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Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 8/11/23 Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 8/11/23

The Story of Abraham and Family Trauma Part 2

The stories, like that of Abraham and his descendants, enable us in our modern times to understand that stories of family dysfunction are not at all new. These stories give us much with which to wrestle with as we learn and ponder them anew.

The older woman was frail; months of cancer treatment had taken their toll. But she was undeterred as she made her way to a microphone, before more than two hundred family members, representing four generations. She began feebly, but her voice grew stronger with the recounting of her story. She spoke of a day –when she was no older than fifteen years of age – on which her father had taken her to a man on a nearby farm. She’d not understood that her father was selling her body for sexual favors to the man – until the man had done his deed and her father was pocketing the money the man had paid as he walked away. Violated, confused and physically hurt, she walked home with her father. But she knew that day that she would leave, and he would not continue to hurt her that way.

Her story was met with silence and tears. A sister, two years younger, stood at her seat, and with a tear-streamed face told the gathered family members that the same thing had happened to her. A child resulted from her encounters with the man. Her stepmother threw her out of the family home, and another family member took her child and refused to return him. He grew up in another household, without his mother, the man she later married, and his eight siblings.

So many lives had been affected.

This family story isn’t just any family story: It is my family’s story – the story of two of my Aunts and potentially others – perhaps even my own mother. It is a story that caused our family to reflect on all of the stories we’d heard from older family members about my grandfather. We’d all heard older relatives describe him as “evil,” “brutal,” “cruel” and “mean”; we’d heard that he’d physically harmed my grandmother, and two of my uncles told their own stories about how he’d beaten them, thrown axes at them.

What we saw that day was incomprehensible pain and suffering. As a priest and pastor who walks journeys with families who are broken, scarred, grieving, and fractured, I realize that stories of family trauma are as old as time itself – and that our scriptures tell us much about the ways in which we have struggled with one another, in the presence of a faithful God.

I wonder how the Church can be more supportive – and preach and teach the scriptural texts that have been given to us with more honesty and transparency.

7 This is the length of Abraham’s life, one hundred and seventy-five years. 8 Abraham breathed his last and died in a good old age, an old man and full of years, and was gathered to his people. 9 His sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron son of Zohar the Hittite, east of Mamre, 10 the field that Abraham purchased from the Hittites. There Abraham was buried, with his wife Sarah. (Genesis 25:7-10, NRSV)

A short text from the Book of Genesis appears to wrap the story of Abraham and his family in a lovely package with a bow on top: He lived a long life, was gathered to his people, and was buried with his wife, Sarah, by his sons, Ishmael and Isaac.

If only Genesis didn’t offer painstaking detail about the rest of Abraham’s life, this would seem to be a lovely epitaph. But Genesis does offer painstaking detail about Abraham’s life – from the time that God calls him to leave his father’s house and go to an unknown land that God would show him, until he had become an old man full of years.

The Book of Genesis reveals much more to us about Abraham’s family. Struggles with infertility plague at least three generations of the family – and Abraham’s firstborn son, Ishmael, is the product of his relationship with a slavewoman named Hagar, who with her child become expendable – and are left to die – after Sarah bears a child of her own. Abraham’s second son, Isaac, is left to bear the scars of nearly being sacrificed by his father. After the attempted sacrifice, Sarah leaves to find a home of her own, away from Abraham. When she dies, Abraham remarries and begins a new family – at well past 100 years of age (Genesis 25).

So after his wife has died, after his relationships with Ishmael and Isaac have been fractured, after he has started another family, Abraham dies, and Ishmael and Isaac – after more than 70 years apart – come together, in spite of the scars they both bore, to bury their father in the place where Sarah had been buried.

I want to believe that these sons could, when they are reunited, share their experience of their father, learn from one another how both had suffered, find some bond in their suffering, find some way forward together. That would make for a neater and tidier ending to Abraham’s story.

Genesis doesn’t tell us that any healing takes place when these two estranged sons meet again to perform the duty of burying their father.

Indeed, the suffering in Isaac’s family doesn’t end with his near-death experience. Isaac’s own family would be torn apart when the younger of his twin sons, Jacob, would trick his infirm father and cheat his older brother, Esau, of his blessing and birthright. Jacob’s family would be torn apart with the story of Joseph (Genesis 37-50).

The suffering continued through at least three generations.

But, whatever Ishmael and Isaac believe that they have learned of Abraham, and whatever perceptions they have taken from their own final encounters with their father, they have seen something very powerful about Abraham’s God: They have seen that Abraham’s God is unquestionably faithful. Abraham’s God keeps God’s promises – showing up in the desert to renew the covenant with Ishmael, showing up at the altar to provide a sacrifice in place of Isaac. Abraham’s God is faithful – even if it might appear to his sons that Abraham has not been faithful to them. Ishmael and Isaac would go on, in their own way, to embrace the story of a faithful God and pass that story along to their offspring – a faith story that has lived on, in the faith traditions of Jews, Muslims and Christians.

More than 50 years after a father who had sold his daughters’ bodies had died, a dying daughter came to a family reunion to tell her heartbreaking story of how she had been violated and harmed. A sister was empowered to speak and tell her truth, as well. They told a story of family trauma that has no neat, tidy wrapping, a story that has affected multiple generations. They came with scars – theirs, ours, those of our ancestors – and unspeakable heartache, pain, and grieving, the reality of our humanity etched into our souls. Our family came together with great need to see those scars, and to hear and bear witness to each other’s stories.

Our hopes and expectations for neat, tidy epitaphs may be unrealistic. But in the moments that we are brought together, there is opportunity for healing: for engaging in hard dialogue, for respectfully and lovingly hearing one another’s stories, in diligently working to see the image and likeness of God in one another and in those who came before us. For indeed, it seems that it is only in coming together to share the painful truths that we can find our way forward in healing and love.

Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 7/28/23 Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 7/28/23

The Story of Abraham and Family Trauma Part 1

Year “A” of the Revised Common Lectionary offers worshippers the chance to re-visit the stories of Abraham and the next three generations of his descendants These texts from the Book of Genesis are shared with our Jewish friends, as well, and some people – Christians and Jews alike, find these texts traumatizing. To some extent, they are. However, the stories, like that of Abraham and his descendants, enable us in our modern times to understand that stories of family dysfunction are not at all new. These stories give us much with which to wrestle with as we learn and ponder them anew.

When Abraham settled in Canaan, God entered into a covenant with Abraham and promised him more descendants than the stars in the sky and the sands on the shore (Genesis 15). There was just one problem: Abraham’s wife, Sarah, appeared to be barren. They were advancing in years, and Sarah had not conceived and borne a child.

It was probably good that Sarah didn’t conceive early in their marriage: Twice (Genesis 12 and Genesis 20), Abraham passed Sarah off to foreign kings as his sister, so that Abraham would not be harmed because he was traveling with his beautiful wife. Twice, these foreign kings took the beautiful Sarah, whom they believed to be Abraham’s sister, for themselves – for a time, that is, until their households were punished because of their relationships with Sarah. Genesis reveals quite a bit about Sarah and her opinions (She is far from silent!), but readers are not told how Sarah reacted to having been placed in the hands of Pharaoh and King Abimelech. Maybe she expected to have to commit herself to whatever she needed to do to keep Abraham safe. Maybe she felt betrayed, violated, and ashamed. Maybe she wondered if her inability to conceive might have resulted from her having been taken as the “wife” of other men.

When Sarah and Abraham continued on their way, and still no children had been born to them despite God’s promise of descendants, Sarah took matters into her own hands, offering up her Egyptian slave woman, Hagar, to Abraham so that he might have children through her. Hagar conceived and bore Abraham a son, named Ishmael (Genesis 16). But as Genesis also teaches us, humankind really hasn’t changed much over the ages, and as we might imagine, conflict quickly arises between Sarah and Hagar. Ultimately, Sarah – at age 90 – does indeed bear a child of her own, who is named Isaac. With Hagar and Ishmael’s “usefulness” having ended, Sarah demands that Abraham remove them from the encampment (Genesis 21). And, so, the last encounter recorded in Genesis between Abraham and his firstborn son, Ishmael, takes place on the fateful day that Abraham takes Ishmael and Hagar and leaves them in the desert, with a single skin of water, ostensibly to die. Ishmael is a young teen by this point – old enough to understand, and certainly to be scarred by, the fate to which his father is leaving him and his mother.

All won’t go smoothly for Isaac, either: We are told in Genesis 22 that God tested Abraham in asking that Isaac be sacrificed. The last encounter between Abraham and Isaac recorded in Genesis takes place when Abraham bound Isaac on the altar, preparing to sacrifice him to God. For all of the arguments that Abraham had previously given God for sparing the towns of Sodom and Gomorrah when God is preparing to destroy them, Abraham met God’s request to sacrifice Isaac with seemingly little to no resistance.

Hebrews 11:17-19 extols Abraham for having trusted in God when he prepared to sacrifice Isaac. Perhaps that is true. Perhaps a broken Abraham wonders the price that he must pay for what he has done to Ishmael and Hagar. However Abraham has received this request from God, we fail to ask how Isaac has been scarred and traumatized by this episode. Isaac is old enough to understand that there is to be a sacrifice – and even asks Abraham about the lamb for the sacrifice. Does he truly understand when he is bound and tied that he is the intended sacrifice – until, that is, God steps in and provides a ram? What does Isaac tell Sarah when they return home? How does a mother begin to understand a husband’s need to follow a command from God to sacrifice a child for whom she’d waited 90 years?

There are no further scenes of Abraham together with his family after the sacrifice. Sarah leaves Abraham’s encampment, and dies in another land, where Abraham purchases land for a burial place. Isaac settles in another land, as well.

The suffering doesn’t end with Isaac’s near-death experience; it continues through at least three generations.

Isaac married his kinswoman, Rebekah, who also struggled to conceive. When she finally became pregnant, she gave birth to twins who emerged from her womb embroiled in their own battle. The older twin, Esau, grew up to be an outdoorsy hunter and gatherer. The younger twin, Jacob, received his name because he literally was born holding on to Esau’s heel. Jacob’s envy of his brother as heir would ultimately tear apart their family, when Jacob (at his mother’s urging) tricked a then-infirm Isaac and cheated his older brother, Esau, of his blessing and birthright.

Jacob made a life for himself apart from Esau, and settled with his mother’s brother, Laban. Believing that he had married his true love, Laban’s younger daughter, Rachel, he had been tricked by his uncle, and had married older sister, Leah, instead (“This is not done in our country – giving the younger before the firstborn.” Genesis 29:26). Although Leah bore several sons for Jacob, his favorite son was Rachel’s firstborn, a son named Joseph. Joseph became the target of his older brothers’ jealousy and rage – and while the older brothers plotted to kill Joseph, they ultimately chose to sell him into slavery, pocketing twenty silver coins for him, and representing to their father that he had been killed by wild animals (Genesis 37:22-34). Jacob, too, would know separation from the son he loved.

All was not peaceful or happy among Abraham and his descendants. All is not happy in many families. If we tend to feel alone in family dysfunction, we remember that even the family of our ancestor most chosen and loved by God, Abraham, struggled. Faith persisted, even amid that struggle.

$The misfortune (good fortune?) of a stress fracture$

Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 1/17/23 Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 1/17/23

The misfortune (good fortune?) of a stress fracture

So, from the vantage point of the wheelchair, I learned a few lessons that I hope will be helpful to others. The lessons start with a full assessment of a church campus, and an open invitation to the congregation and persons who visit the campus regularly to offer ideas about how the campus can truly serve all of God’s people.

Monday, October 31, 2022 started out as a glorious clergy Sabbath, as I headed out for my usual 4-mile walk with our younger dog, Maggie. Before we made it back home, I realized that my ankle was bothering me. I did a few flexing exercises after I came in, and shrugged off my concerns.

But by the time I had run to the grocery store and the pet food store, I was in pain.

Within a week, what started as minor pain had intensified to the point that I was unable to bear weight on the ankle, and I found myself in a wheelchair, for the first time in my life.

The first trip to the orthopedist yielded no answers: No fracture appeared on the X-ray. An ultrasound showed no blood clot or other concern. I was given a steroid pack, and told to give the ankle a rest for a few days.

That day was the beginning of a two-month (and counting) journey.

It took a few weeks (and more than one X-ray, an MRI and a CT scan…) for the orthopedist to diagnose the “problem” as a stress fracture. In the meantime, I’d been navigating around our church in a wheelchair, and eventually, on a knee scooter, with an orthopedic boot.

And I learned a few things: Our campus is very accessible – minimal steps, ramps at all of our entrances, and designated parking for persons with hangtags. But seeing our campus from the vantage point of a wheelchair was eye-opening. Restrooms posed a particular problem: Although I was able to hobble out of the wheelchair at the restroom door, I learned quickly that my attempts to navigate entry in the wheelchair were nearly futile. There were no automatic doors, and the entry doors were heavy enough to be very tough to manage from the seat of the wheelchair.

That one issue made me wonder about a few other things, as well – like whether we actually had sufficient accessible parking, and whether our ushers and greeters would always be on the ready to assist persons arriving on Sunday mornings who couldn’t open the heavy entry doors. A member of our parish family who uses a motorized scooter asked me about serving as a lector – and while we easily arranged for her to do so, I realized we’d not made a point of letting our parish family know that everyone was welcome in all of our ministries, all of the time.

Where to begin?

Be intentional.
Let everyone in your church family know that the review of the campus is taking place, and invite feedback. Reach out intentionally to persons who rely on wheelchairs, scooters, walkers, canes and other mobility assistance devices (or whose family members rely on such devices) to invite them to be part of the conversation.
Start with a parking-lot view.
Do you have adequate designated parking for persons with hangtags? (Ask someone to walk through the parking lot on a Sunday morning to see if anyone who has a hangtag has had to park in a space not designated for hangtag parking.)
Should thought be given to even more designated parking for persons who may not have hangtags but rely on mobility assistance devices, temporarily or permanently?
Should thought be given to designated parking for expectant mothers or families with newborn infants?
From the parking lot, head to the doors.
Is there signage to identify the best accessible entrance? Is designated accessible parking closest to the best accessible entrance? Are there any automatic entry doors? Before worship, ushers and greeters can help tremendously by watching for persons who need help with heavy doors and opening those doors to assist with entry.
Stepping inside: How accessible are your interior spaces?
How accessible are your spaces? Is there a place for wheelchairs in your worship space? [If not, might a pew or some chairs be removed to allow space?]
Are spaces for learning and fellowship easily accessible? Is there signage to point to alternative accessible paths/elevators?
Don’t forget conveniences.
Keep an extra wheelchair, walker or steady cane on-hand and readily accessible to ushers or greeters should an unexpected need arise (Someone might realize, upon arrival, that a walker or cane was left at home accidentally, or experience some uncertainty in navigating the space.).
How accessible are your restrooms – really?
Try entering your restrooms in a wheelchair, and invite others who don’t rely on a wheelchair to try. Would someone who is unable to stand and climb out of the wheelchair to enter the restroom be able to enter easily? Are there any furniture items that need to be removed in order for a person in a wheelchair or with a walker to enter and navigate easily?
If one restroom is better suited for a person in a wheelchair, might there be a sign to help persons locate that restroom?
Is there a space for changing infant diapers that is accessible to a parent in a wheelchair?
Think outside the box.
We may perceive that older spaces which truly weren’t designed with accessibility in mind would require costly renovations that aren’t in our budgets. Instead, we’re called to think about how ministry can happen differently in areas that are accessible.
Is the choir situated in a space that requires the use of stairs? Perhaps a ramp could be constructed – but if a ramp really isn’t in your immediate plans, invite musicians to prayerfully consider other spaces from which the choir could offer its musical gifts – and communicate well so that church family members who might have felt excluded know that they are welcome.
Can differently-abled readers access spaces where scripture lessons are normally read? If not, consider having a hand-held microphone in an accessible location. Again, communicate well so that church family members who might have an interest and have felt excluded know that they are welcome.
Reassuring church family members that serving as an usher/greeter, lector, or assisting with Communion is very much possible for someone who relies on a mobility assistance device can open worlds of possibility – and help all of God’s people feel welcome to serve.
Renovations may not be beyond the realm of possibility.
Many churches that have some challenges to accessibility know that they don’t have the funds to embark upon thoughtful renovations to accomplish accessibility needs. But don’t rule out the possibility before doing a bit of exploration. Are grants or other funding available from your denomination, city, county or state? Invite a team to investigate funding possibilities. If funds may be available, invite proposals from build-design firms specializing in accessibility projects to help with some thoughtful planning, tackling the areas of greatest need first.
Think beyond mobility assistance.
Assistive listening systems (ALSs) can provide support for those who are experiencing hearing loss. Electronic magnifiers can provide support for those who are experiencing visual loss for reading Bibles, hymnals, or orders of service during worship. [Another idea: Have orders of service accessible online, and have links to hymnals or Bible browsers available so that persons experiencing visual losses can use their own devices (with which they are familiar and comfortable) to access and magnify those worship tools.]

Our houses of worship should be the places where all of God’s people feel welcome – and there’s no substitute for giving focused time and attention to considering just how welcoming our spaces are for all worshipers and guests. It’s a great way to start a new year!

Rev. Dr. Dorothy Sanders Wells

The Rev. Dr. Dorothy Sanders Wells is an Episcopal priest who often writes about justice and equity issues for God's people.

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Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 12/9/22 Rev. Dr. Dorothy Wells 12/9/22

New Lessons from the Grinch

Christmas was not, for me, a time of joy and happiness, and it certainly wasn’t yet about celebrating God in the flesh having been born among us. Christmas was just lonely and sad.

I wasn’t a fan of Christmas when I was a child. Christmas was, for me, a long, two-week winter break during which I felt disconnected from the settled routine of school, learning and friends that brought an escape from the troubles of home. My parents had their own struggles – my mother, with mental illness and my father, with alcoholism. Christmas was not, for me, a time of joy and happiness, and it certainly wasn’t yet about celebrating God in the flesh having been born among us.

Christmas was just lonely and sad.

Maybe that’s why I’ve always been drawn to Dr. Suess’ The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. As a child, I could identify with a Grinch who didn’t experience happiness at Christmas. The good news is the Grinch wasn’t stuck in his unhappy place; I needed to know that I wouldn’t be forever stuck in my own unhappy place, either.

As the years passed, I began to think a bit more critically about this beloved children’s tale – and whether its message was quite as simple as we all might like it to be.

The story introduces us to a Grinch who lived in seeming isolation above the Whos in Whoville, and with little interaction with them, save his growing annoyance with them every year at Christmas (apparently, only at Christmas), with their presents, and feasting, and oh-so-joyful singing and music-making. His annoyance grew so great, indeed, that it became an obsession: He needed to keep the Whos’ happy Christmas from coming, at all costs. And so the “mean one, Mr. Grinch” came down to Whoville and took all of the presents, the food, the decorations, the trappings, thinking that he had stopped Christmas from coming. But to the stunned Grinch’s surprise, the Whos still gathered together, holding hands and singing carols – just as if nothing had happened.

My own puzzler starts puzzling: Just why did the Whos’ happy celebration bother the Grinch so much? Maybe the Grinch was lonely, or felt excluded and cut off from celebrating the day with his Whoville neighbors. Maybe there was some sadness or loss that the Grinch associated with Christmas.

It didn’t appear that those Whos, for all of their joyful celebrating, had ever tried to include their Grinchy neighbor – who didn’t look at all like them, or act like them – by inviting him to join their celebration, or taking him a gift, a plate of their Roast Beast feast, or even a can of Who-Hash.

It seems that the Whos paid no attention to the Grinch at all – that is, until he came down to pay them an unexpected – and, no doubt unwanted – visit.

Maybe the Whos didn’t really understand Christmas, either, not nearly so much as they (or we) thought. Maybe its message had eluded them, just as it had eluded the Grinch.

Perhaps if the Whos had initiated contact with their isolated neighbor, to invite him to share in their joyful celebration, they might truly have shown that they understood the message of Christmas. It’s the very act of radical hospitality that the Whos showed after the Grinch came down to Whoville, after he returned their presents, food and decorations – inviting him to join their celebration, and even to carve the Roast Beast – that helped release him from the unhappy place where he was stuck and gave him a new lease on life.

But the Grinch shouldn’t have had to invite himself to the community by attempting to ruin their celebration – and taking all that the Whos had – in order to get their attention.

All grown up now, and part of the organized Church, I find myself thinking about those Whos – and the larger lesson for faith communities, particularly in a post-COVID world. Here’s what I think: However festively we celebrate our traditions, however joyfully we sing our hymns, however piously we display our faith, if we fail to acknowledge the presence of the neighbor who sits just beyond our doors – the neighbor whom we see but whose story isn’t known to us, the neighbor who may not look like us, the neighbor who may not know our traditions, the neighbor who may be completely alone and struggling – we pay lip service to what we claim that we believe.

After the past two years of sickness, grief, loss, and, of course, the broken habit of church attendance, faith communities are struggling to find their identity and footing. Some churches have closed permanently during this season of our lives because there simply aren’t enough churchgoers to continue to support them. Some churchgoers have indefinitely postponed a return to worship and church activities, while other churchgoers have made no plans to return. And when the habit of worship was broken, some moved on to other activities.

About now, our faith communities should be discerning new ways to connect with suffering neighbors to extend some invitations to holy and radical hospitality. About now, our faith communities should be discerning how we serve in a vastly different environment – and how we visibly demonstrate our relevance as bearers of the love of God and the light of Christ in a broken, fractured world. If ever there were a time that the world needed to see the Church as a unifier, as a place of welcome and caring for all of God’s people, as a place committed to loving neighbor, and as a place of holy hospitality, this is the time. Our buildings are replete with places and spaces to welcome new ministries – to help address needs around food insecurity, childcare, literacy, addiction recovery, mental health, physical exercise, legal aid, immigration support, employment networking, community music lessons – that bring healing of body, mind and spirit to neighbors who desperately need to know that we’re there.

It’s that kind of invitation to radical hospitality that we in our faith communities should prayerfully discern – right about now – so that our neighbors aren’t left to struggle alone.

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