How in the heck do you respond to this?

[springhill]

At my son's baseball game tonight, one of the mothers was taking about this boy who died of cancer. Very sad. What really just floored me was the comment evidently from the of the family members that it was a blessing from God because it brought the family so close together. Is this a comment of someone sane or a religious fanatic?

[WCGreen]

1. It's someone in deep personal anguish who is trying

desperately to make sense of a senseless part of life....

[Lerkfish]

7. I think this is it, also. Grief is a strange thing. You grab at any straw

to try to make sense of loss.

I think its ok for people to deal with it however they can. I think they're just hurting themselves in the long run to think its "god's plan", because the next step is that God wants to kill people or the bereaved think they did something wrong to deserve it.

Religion as solace during grief is helpful, religion as rationalization for grief leads to other problems.

[WCGreen]

11. People say that kind of stuff all the time...

Invoking god...

Just to help make it through all the downsides of living....

[BuyingThyme]

2. Religion aside, it's looking at the bright side.

Which is all you have in such situations.

[Mythsaje]

3. Rationalization...

Plain and simple...

[Erika]

4. Grief does strange things.

Anything to lessen the impact of the loss of a loved one on the psyche.

[shadowknows69]

5. I think its natural to look for meaning in tragedy

but sometime tragedy is just tragedy. If good things result from it then fine but I don't think I'd describe it as a "Blessing", but whatever gets them through the night I guess.

[TygrBright]

6. Huh. Good thing no one made an asinine remark like that to me...

...at my Dad's memorial service. Sometimes I'm not a very nice person. I mighta said something like "Gee thanks. May God bless you, too. Again, and again, and again...." Or I mighta quoted that bit from the Bible about rain on the just and the unjust. Or I mighta just coldcocked 'em.

Feh. The cruelties people perpetrate and ascribe to God...

disgustedly,
Bright

P.S. Yes, I know the person who made that grotesquely cruel and insensitive remark was probably not being intentionally vicious, but anyone THAT insensitive probably won't pick up on a subtle hint about it. A two-by-four upside the head MIGHT get through to them.

[Caoimhe]

8. I agree, it's a presumptuous statement

at least it brought the family together? that in itself gives the gossip the power to judge the victims family togetherness and unbelievabley enough... how a child's death will help them bond. Sorry, grief is one thing. Mean gossip is another.

[Journeyman]

9. We neither know the torment in other human hearts. . .

nor the depth of their desire for love over all. Uncomprehending at the best of times, in the worst we need empathy from the depths of our beings and compassion without measure, for it is in the giving that we open ourselves to receive in our turn. Smile warmly, set a twinkle in your eye for the love of humanity, and recognize that all we do is the best we can be.

[hopeisaplace]

10. my heart aches for their loss..I don't want to ever know this kind of pain

I hope they find a way to cope...maybe this was their way, who knows though..sad
beyond words.

[Nicole]

12. I wouldn't

I think I would be speechless if a member of the family said that.

[Raster]

13. Hmm, not a very close family to begin with, eh?

[banana republican]

14. I lost my first wife in 1984

she died from complications resulting from diabetes. The pain caused by the degeneration of the nerve tissue is very painful. She described it once to me as being like a tooth ache in her legs that she could get rid of.

There is indeed a profound sense of senselessness to it all. Read the book of Ecclesiastes.

As she was dying in the hospital I had a dream. In the dream I dreamed the I was speaking to god. He said that if I wanted he would return my wife to me; but that she would live out he life in pain and she would live in a wheelchair. I said that I am not god; who am I to make such a decision.

A short time later the doctor came to me and gave me the wedding ring she had worn for 5 years.

I grieved for 5 years, lost my business, lost people who I thought were my friends (but I am glad to be rid of) and found many new friends and my faith.

Remember this if you remember nothing else:

We are spiritual beings having a human experience; not human beings having a spiritual experience.

Peace.

[bluerum]

15. hey banana, my thoughts went out to you when I read your post.

I too lost a wife and grieved for over three years. No time is too long or too short for such a process. There are many personal transformations that need to take place.

I think that when the personal transformations are not acknowledged and accepted, then one must reach for other understandings of the bad things that can happen during our lives.

One day, shortly before my debilitating grief suddenly seemed to dissipate, I read something that has stuck with me as a kind of mantra:
Don't let the seeds keep you from enjoying the watermelon.

I really think this silly little phrase helped me to let my wife and my grief go.