Last Month Tanya Marlow invited me to participate in her fall Tuesday series: Suffering and God. I was very pleased to be asked and wrote the following refledtion.
My brother died last May of a sudden heart attack. He was a builder. He died lifting a log. Everyone said it was good he didn’t suffer.
Yes, he didn’t suffer. But his loved ones did.
He didn’t have to endure being immobilized in a hospital, being dependent on others. That would have been very hard for him. That’s what every one said. It’s a good thing he didn’t have to go through that.
But his daughters, and wife, and best friend suffered the consequences. Suddenly he was gone. There was a big emptiness where his presence had been. They are still suffering.
This emptiness is the suffering.
When we lose those we have loved – when they die, or move, or we move, or we break up, or are cut off – there is a loss: an emptiness. Part of ourselves is gone.
for the rest of the article, go to Tanya Marlow
Newell Hendricks 