I want a word that means
okay and not okay,
more than that: a word that means
devastated and stunned with joy.
I want the word that says
I feel it all all at once.
The heart is not like a songbird
singing only one note at a time,
more like a Tuvan throat singer
able to sing both a drone
and simultaneously
two or three harmonics high above it—
a sound, the Tuvans say,
that gives the impression
of wind swirling among rocks.
The heart understands swirl,
how the churning of opposite feelings
weaves through us like an insistent breeze
leads us wordlessly deeper into ourselves,
blesses us with paradox
so we might walk more openly
into this world so rife with devastation,
this world so ripe with joy.

For When People Ask 
by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer


Dear Westwood Family,

For the past year, I have longed for a word that means both “okay” and “not okay,” because I have not felt quite either. I have longed for a word that means both devastated and stunned with joy, a word that conveys the complexity of living one’s life with the paradox of grief/love. Most days, I feel it all, all at once. 

One of the sentences from the benediction I say every week captures this grief/love in the following blessing: “May God bless us with grief, with tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, and war, because all life has tears and all lives deserve tears. And through our tears, may we be moved to help turn their pain to joy.” I read the phrase “all things have tears, and all things deserve tears” in Richard Rohr’s most recent book, The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom for an Age of Outrage. I have always loved the prophets, especially Jeremiah and Isaiah, for their willingness to demand accountability from those in authority. Their righteous indignation resonated with my desire to reform my faith tradition and hold authority, within and outside the church, to account. However, over the last few years, the fire within me that fueled righteous anger has begun to produce tears of love, compassion, anger, sadness, and hope. 

My tears are the best way I can express this fiery passion, especially when I am preaching. In that moment of vulnerability, I feel it all, all at once, and I know that the Divine is pulling us toward love. I see this pull toward love in our church; I saw it in the clergy I worked with a few weeks ago; I see it in the seminary students I teach; and I see it in the comments and emails from listeners of The Progressive Christians Podcast. 

To be sure, I am grateful that you all have accepted my tears during worship over this past year. Thank you for normalizing seeing a six-foot-tall Black man cry once or twice a month! Thank you for accompanying me through this stage of faith. And may our tears move us to compassionate actions, so that we may turn suffering into joy.

Love and Solidarity
Rev. Dr. Christopher Carter