room as the observations around leprosy and the consequences of touching one who has it. Leprosy was both seen as a natural disease and sometimes a punishment of God1. There is even a story where lepers saved a city (2 Kings 7). Either way, leprosy ultimately represented that which people did not wish to see: pain and suffering, the most contagious affliction of all. 2

All have been touched by pain and suffering and death. We all are like lepers, “the unclean”, the scarred, and if you’re like me, you tend to banish the leper within you, out of sight to suffer alone. Perhaps you also have been banished by your tribe.

Today on Easter Sunday I’d like to reflect on the paradox of being both wounded and healed, clean and unclean, broken and whole. John 20 tells the story of Mary discovering Jesus’ empty tomb and how Jesus appears to her, and then later to his disciples. Twice it mentions his physical wounds, in his hands and in his side. The second time is when Jesus is proving to Thomas that he is real:

“Reach here thy finger and behold my hand, thrust it into my side.”

— John 20:27

Richard Rohr remarks in The Universal Christ that this is a moment where Jesus holds the paradox of healing and woundedness, there in his resurrected, scarred body. I think that suffering, with all it’s pain, connects us; to each other, to our ancestors, to the Christ, to the Madonna, to our own souls. Jesus demonstrated in the biblical story, when he touched lepers and had his own wounds felt, that scars are to be touched. The pain of others is not to be turned away from.

Jesus cleans the leper, Mosaic detail, 12thC, © Cathedral of the Assumption, Monreale, Sicily

This essay is not to give a reason for suffering, or bypass the trauma and terror of great suffering, but reflect on it and how it has transformed me and many others before me. Much like Christ in the Garden of Gethsemene, I did not want any of it, no matter what “good” may come of it. I was sick of asking for fish and being given scorpions. But, like Yeshua of Nazareth, it seemed I had no choice in the matter. I felt forsaken. No one chooses suffering, its something that happens to us, with or without our consent.

Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate, wrote a story in his memoir Night that first opened my eyes to the transformative truth of suffering. He named this memory “God on the Gallows” where he recalls a young boy dying slowly:

““Where is God? Where is He?” someone behind me asked. ..
For more than half an hour [the child in the noose] stayed there, struggling between life and death, dying in slow agony under our eyes. And we had to look him full in the face. He was still alive when I passed in front of him. His tongue was still red, his eyes were not yet glazed.
Behind me, I heard the same man asking:
“Where is God now?”
And I heard a voice within me answer him:
“Where is He? Here He is—He is hanging here on this gallows. . . .””

— "Night" by Elie Wiesel

After years of wrestling with the question, “Why does God allow suffering?” I still have no answer. I don’t think there is an answer that could ever suffice. What I do know, from the God on the gallows and the wounded and resurrected Christ, is that suffering is written into the DNA of the divine, just as much as resurrection, springtime, healing, and light.

The broken wing is my spiritual limp, like Israel’s limp after wrestling with God; fighting for an answer, for a sufficient reason as to why I have suffered, why so many have suffered. We, as humanity, have never been so in touch with the suffering of others in this world through media and news and the internet, yet never so out of touch. When I was depressed, I felt I was Nero in The Matrix. I felt I could see what others shut their eyes to; I could hear the cries others shut their ears to. It overwhelmed me because I had no one to share my grief with. We prefer to banish the thoughts, change the channel, or rationalize them with free will and fallen world arguments (and I’ve done all of these things), but Jesus instead asked us to remember and embody the death and suffering of Christ—who is every human—every time we break bread or sip wine.

I am broken and wounded and I carry the deaths of many souls, and yet I am whole and healed and I testify to the life of many souls. I have mourned the loss of many Bryanna’s, and I have also basked in the glow of many Bry’s. My hope for my writing is that B. C. Clare holds enough space for both truths, without one diminishing the other.

“But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. ”

— 2 Corinthians 4:7-10

“Do I contradict myself? / Very well then I contradict myself, / (I am large, I contain multitudes).”

— Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

1. Sometimes, like the tyrants who were “punished” with leprosy, our suffering can be a direct consequence of the abuses we’ve committed and the harm we’ve caused others. Accountability and the consequences of violence are painful.

2. It is a common misconception that lepers cannot feel anything, but, although they suffer nerve damage, they also suffer immense, chronic pain.

2021: Redeeming Fear

I love fear. 

What a radical thing to say. It’s so radical that it’s hard to hear that sentence as anything but sarcastic. But I do love fear and I think you should too. Just like every emotion, there are positives to it and negatives. Like every emotion, it can mix with other emotions in a beautiful way and in a scary way. 

Growing up Christian, many feelings were shamed that shouldn’t be: fear, worry, anxiety, doubt, even my overall sense of “feeling” has been and continues to be shamed with spiritual and theological claims that our hearts are corrupt. But what’s unique about the shame of fear is that it’s not only within church walls that it is a shamed emotion. It’s everywhere.

Cowardice, having phobia’s, being afraid of what others think of us, having PTSD, are all seen as negatives, signs of weakness. Which seems like an okay perspective at first glance. If it’s not pleasant it must be negative, bad, and unhelpful. But honestly, anything that our bodies are telling us, especially when they manifest through strong emotions, it’s neither negative nor positive! And experiencing the full range of human emotion is not a weakness. Demonizing our thoughts will however be negative in the long run.

My children’s book series, Misericordia’s Fables, is all about having compassion on ourselves and others who struggle with their emotions. In the teaching handbook, the recurring question we bring to children is: “Is feeling sad/anxious/scared/angry/overwhelmed etc. BAD?” And the answer is always a resounding NO.

Of course it’s not! But even people who seem aware of this continue to feed into the culture of “Fear is bad”! There is something numinous about Fear. When we think of fear, we think about the times fear blinds us, when it spins out of control, and it is seen as a moral failure; a weakness. People will betray themselves and others in order to protect themselves from what they fear. People can act irrationally when they are afraid. Fear can cause us to give up (coward) or become overprotective (bully). Fear imbues us with shame, weakness, and disgust. What’s frustrating to me is that all emotions have these shortcomings with no where near the same amount of negativity attached to them: you can be blinded by love, blinded by anger, blinded by despair. All of our emotions can be Titans and cause us to behave erratically. But why is fear the designated devil of all of our emotions? 

Of course, how we respond to our emotions can be harmful to ourselves and others, and perhaps that’s why fear gets such a bad reputation: We don’t know how to properly respond to fear. Our instinctive responses are to fight or shut down or run away.

Fear has taught me to fight and stand up for myself when I was bullied. Fear has taught me to shut down my emotions in abusive situations so that I could continue to function day-to-day. Fear has taught me how to run away from bad situations into far better ones. Fear has fiercely protected me. 

Fear has also caused me to be too defensive and quick to attack when I feel threatened. Sometimes I’ve shut down and can’t get back up again. Sometimes I’ve run away too quickly instead of resolving the problem in front of me.

Fear is not always good or always bad. Its intentions are, however, always good: Protection.

We have this militaristic approach to “battling” fear. We live in a culture that promotes suppressing and shaming fear with quotes like “Faith over Fear” and “Fear is the mind killer” and “Fear is a liar”. Even the word “Fearless” is a myth. Christians specifically speak as though fear is a weapon of Satan, when this is completely absent from any ancient wisdom. In fact we are taught that deceit is often where our “evil” forms, and I believe the biggest lie around fear is that it is your enemy. 

This is where we become our own worst enemies. The more you despise any emotion, the more you fight it, the more intolerant you are of it, the less likely you are to notice it and self-soothe and the more likely it is to spin out of control and grow into a Titan.

If our fear is becoming a titan, we must look it in the face and ask it with compassion where it’s coming from. Do not interrupt what your body is telling you by shouting “just trust God!” or “triumph over it!” as if it’s something we can ignore or stamp out with our willpower. True peace doesn’t come from “exposing” fear and its nefarious schemes, but confessing your complex emotions and the reasons behind them without being too hard on yourself, shame-free. (FYI this is what therapy looks like).

I would like to end on a note that gives this complex emotion some long overdue appreciation, and hopefully after reading this we can all find a little more compassion for fear when it comes to say hello. 

Fear propels us into action. It can light a fire beneath us. Fear of becoming depressed motivates me to take preemptive steps towards caring for my mental health, including getting exercise. Fear compels me to see a doctor and advocate for my health. Fear for another’s well being can give us the strength to catch someone when they’re falling and the courage to call someone and offer help and support.

Fear keeps us safe. Spider-Man’s spidey senses are a superpower and so is fear.

Fear makes us vulnerable to others. This can cause even more fear which makes you all the more human. The thing is, vulnerability isn’t shameful or weak (that’s another lie). Seeing someone afraid humanizes them and inspires compassion, not disgust. It is an emotion that, when witnessed, reaches the most tender place in our hearts.

Lastly, one cannot extend love to another without feeling the risk of rejection. One cannot love without fear. This is why a Jewish psalmist writes, “We are fearfully and wonderfully made.” Love and vulnerability and fear go hand in hand. Not to mention creativity. Fear is the beating heart of being human.

May this year, when fear sets in—fear of the future, fear of the unknown, fear of change, fear of disappointment, fear of loss—may we look at ourselves as we would a small, scared child who simply needs compassion and say, “It’s time we find a therapist.”

The Future is Female

Christmas Eve, 2019

Have you ever flown from night to day? 

I took my window seat on the plane. Mariam and I began chatting and we became fast friends. It was Christmas Eve and we were going to see our families. Mariam lived in Miami and knew how to sweet talk herself to an upgrade. The trick, she said, was to talk to a man. She wasn’t entitled or loud, her voice was soft and kind. As just about everyone else I meet while travelling, she loved Canadians. 

It was 5 am Toronto time as I woke up from a half sleep, lucky to get even that. I mean, if having a string of panic attacks before moving country and getting prescribed a bunch of meds to put this girl to sleep is lucky.

So as my Hydroxine wears off I look out the open window. By this time I wasn’t sitting next to it anymore, I gave Mariam the window seat. I guess her powers work on women too. The sky was neon pink and purple. I had never seen anything like it. At first I thought it was a sunrise. I wasn’t sure whether the bright neon pink hole in the sky playing peek-a-boo with me from behind the wing, was the sun or moon. It all filled me with wonder, the science, the perfect conditions that had to happen for me to witness this. Pink and purple, and more pink and more purple. It was like a black light shone on the moon for some atmospheric rave. Yet it was peaceful. 

When I hear the popular saying, “The Future is Female,” I never quite got it. Seeing this spectacle and feeling inspired to write, it was the first thing to come to mind. The future became personified as a woman, the divine feminine, as I caught a glimpse of her radiance at its most empowered. The phrase also meant at that moment that the sacred feminine spirit which lives in all things is becoming increasingly known. Femininity is not exclusive to women, just as masculinity is not exclusive to men. No matter how progressive one is, you can’t deny the female spirit as unique from the male spirit. The mother from the father. I’ve seen many men embody mother, and women embody father. The masculine and feminine are intertwined and live in all of us. 

That being said, “The Future is Female” means the feminine is unapologetically entering the sphere of consciousness, one sunmoonrise at a time. The feminine is taking back the space that belongs to her. One female friendship at a time. One voice at a time. One pink sky at a time. Liberating, birthing, beautifying everything it touches. 

As I’ve been writing this on the plane, perfection happened. The sunmoon continued to rise and the sky turned blue. Deep ocean blues upon tropical shades, the kind of blue you would find on a long lost flower with mystical qualities. Bordering neon, the pure vibrancy of this sky took my breath away. Again. This celestial transformation from pink to blue was not competitive. It was natural. The sky is co-inhabited by spirits making themselves known through colour. Each owning their share of time and space, for in the vastness that is our sky, there is plenty to go around.

2020: The Fox and the Rabbit: 10 years later

Ten years ago when I was seventeen, I moved out.  Not because I had to, not because I didn’t like it at my moms, but because I wanted change, excitement, to experience something new. That was ten years ago and without a breath I have been seeking out change and newness ever since. But I don’t want change anymore. I just want to live in the now. 

My graduating year of high school was 2010. Many saw it as an end of an era, but I saw it as the start of a new age. I wished for adventure and I got more than I bargained for. Since then I have moved house eleven times between seven cities. I often returned to St. Catharines or Toronto to restart and “try again”. I wouldn’t be able to tell you what I was “trying” at exactly. I changed degrees four times and changed jobs thirteen times, also going on unemployment for depression/anxiety twice. Whatever it was, I was trying desperately to find it.

I read once that the natural response to sadness is a desire for change. I remember thinking, “Is this why I am always craving change?” I had already been diagnosed with Depressive Disorder, but reading this connection between sadness and change led to another level of awareness. A major pillar of my personality, what makes me me, could be due to my depression. 

I’ve had people approach me in awe of all the things I’ve done, places I’ve lived, but I never saw it as an exciting life, at least not as exciting as others made it out to be. The past ten years, for me, could be described as a chase. My depression/anxiety was a fox, and I the rabbit. I made drastic life changes because I was being hunted, and I’ve been running for my life for ten years. More than that.

There have been times where I thought I’d finally found the thing I was searching for: my safe haven where the fox couldn’t find me. But then I caught a glimpse of a dazzling carrot promising whispers of something even better and I risked the safety I’d finally found to go chase it. Other times, what I thought was my sanctuary turned out to be a trap that left me with scars. There were times I ran so hard I caught a cramp that sent me crashing to the ground gasping for breath. 

While writing this piece over the last two weeks of this decade, I had a panic attack and became hospitalized as a suicide risk. Mental illness looks different for many, but for me, when I experience a panic attack, I feel like I am dying from the screaming pain in my body and soul. If one experiences a panic attack, they are unable to see past their present moment of excruciating mental and physical pain. I personally experience psychotic breaks during panic episodes where I have auditory hallucinations, paranoia, and thought disorder. One is unlikely to recognize me in this state. 

My panic attacks are like two animals fighting to the death. It’s hard to watch, harder to live through. Animals fight, not simply because they are hungry, but for survival. They sense a threat and they must eliminate it. The only way to end the blood shed is for them to, by some miracle, trust one another enough to not attack, to feel safe. A panic attack is like two halves of me attacking each other, my emotions vs my will. This is the twist to the fable: I’m not the rabbit being chased by a sad fox. I am the fox chasing the sad rabbit. The moment the rabbit shows weakness, lets out a tear, discovers bad news, starts losing hope, the fox pounces in attack of her prey and chases the emotional rabbit out of sight. The rabbit is a threat to the equilibrium of the forest… or so the fox intuits. But eventually the rabbit refuses to run and chooses to fight back. Crack.

So am I the fox chasing away my emotions? Or am I the rabbit trying to flee from my emotions? Or am I the emotions doing the chasing and the fleeing? In a panic episode I’m all of the above.

There’s someone, or something, else in this equation. The valley, the mountain, the forest. In each I feel a presence. There was a Realness that took many forms. He was the air in my lungs that kept me alive. They were the trees, that surrounded me. She was my blood pouring onto the teeth of the traps. It was the spirit of love I encountered at every sunrise. The mysterious voice guided me with silence and stillness. This was the voice that reunites the prey and the predator, calming the storm in my mind. This voice, this presence, always appears, whether I’m the fox or the rabbit or both at once, the voice whispers and I can breathe. Prescription drugs also help to subdue the wild animals within me, I must make clear. And when the fighting in my mind stops, this other silence speaks peace over me as I breathe: Everything is going to be okay. And it always is. And it always will be. 

As I enter this new decade, 2020, I hope to stop seeing my feelings as an inconvenience I don’t have time for. I will stop chasing and I will stop running. My medication isn’t to aid me in avoiding feeling what I need to feel, chasing out the rabbit or killing the fox, but it helps quiet the fear of the immense, threatening form the fox and the rabbit can each take. 

It has been an adventure. I relish the memories of the valleys and the mountain tops which have formed me into the woman writing this now. I am saddened to see this wild, tragic, epic, ever-changing chapter come to a close as I settle down in Boars Hill, Oxford, England to start a family of my own. But I am more happy than I am sad. Not because this rabbit has outrun the fox, escaping to her sanctuary across the ocean where she can never be hunted again. Instead, by a twist of fate, the rabbit and the fox became friends and have learned to co-exist among these billowing hills. These two friends still fight sometimes (rabbit loves to play the victim, and fox likes to sneak up on her), but I have friends and family and mentors who help me stay grounded and feeling safe with the fox and the rabbit who, for all their shortcomings, simply remind this human to feel. 

Unthinkable

Sometimes its hard to see things from someone else’s perspective. I’ve been procrastinating, struggling, dreading seeing a certain thing in my life from the perspective of those who have been opposing me and my decisions. Typically, I wouldn’t bother with other people’s opinions or even bother trying to persuade those people who are not in a state of mind to be persuaded. However there are times, for one’s own well being, it’s necessary to find reconciliation with these opinions, especially when those attached to these opinions play a large role in your life. No matter how unwelcome these opinions may be, I must try to make peace with them to silence the war in my mind and the tension in my relationships. 

I’m going to keep my specific context private for the sake of, well, privacy.

For a while I was truly struggling with trying to understand these opinions that were being imposed upon me: “They are ill-informed, they are rooted in bias and indoctrinated fear, they only allow themselves to see the negative outcomes of my decision, etc, etc.” These internal criticisms weren’t productive for helping me find peace. The one thing that helped me feel a glimpse of compassion for my disputants was that they were motivated by fear, and fear is relatable at the very least, no matter how unhealthy or misplaced it is. Somewhere after the realization that I can sympathize with fear, I had an image come to mind. And this image helped me pause in that compassionate middle ground where I could find grace for that fear and sympathy for how hard it can be to get past. 

The image that came to mind is of a mother watching her daughter decide to go into ski jumping. Ski jumping has always captured a sense of awe within me. Seeing someone launch themselves into the sky at 60m/h with nothing to land on except for two long, flat, skinny sticks strapped to the bottom of their feet—ya, that would cause someone a certain amount of anxiety if they cared deeply for the person attempting to fly. It causes anxiety in me when I see it and I don’t even know the people doing it on TV. Anyone can understand and have sympathy for that mother shouting, “No! It’s too dangerous!” The problem arises when the anxiety of that mother, instead of being dealt with by the beholder, is instead projected onto her daughter in an attempt to hinder what her daughter clearly longs to do: Ski jump in the Olympics. Maybe the daughter made her decision when she was intoxicated, or in a mid-life crisis, or in a moment of pure impulse. Maybe the daughter has muscle atrophy and is in denial of it. And even if the daughter is level headed and had taken time to think it through, consulting experts along with other ski jumping athletes into what she should realistically expect and what she is practically risking, the mother, sister, brother, friend could still have a strong argument against her decision: “Many ski athletes are seriously injured in the sport and some even die! I know of someone who did ski jumping and realized it was unfulfilling and they ended up regretting it.” Et cetera, et cetera. Not to mention the rational arguments: “There are other sports you can do that are safer, like golf! Or you can make more money in a big corporate job AND not risk your personal safety!” These are all valid arguments. Which is why it can be near impossible to persuade the person making them to accept your decision to ski jump. 

And why make that decision? Why would someone so resolutely decide, despite all the risks and warnings, to catapult themselves off of a snowy peak? Through doing research into some audacious folks, I’ve found answers that resonate with why I’m making my unpopular decision.

First I found Sarah Hendrickson, a ski jumper who said this on returning to the sport after a serious injury:

“I think I was born to be a ski jumper. The feeling of that first jump back was one of the best sensations in the entire world. I just let go of the bar and felt completely comfortable. All my nerves simply disappeared.”

Tenzing Norgay was the second person to climb Mt Everest and when he was asked why, he said:

“It was the one thing that I had dreamed of all my life.”


Pioneering astronaut, John Glenn, said this before his historic 1962 flight:

“You fear the least what you know the most about.”

In my research I came across some other quotes from inspirational figures who risked a lot by being true to themselves:

“Find out who you are and be that person. That’s what your soul was put on this Earth to be. Find that truth, live that truth, and everything else will come.” — Ellen DeGeneres

“It always seems impossible until it’s done.” — Nelson Mandela

“I came to the conclusion that there is an existential moment in your life when you must decide to speak for yourself; nobody else can speak for you.” — MLKJ

“He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.” — Muhammad Ali

“You have to take risks. We will only understand the miracle of life fully when we allow the unexpected to happen.” — Paulo Coelho

“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far it is possible to go.” — T.S. Eliot

At the end of the day, if I were to sum up my motivation for this decision in a quote it would be this:

“Some of the most important decisions in life don’t actually feel like decisions. Sometimes you choose to do something because the alternative is simply unthinkable.”

Not making the decision I am currently making would be INSANE. It would be a betrayal to myself, to God, and to the one I love. It simply is not an option.

To my current situation I will say this: It is a religious dilemma. This is why I believe it is also unavoidable for me to include Biblical inspiration in what has motivated me to stand firm in what I know I must do. In 2 Timothy 1:7, Paul writes “For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” In the early church, there were a lot of opinions. Opinions based on Scripture, religious authority, tradition, and common sense. With the new message of Love and inclusion and the new standard of Truth found in Christ and the Holy Spirit, it was extremely difficult to navigate the intricacies of morality on a general scale. From circumcision to laws on clean and unclean people and things, it was a ride on which Paul and his followers had to improvise through with discernment and faith, faith that God was leading them through every clash of opinion. At the end of the day, the apostles had to trust in the power they carried within them to make the decisions only they can make for themselves. This is why Paul instructs believers to think for themselves and address the Spirit directly. Just as Jesus could not stick around to help with every moral dilemma the Church and its Christians would have to make, he instructed his followers to trust in the Spirit and seek out truth for themselves. 

But this can be scary. It’s easier to navigate decisions through mathematical, legalistic, and dogmatic thinking because it relieves you of all liability. It replaces faith in God with faith in doctrine. Any time this is done in the Scriptures, the person is often in for a rude awakening. Or, in one man’s case, a rude blinding. 

I saved my favourite quote for last, what has given me the most peace and encouragement while writing this. I hope the inner reconciliation this piece has given me can give my loved ones something similar.

Onto the slopes. Further up and further in.

Deuteronomy 31:8 “It is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.”

Ποῦ ἐστιν ἡ πίστις ὑμῶν; 

The Caravan is Marching

The most common piece of criticism I receive in regards to my faith in God and how I study the Scriptures is this:

“You just pick and choose what you want to believe.”

If you hear this said to you, I’m here for you. If you say this to others, please remember that this is hurtful and isolating to those you say this to. Those who say this usually claim to take the Bible at face value and not “pick and choose”.... but they don’t take the whole Bible at face value, and they do pick and choose what not to take at face value and what to take at face value. If you have tattoos or are against slavery or believe women can teach, etc... then you actively choose to read more deeply into those pieces of Scripture that at surface level seemingly contradict your deep, inner convictions. You find nuanced meaning and richer application for your life. Acting like you are more “right” because you read certain passages at face value, or in higher authority over other passages, or project traditional views onto nuanced passages, it can be extremely dangerous. This kind of thinking leads to hypocrisy, judgement, and pride. Even the term “face-value” insinuates that you are only judging something by its surface level appearance, which we all know can be unreliable and unethical.

I don’t pick and choose what I want to believe the Bible says. I follow the ancient rabbinic tradition of reading the entire Bible through as many eyes as possible, following every question in every direction with the guidance of the Holy Spirit and others whom I trust to be humble and wise in their reading. If you are not self aware of your own biases and selectiveness when interpreting the Bible, this immediately disqualifies your interpretation as reliable. So my advice is to first acknowledge that we all have the power to read anything into anything— a lesson taught by Martin Luther, CS Lewis, Augustine, Plato, St John, and more. Secondly, accept that we all have the potential to be mistaken, something Apostle Paul readily teaches in reference to himself. When you read every passage in the Bible that talks about how one should read the Bible and follow God, you will find it repeated most frequently the all-encompassing importance of humility. 

Christ came to show how problematic and harmful it can be to only rely on the written word of God. Jesus came and said HE is the word of God, subverting the idolization of Scripture. He not only enlightened traditional views of Scripture, but challenged them. His followers didn’t know what to do once Jesus left them because they knew how hard it is to navigate nuanced, moral issues. How were they to continue his complex work of starting a new worldview? It’s easy to say love God and love your neighbour, but what if your neighbour wants to eat a burger in front of you when that is considered unclean by God? Or what if they ask to be euthanized? They begged Jesus to stay for they knew they only had a taste of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, and he was the tree. So he sent his Spirit to stay with them and continue the work he started. The thing with the Trinity is that the Father, Son, and Spirit are all equal, and what the Spirit speaks is just as authoritative as what Christ spoke. Albeit, the means through which the Spirit speaks—through our conscience, thoughts, heart, etc— can cause obvious issues when it comes to our own biased thinking. However the means through which we have the words which Christ spoke can also be problematic when it comes to translation, second and third hand accounts, limited memory, etc. It’s called faith for a reason.

I trust God. If the Bible (or what I was taught about the Bible) doesn’t line up with my deep convictions, I look deeper into both my convictions and what the Bible actually says... just as many have done before me in regards to slavery and women’s rights among many other things. 

The reason I feel hurt and isolated when people accuse me of twisting the Bible to fit my beliefs is because it pushes me farther away from the church, the church I deeply want to be a part of. It reminds me that pride, hypocrisy, fear, and judgement still have their hands on the wheel and these things are hijacking the gospel to run people over with. Maybe it’s the injured's fault for being on the road, or maybe it was an accident, either way I decided to get out of the car a few years ago.

Boy, is it beautiful out here. People are tending to each other’s wounds and offering each other shelter and food. We are forming a caravan and we are marching onward. 

Note: If you resonate with this and feel alone, there are amazing communities of people who feel just like you. Research the “emerging church”. You can follow writers such as Richard Rohr who has a free daily email devotional. Phil Drysdale has a book list on his website and a global Deconstructionist Network where you can connect with others near you. You can listen to podcasts such as the Deconstructionists, The Liturgists, the Robcast, and more. You are definitely not alone. 

Death

Feelings, and feelings, and feelings. Let me try thinking instead. — C.S. Lewis

I recently grieved the loss of a beloved pet. He was a good dog named Jersey. A consolation as he lied there breathing his last breath was that he shouldn’t have ever lived as long as he did; he was a rescue dog found in a garbage bag on the side of the road and he was almost mulled by a bear while I was camping with him. He was very instinctual and it would often get the best of him. When he was younger he would bite. Typically, a dog with that sort of temperament would be put down. Instead, we had him professionally trained. He continued for the rest of his life to battle those urges that welled up inside him to protect himself and others. You could see in his whole body when my brother would be testing him the immense degree of self-control he was exerting. His inner demons battling behind those beetle eyes:

“This is your body and it is being invaded. You’ve already growled ‘no’, what else is there to do but fight back?”

“Violence isn’t the answer! Walk or run away instead.”

Daemons were originally deities who spoke truth, after all. Jersey’s was loud.

He was the most empathetic dog I ever knew. If I cried he would lie down with me and ever so gently lick my tears away. He was primarily motivated by praise and affirmation. He reminded me of the idea C.S. Lewis taught me, the possibility that animals grew souls from being in an intimate relationship with a human soul. It did feel like he was an extension of myself.

So he’s passed away and I’m left with the consolation that he had a remarkable life, especially considering the earlier deaths he evaded.

The word shalom means peace within the wrestling. Across cultures and tribes it is understood that there can be no peace without two or more opposing forces—like the eye of a storm, or orbiting planets and stars and galaxies in the universe, pulling against each other’s weight. I find myself in this tug and pull when contemplating death and I wonder whether I will ever find my shalom with it. Growing up in a Christian community, death was always spoken of as evil, the enemy, unnatural, etc. In my adult years I have come to understand death as something that is not evil or against me or unnatural at all, especially when looking at the Ancient Jewish and Christian tradition, among other Ancient religions and philosophies.

The Ancient Wisdom understands that death is simply a part of life, an ever-present mystery, and often times good. What is mysterious about it is not that it is a gateway into the unknown, but that it can feel both perfectly good and abhorrently evil at the same time. In a Canadian winter, things die so that they can be reborn in spring. The very cells in our bodies die and are remade all the time. Before science could explain it, indigenous peoples knew above all that we are all one body and death brings new life. As Mufasa says, “We are all connected in the great circle of life.” So why has modern Christian tradition gone astray from this fundamental truth and demonized death? Power, greed, political agendas, mass manipulation, fear mongering, military mindsets, etc. But also, I would argue, that it is because death does have a sting. And that sting is often debilitating. Sometimes in order to survive it, we fight back, we blame it, we react against it with all the hate we can muster. We dig our heels into the pain while shouting, “Nothing good can come from this.”

This human response is valid, but unfinished. Many ancient cultures would indulge in these emotions to such a degree that as they carried their deceased through the streets, they screamed and tore their clothes apart. They would put ash on their head and wear sackcloth. And yet, the visceral stages of grief are reconciled in the last stage: Acceptance. That is all we can do, really—but true acceptance isn’t a placid response. It doesn’t mean you’ve just given into the inevitability of death and laid down your sword, but also walked across the battlefield to embrace the vivid reality that surrounds you, with all it’s pain and darkness and beauty and light. Acceptance is honouring the thing you’re grieving by allowing it to complete it’s life story. Death isn’t the end, remembrance is. After all, remembrance has a life of it’s own that never ends.

C.S. Lewis envisions a species on Mars in his science fiction Out of the Silent Planet that has this undisrupted understanding of life and death. Hyoi, a Hross native, explains to the man, “A pleasure is full grown only when it is remembered. You are speaking, Hmán, as if pleasure were one thing and the memory another. It is all one thing.”

Jersey could not be fully made real without the transition from life to memory. We can never be fully real, fully enjoyed, fully loved, fully alive without the embodiment of our memory which forms in our absence. What we do in this life and the imprint we leave on this world has an eternal life of its own.

This is my experience anyway. Perhaps it’s not useful to hear while we are screaming through the streets, but right now it resonates with me. 

In this framework, death is something I can not only accept, but embrace.

PS.

It’s been difficult to find scripture verses on death because it is often used as hyperbole or metaphor for suffering—and rightly so. However, the one consistency that I do find in scripture is that physical death is not the same as spiritual death.

There is a time for earthly death, as Solomon says—and as Jesus says, those who mourn it are blessed.

As for the Christian tradition, the “enemy” is not in our physical dying, but in our spiritual decaying with every action we make that leads us away from Love.

2 Corinthians 4:8-18

'True West' Review

Theatre Review: True West 

Written by Sam Shepard

Directed by Matthew Dunster

A new take on Sam Shepard’s True West has emerged in West London starring Britain’s latest heart throb, Kit Harington (Game of Thrones) as Austin, and rising singer/songwriter/actor, Johnny Flynn (Beast) as Austin’s brother, Lee. The play is directed by Olivier-nominated director/playwright/actor Matthew Dunster who takes this postmodern-classic black comedy and innovates new twists to this already perplexing play.

To summarize the play, Austin is staying at his mother’s house just outside of Los Angeles while writing a screenplay and earning his big break. Austin’s older, estranged, and wild brother, Lee, arrives unannounced after spending a long period of time in the desert. As Lee suffocates Austin with his presence and steals his golden opportunity as a screen writer, Austin gradually slips into a claustrophobic madness—expertly transitioned by Kit Harington and the deterioration of the set. The theme of reversal is evident by the intermission; Austin becomes the wild and uncontrolled one while Lee becomes the serious and responsible one. 

Sam Shepard’s script is intricately detailed and strict in terms of props, costume, and stage design, leaving little creative room for directors to make the play their own—but this didn’t stop Dunster. While respecting Shepard’s map for his play, Dunster adapted just enough of it to include the denounced interpretation regarding the identities of the two brothers. Shepard stated in an interview with the New York Times, “I wanted to write a play about double nature, one that wouldn't be symbolic or metaphorical or any of that stuff,” (New York Times). Many have taken Shepard’s statement to mean that the two brothers were meant to be distinct individuals, each showing their own double natures throughout the course of the play. However, with the beloved psychological twist made popular by Chuck Palahniuk’s novel, Fight Club, many have speculated on whether True West could share a similar twist: Lee is actually a figment of Austin’s imagination. Directing the play to support this interpretation goes against the playwright’s original intent is arguable, especially in the light that this approach isn’t technically symbolic or metaphorical, but deeply rooted in the devastation of our “split” psychologies as Shepard intended (New York Times). As for Dunster’s direction, it seems that he purposefully orchestrated the play so that Lee may or may not be a part of Austin; Lee could be an estranged, mysterious brother, or he could be Austin’s Übermensch, triggered by the maddening effects of the Hollywood Machine. As with any great post-modern classic, the dilemma is left unconfirmed for the audience to navigate on their own.

The two major directorial decisions which help obscure the question of Lee’s true identity rests in the opening and closing of the play. Ten minutes before the play began, Kit Harrington walked onto centre stage and assumed his role as Austin, stressfully writing his screenplay on the kitchen table. The lights remained on, audience members continued chatting and taking their seats, and all the while the play had already began. Austin stood up at various points, paced, refilled his coffee, smoked, and continued to write, leaving the audience in a state of confusion and anticipation. The lights dim and the play finally begins. The stage lighting changes to resemble time passing from day to night. As the moonlight gradually brightens the kitchen in the upper stage, you notice Lee, Austin’s brother, inexplicably appear out of thin air. As he addresses Austin, one would expect Austin to jump in confusion, wondering how his brother suddenly came to be in the same room as him. Instead they begin conversing while Austin struggles to focus on his writing. The choice to have Austin on stage for ten minutes alone before the play begins to send the message that, well, he’s alone. In the original script, Shepard has them appear together; Austin first by candlelight, then Lee by moonlight. Directing Harrington to assume his role so early in the play solidifies him as the central character and emphasizes the question, “Where did Lee come from?”

The second direction Dunster uses to heighten the ambiguity of Austin and Lee’s entangled identities is at the last moment of the play before all the lights go out. The play ends with Austin and Lee facing each other off, as though in a typical Western showdown in the middle of the desert. In Shepard’s script, the lights fade softly to moonlight and then black as the brothers stand frozen facing each other. Dunster instead has the brothers circle each other slowly with a large, bright light behind them, accentuating their silhouettes. As the lights continue to fade fully to black and the brothers continue circling each other, the circle becomes smaller and smaller until they slowly walk into one another, merging their silhouettes into one. This big move by Dunster really makes one question whether or not the two brothers were, in fact, just Austin. 

Overall, the play was expertly executed and performed by all the cast and crew. If the aim was to leave the audience wondering whether the two brothers were the same person, they succeeded. These minor changes in staging had the impact of an elephant doing a front flip across the stage: impossible to ignore and hard to understand. Well done.

Bibliography

“New York Times: November 23, 1980.” Sam Shepard Saga, Jan 28, 2018, http://www.sam-shepard.com/press112380.html.

The Stakes Are High

I e-mailed my “Irrefutable” essay to a professor at my school because I was curious on what counter-arguments he could offer. His response was nothing less than dismissive: “These arguments are out-of-date,” “the debate is over,” etc. He, at least, helped remind me that my main point is that the Bible is unclear on this issue for various reasons. Hermeneutically, all arguments and counter-arguments for and against homosexuality are speculative—but the power lies in the arguments which humble biblical interpretations and clarify the ambiguity on the subject in a culture of religious certitude. 

This man, among many others who have written articles and books which I have studied, are loud in their opinions and menacing in their condescension. After researching Matthew Todd, I’ve realized/remembered the stakes of these toxic claims: murder, incarceration, internalized homophobia, trauma, psychological and physical torture, repression, addiction, and suicide.  

It’s not over. 

The power of words can be overwhelming. The negative and discouraging words of my professor were, surprisingly, not without sting. But I also have been given words—from God and the Holy Spirit—and they will not fall on deaf ears. I may not be able to silence the voice of religious oppression, but I can meet it with a voice just as vigorous and unrelenting; vigorous in respect and unrelenting in love. We can agree to disagree, but I will not be dismissed.

I'm not going anywhere.

Disclaimer: I do not advocate discrimination or adversity towards those who believe homosexuality is a sin for religious reasons. I advocate co-existence between those who differ on the subject, which can only be found in mutual respect. Oppressive and divisive language is found on both sides and we can change that, one conversation and relationship at a time.