What things in your story are waiting to be told and heard?

Near the end of Luke’s gospel, two companions of Jesus ask him, “Are you the only stranger in [town] who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?  Jesus asks, “What things?”

Of all the moments in the trial of Derek Chauvin, the one that must surely have caused some considerable frustration for the defense was the way that the testimony of Darnella Frazier backfired for the defense.  It’s been speculated that the defense hoped to discredit the testimony of this young woman whose videotape of the murder of George Floyd went viral after she posted it on Facebook.  Instead of showing her as only being interested in fame or notoriety and perhaps not being sincere, it was obvious to everyone that she was clearly dealing with the trauma of having witnessed his murder.  Now 18 years old she testified “that she has been haunted by what she saw, sometimes lying awake at night ‘apologizing to George Floyd for not doing more and not physically interacting and not saving his life.’”

A victim of secondary trauma, she talked about how every time she closes her eyes, “she sees George Floyd’s face as he’s dying. She opens them up and he’s gone, she closes them, and she sees him again.”  

Instead of serving the purposes of the defense team, she and other numerous witnesses are leading the nation through an essential step in responding to an event as horrible as George Floyd’s murder, that of telling the story, recalling the experience, giving voice to the trauma that lives within them and having it be heard.

I’ve been doing a lot of reading about trauma these last 5 months and I am learning about the effect of losses and tragedies, from small ones to enormous ones, and the effect that trauma has on the mind, the body, and the soul.  To be traumatized is to be harmed by some external force that threatens to destroy one. Of course, this can be not just physical, but the damage can occur to our psyches as well.  The harm done there is no less damaging than more visible wounds. “Like mortal wounds”, writes Judith Herman, “such harm to the psyche can destroy a human life, and precisely because it is invisible, it can do so in secret, hidden ways.” 

Five years ago in February of 2016, news shared with me by a close family member began to affect me in ways that I have just recently begun to explore.  For 4 and a half years I think I lived in the numbness and paralysis of denial that is common when trauma hits.  I didn’t speak of it much to anyone. It’s a self-protective measure many of us take because it’s just easier to keep on going and compartmentalize the pain that way. After all, one must function day to day.  And while I’ve come to regard this experience of mine as one of trauma, I readily acknowledge that my experience of trauma is infinitely less significant than those who suffer from real violence, abuse, and the unspeakable harms that frequent the news each and every day from around the globe.  

And yet, trauma is registered within us whenever and however it happens. No matter the type, trauma is experienced in the body and it also affects the soul and spirit profoundly in ways that shape our lives, our choices, our journey.  Post-traumatic stress disorder occurs to varying degrees in many persons, and I find myself being no exception there.

So, understandably I’ve been reading lots of books on trauma recently. I’ve read:  

• The Body Keep the Score by Dr. Bessel Van der Kolk.  
• My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending our Hearts and Bodies by Resmaa Menakem. 
• Next on my list is “Healing Racial Trauma” by Sheila Wise Rowe

This week I stumbled onto an interview by Krista Tippet on the podcast On Being with the Rev. Dr. Serene Jones, president of Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York.  A quote from this interview prompted me to read her book “Trauma and Grace: Theology in a Ruptured World” this past weekend.  And while it speaks to my personal journey and the work I’m undergoing; I believe it has a word to say to life together as a Church as a whole.  It’s a word I believe we need to hear but likely will find it hard to receive or ever put into practice. Most days I’m more pessimistic that I would like to be about the state of the various communities within Church life. Still, I can dream of another world where greater health would be possible.  Responding well to trauma requires us as a collective body to speak our hard truths to one another of pain and harm experienced, to listen receptively without judgment, and to do the courageous work of reimagining a different kind of future together.

In the podcast Dr. Jones comments: “…one of the things that I learned from life, but it came to the fore in writing the book on trauma, is that not just individuals but whole communities undergo trauma, and that one of the characteristics of trauma is the deep human desire to repress it and to not deal with the story of the harms that have happened. But the truth of the matter is, with individual and collective trauma, is that the harm haunts you — haunts your dreams as an individual, haunts your collective unconscious as a society — until you tell the story; till you face the truth of the horrors that have happened. And I think what is happening in our nation today is, all of the harms of the past have come up to claim us, all at once, and they’re not gonna let us go until we take the stride of reckoning with them.”

It’s worth thinking about the effect of trauma on the collective body of a whole community.  What does it do to a community when trauma and harm and pain are not acknowledged?  What are the ways that life together could be altered if trauma were addressed publicly instead of being ignored?  Will the public telling of stories of observers of George Floyd’s murder, for example, contribute to the healing of the community in Minneapolis, to the healing of our nation?  Will Darnella Frazier find a bit of healing at having told her story in the trial?

Dr. Serene Jones draws on the work of Judith Herman to suggest that healing from trauma can best take place in a process in which the traumatized person is able to testify of her or his experience to someone safe who is willing to receive that story.  The trauma survivor offers testimony to the harm endured and the receiver, the one who has established a place of safety for the telling of the story gives witness to the trauma, the agony, the pain, the previously unspeakable agony.

The hearing and receiving of the story mean that the voice of pain is heard, and that “the plight of the one suffering no longer needs to be hidden in a dark corner of the soul” but can be heard as lament and worthy of repair, writes Jones.

When this telling of the story occurs, then both the testifier and the receiver can together begin to “reimagine a future that allows the trauma, in the long run, to be integrated into a broader and more expansive story of hope and hence of future possibilities for fullness of life.” (Jones)

I found myself wondering what it would take for a reckoning to happen within the life of the particular church denomination in which I live and move, a reckoning of the harm done, the harm that we all have had a part in.  Some have caused harm by their own complicity.  I have caused harm by my own complicity.  Others have caused harm within the body by inflicting deliberate harm.  

Could there be a “Truth-telling and Listening” commission named?  A “testifying and receiving of stories” commission.  What would it be like to offer a place, a safe place, for stories of harm to be told and received? From persons of color.  From women harmed by the church. From members of the queer community and those whom they love.  For the work of trauma to begin there must be a safe space for these stories of trauma.  Would that begin to break us out of the paralysis we are in and free us to be courageous enough to invite storytelling to take place?  I believe that we need to pass through the stage of lament of what has been and to have that received and honored by others before we can re-imagine a future together.

I haven’t shared the content of my story here, for example, because I wonder if this is a safe place to do so, to tell and receive those stories that we each have within us.

I believe we could … but whether we will … remains to be seen.

Jesus, the Risen Christ, offered to Cleopas and his companion a chance to reckon with the trauma they had witnessed.  He simply asked, “what things have you witnessed?” and in the sharing of their story of trauma with Jesus, the safe and trustworthy listener, they discovered a future that they could never have imagined.  I believe that the Risen Christ has the power to create a hospitable space among us where the unspeakable stories of trauma can be spoken.  Where they can be believed and heard and embraced.  And where a future we cannot imagine now can open up among us. Oh, may that come to pass among us, that Jesus would be present that way as we are together. 

Loving God, for the courage of those who speak their truths, for the kindness of those who listen, and for the future we have not yet imagined but that You promise to create among us if we ask, we give You thanks. Amen