Brian McLaren on Cancer & Theology
March 26, 2012 · 2 comments
This post is a part of a series which features an assortment of adroit voices exploring how to think theologically about cancer and those who have it. Read the series introduction or view all posts in the series.
My wife, Grace, and I have four adult children, now in their 20's and 30's. Back in 1990, when our third child, Trevor, was 6 years old, he was diagnosed with Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia, cancer of the white blood cells. He was assessed as "intermediate risk," which meant he had a 60-70% chance of surviving for five years. That's better than 50-50, but it still was pretty scary for Grace and me, who were just in our mid-30's at the time.
When he was initially hospitalized, I was out of state and had a 5+-hour drive back to the hospital. I'll never forget those agonizing hours of praying and cussing and crying, roughly in that order, again and again and again.
I was a pastor at the time, and I remember the first sermon I preached after Trevor's diagnosis: it was entitled either (I can't remember for sure) "Finding" or "Making" "...Meaning in the Madness."
The word "madness" expressed some honesty about the pain that we faced. And whether the title began with "finding" or "making," it suggested that meaning wasn't necessarily obvious and easy to find: it needed to be sought or constructed in the midst of pain and tears and unanswered questions.
We had a lot of folks try to comfort us with the standard sort of thing... "I'm claiming a healing for your son in Jesus' name," or "God must have planned this for a reason," or "It will be exciting to see how God uses this to bring glory to His Name," and so on. We tried to accept their well-meaning intentions, even though the theology behind their attempts at comfort often made us wince and added to our pain. Cheaply dispensed meaning doesn't mean much for people experiencing madness.
Several times, people simply came up to us and hugged us or said they loved us, and that helped more than anything. People sent us money - knowing that when your time and energy are drained, a few extra dollars can mean a lot. People showed up and did stuff for us... cleaned our house, did our laundry, things that we wouldn't have asked them to do, but once it was done, it helped both practically and emotionally.
It was the ministry of presence, as an African friend calls it, that meant the most to us... just being with us, whatever might happen. Presence means everything, and theologically, I think it is the deepest thing I know about God and cancer. God was with us when we were praying, crying, and cussing... when we felt buoyed up and when we felt drained dry. God was with us when blood counts looked good and when they looked terrible. God was with us in waiting rooms and infusion rooms and parking lots and emergency rooms. God was with us when we didn't feel God was with us... and there were those times.
"I will be with you, no matter what" — said by human beings, but always echoing God's promise — means more, and matters more, than anything else... especially when everything else seems like madness.
Trevor came through after 3.5 years of daily chemotherapy. Our family was marked forever by those years. We feel bonded to other families who have gone down this road, and we feel even more deeply bonded with those who have lost family members to cancer. We know something of the madness, and of the meaning.
As is usually the case, songwriter Bruce Cockburn captures it best for me: "Those who know don't have the words to tell, and those with the words don't know so well."
Brian McLaren is an author, speaker, and networker among innovative Christian leaders, thinkers, and activists. He blogs at , and has written , including his forthcoming (September 11, 2012) release, .
Tagged as: brian mclaren, cancer and theology, christianity, guest blog, ministry of presence, theology
Brian, great post, and I’m sorry your family went through this. Your book Naked Spirituality is really helping me through my own terminal cancer (at age 39), when God doesn’t seem present, and there seems to be a lack of meaning.
Eric: I’m slowly making my way through Naked Spirituality as well… It’s great stuff.