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June 29, 2010
Something so strong
A woman told me a story this weekend, and it stays with me. There's something unresolved here, yet something so strong.
When she was younger, this wonderful woman knew a priest who had worked on the Burma road in the war and still bore the scars, a broken man in many ways. He took her with him when he went on a difficult parish visit.
His churchwarden had just lost two sons in an accident on the beach. The children had been digging tunnels in the dunes and the sands fell in on them.
The mother and father were distraught. The churchwarden had only one question: 'Why the hell has this happened to us?'
And the vicar? The vicar said 'Why the bloody hell shouldn't it happen to you?'
And then he hugged him; hugged him tight.
This incident is probably not in any manuals of pastoral care. And maybe only a priest who had been broken on the Burma road could say it.
Something unresolved, certainly, yet something so strong.
Posted by Mr Bojangles at June 29, 2010 04:57 PM