TODAY A CHILD DIED

Today we learned that friends lost a grandchild.  She was five years old and was hit by a car and killed.  The grief is immeasurable.  I cannot think of a single word of comfort.  Nor thought of comfort.  Unfair and without reason.  Nothing is adequate.  Nothing justifies such a loss.  

We know this happens all over the world, from starvation, stray bullets, abuse . . . .  When I see headlines, "Mother's Boyfriend Kills One-Year-Old," I want to turn away; the bile rises in my throat.  

These friends are people of faith and will endure.  But right now they must be asking why.  Why endure such pain?  Their loss, the parents' loss, and the child's own loss.  Her very life disappeared into the ether of eternity.  As a Christian myself I admit, there is no consolation; eternal life should come at the end of a long sojourn here on earth.  Not suddenly in the midst of a five-year-old's bicycle ride. 

Sometimes we simply must say "not fair," "not comprehensible," "not what God meant to be."   I know God grieves with this family.  I know God was there at the moment of the soul's passing to welcome this child to His side.  To love her as much as her parents do.  But it will be a long time before anyone can live with this grief in any way that hurts less than a knife in the belly.  

When our son died, a grown man but still young, that was the way I felt.  As if a knife were forever twisting and hollowing me out.  I didn't see how long anyone could survive that way.  But we did.  Over the years we became able to give thanks for his life and leave the trauma of that 9th Floor hospital room behind.  We became better at being parents who lost a child.  I don't know what else to wish for this family.  

Her name is Allie.  I don't have permission to say it, but I know without asking that they want her name remembered.  They will long to hear it spoken as the years pass. So if you pray, add Allie's family to your prayers.  

O Lord be with this family.  Help them survive this unspeakable loss.  Let the love that enfolds this family grow as they cling together bearing this tragedy. Come to them when they cannot seek you.  Help their faith protect them from despair as they look at the years ahead without this precious child.  And in your kindness help us all face death and tragedy as part of our humanity.  This we ask in the name of the suffering Christ who opens his arms to all who cry out and accepts their pain as his own.  Amen.