A Simple Change in Language, A Profound Spiritual Lesson (Reprised From 19. August.2024)

Postscript: 

Marsha died this morning at @7:00 EST, at the IHM Motherhouse Campus in Monroe, MI. I am grateful for the opportunity to have worked with her for many years and particularly during these last weeks and months. Marsha was under hospice care, met with me weekly or oftener (recently), and was accompanied in close friendship and sisterhood by many IHM Sisters and Associates. They surrounded her when she died as is the IHM custom and as Marsha had always wanted.  I am reprising this piece today and have redacted it slightly to bring out important truths; I have also used Marsha's name throughout.

Original Piece: 

One of the persons I accompany in Spiritual direction (Marsha West) is actively dying. We met today for only a half hour, and during that half hour, we focused on a lesson that is fundamental to spirituality and maintaining one's focus on God, even in the presence of terrible pain and weakness. I learned it from my own Director and try to pass it on to those I work with. It's a "simple" lesson with far reaching consequences, and yet, it is not one that is easy to do! I am hoping I can share here, what it is and something of why it is so important. The lesson is this. When you are speaking of what you feel -- especially if the feelings are multiple or at least seem antithetical, or when you are speaking of what is true and what you feel, please do NOT use the word BUT to link the clauses. Use AND instead! Let me give you an example.

It begins with a relatively positive statement: "I had a great idea today!" and then, all-too-often, the person says something like, "BUT I am afraid I don't have the expertise to carry it out!" Suddenly the excitement of the first statement is quenched with the second more negative or critical statement. If BUT were replaced with AND, this would not happen. Today Marsha said, "I feel so sick and weak! I am not capable of being myself." I asked her then to tell me who she was.  I suggested she imagine doing a school assignment and write 4 or 5 sentences affirming her identity. We tried it together and her first sentence was, "I live within the presence of God." She then followed this immediately with, "BUT I don't find any comfort in this!" We talked about what she was experiencing, of course, and then I brought her back to her first sentence and how she had followed it up; I pointed out the BUT in the middle of the construction. I asked her to replace it with AND. 

She then repeated,"I live in the presence of God AND I find no comfort in it." At first, she thought there was not much difference between using but vs and, but pretty quickly she said both sentences over again out loud, finishing again with, "I live in the presence of God, BUT I find no comfort in it." What she saw was the "but" in the sentence negates the whole first part and caused her to focus only on the second part, "I find no comfort (in living in God's presence)". Then she said again, "I live in the presence of God AND I find no comfort in it." And she began to see that replacing but with AND, manages to hold both truths together simultaneously. Both parts remained alive for her, both things remained true, and she could feel those truths even though it was uncomfortable to live them in tension with one another. 

In fact, holding both truths together with AND, does a lot more than this. It allows one to focus on the truth that one lives in the presence of God even when one is finding no apparent comfort in that --- a very positive affirmation that diminishes the power and scariness of the second clause. As one continues to pay attention to the fact that one dwells in the presence of God even though there are negative feelings at the same time, it allows one to find comfort precisely where there was none present before! It allows one to find God in the unexpected and even in the unacceptable place, right where Christ made him present through his public life and cross! And even when we are not speaking of God directly, we will gradually feel stronger when we substitute AND for BUT in our constructions. 

Marsha then moved on to make several other statements of identity. "I am beloved of God. . .", "I am a disciple of Christ. . ,", "I am a loving mother and grandmother. . ."; each was followed with a critical or self-doubtful BUT statement. And finally, "I am an IHM Associate. . . " She looked at each of these and, more and more securely, began to hold everything together with AND: "I am a disciple of Christ and I feel incredibly weak!" "I am a loving mother and grandmother AND it is so hard to die [and leave them without me]!" And finally, "I am an IHM associate AND. . ." (Marsha stopped here and looked at me; she was stunned and radiant with surprise and joy.) At this point Marsha found there was no BUT statement waiting to detract from the first half of the sentence, no critical voice telling her she was incapable, or doing it wrong, etc.). She felt only gratitude, not least because she was coming to see she didn't need to lose a sense of identity in dying into the presence of God. This was the gift of the IHM Sisters' and Associates' welcoming and sustaining love to Marsha. 

Being completely honest about what one feels is not a betrayal of one's faith. It helps demonstrate how strong that faith is. Marsha knew this, but as she approached death, it was harder to hang onto! Expressing such complete honesty results in the kind of statement Jesus made from the cross when he cried out "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Faith is held together with the sense of abject aloneness and abandonment; Jesus still calls upon his God in faith.

Yes, Marsha was a woman of deep faith, a woman who worked hard in spiritual direction over the years, a woman who loved deeply and generously, AND she was a woman who found dying demanding and difficult as she also found ways to rest in God while letting go of any need to control things or make God measure up to her expectations. In these moments she found God always surpassed those expectations in surprising ways!! I reminded her of Paul's quote from 2 Cor 12:9, "My grace is sufficient for you, my power is made perfect in weakness," for that is what she practiced in this session, as she held two seemingly antithetical facts together: 1) the graced presence and power of God AND 2) the incredible weakness she experienced as she felt the diminishment of dying overtaking her strength. Holding these two experiences together in a single act of faith and love is often the essence of being human. Practicing using AND instead of BUT can help us learn and internalize this lesson.

Used with Permission: My thanks to Marsha who gave permission for me to tell the story of this session and of her own struggle in faith and dying. In fact, she hoped I would do so. Otherwise, of course, our sacred work was entirely confidential.