I have been thinking about lament for a few months now. There are several reasons for this. One, is my recent time spent as a chaplain intern allowed me to journey with people in dark, difficult times. I have experienced close friends dying, others have had difficult diagnoses. Personally I am left wondering about my own experience of lament, and how I may have been trying to avoid elements of it over the years. The tough thing about avoidance of what we may consider "negative" feelings is that they are still there, doing damage to our bodies, our relationships and our psyche, all while we are trying so hard to ignore it all. It seems as if the pressure of all that "stuffing" simply invites that which is being stuffed to leak out in a different place.
Lament can be used in a couple of different ways. First it can be used as protest. I am reminded of our local nurses and hospitals that are in many ways lamenting what is going on in the work place and how that matters to staff, hospital workers, administrators and especially patients. The picket signs downtown show, in a public fashion, lament.
Lament can also be experienced as a dark night of the soul. A feeling of being in a desert, without the hope that you may actually claw your way out of that dry place. What brings me to a place of curiosity is this: it seems as if we (yes, I am certainly including me here) seem to want to bypass the pain, as if by not confessing it, it is sure to go away. We behave as if we believe, "if I ignore it, it doesn't exist." While we may not think about it in this way, it seems as if this is how we can often behave. If we admit we have something to lament, we might have been told to "buck it up." If we hide it we are often told we are either "in control" or have "courage." I suspect it might be (sometimes) less about courage, and more about fear that someone else think we can't keep it all together.
Why is it that we think along these lines? I have had plenty of conversations with folks to know that it is just not "me" who does this, it is "we" ~ or at least there is a bunch of us. What is the usefulness of lament? Is it useful? I suggest it is. And, it is needed. Now the question seems to be, "so now what?"
