If only...

We've just learned that my mom has cancer.

If you know my mom, if you've been around my mom in the last few years, if you love my mom like so many people do, then I imagine you felt that same sense of shock that I did when we received the news on Friday. Perhaps, like mine, your heart already feels a bit of its brokenness because of the looming questions and decisions that we must face. Or maybe you feel a sharp pain in your gut that I'm sure is some primal instinct we get when we want to turn tail and run, but realize we are trapped. But I pray that you also feel God's calming, soothing presence surrounding you, as I did while we listened carefully to the doctor's words.

If only it had been "just" pneumonia.

We don't know much, but already we do know that the next few weeks will likely be full of anxiety, questions, uncertainties, and decisions. The first round of test results is due back early this week, hopefully Tuesday. At that point, we will begin to discern the best way forward. I suppose the best way to keep folks abreast of all that is going on is via this blog, at least for now, so that's what I will do. In the meantime, we ask for your prayers and your support. I believe both can make an impossible situation bearable, both are powerful witnesses to our common bond in life and faith, and both are gifts we can share.

I receive a daily devotional from the Henri Nouwen Society , then send it out to my Emory students. They are always good, and occasionally seem eerily appropriate. Such was the case today.

Care, the Source of All Cure

Care is something other than cure. Cure means "change." A doctor, a lawyer, a minister, a social worker-they all want to use their professional skills to bring about changes in people's lives. They get paid for whatever kind of cure they can bring about. But cure, desirable as it may be, can easily become violent, manipulative, and even destructive if it does not grow out of care. Care is being with, crying out with, suffering with, feeling with.

Care is compassion. It is claiming the truth that the other person is my brother or sister, human, mortal, vulnerable, like I am.When care is our first concern, cure can be received as a gift. Often we are not able to cure, but we are always able to care. To care is to be human.

Friends, may we all learn the gift of CARING first, and may the cures we seek--as daughters, doctors, earth-lovers, teachers, friends, ministers, relatives, counselors, writers, and people-lovers--may they grow out of the deep care that we have for one another.

God bless each of you, now and always.