Hope: Faith’s Weaker Cousin?
Tom Pfeffer, my sister’s brother-in-law, was an extraordinary priest who was pastor of a mostly Hispanic parish before he died in April of 2004. Before that, he was pastor of a rural Iowa parish where he noticed on frequent funeral trips to the cemetery a lone grave outside the official Catholic cemetery.
Tom made it known that he wanted to be buried next to the man, also outside the official cemetery. It reportedly caused a stir among some who didn’t want their beloved Tom to be buried in “unholy” ground. But Tom won.
Unlike many of his contemporaries, he didn’t view suicide as a cowardly act resulting from despair. For him, compassion trumped passing judgment. He understood that people can be so down on themselves and their lives that they are driven to take their own lives.
I’m writing about this in an attempt to shed some light on the subject of hope. I’ve had a start to a blog on this subject for some time but just couldn’t get it written because I hadn’t figured out exactly what I wanted to say.
(After reading this blog, Jim Stessman, my friend and former newspaper colleague who reviews these blogs pre-publication, noted that Tom, who was his friend, too, “was a cheerful guy whose face communicated hope.”)
It
occurred to me that I could get into the subject by considering its opposite,
hopelessness.
Thankfully, I haven’t experienced hopelessness personally. But many people do, and I imagine it as the worst thing that can happen to you. In the case of hopelessness that results in suicide, it may be the worst thing that can happen to family and friends as well.
I’ve been to places where you would expect to find hopelessness. I experienced terrible poverty while living in South America, but I was shocked about the lack of basic human resources that I found in several later trips to El Salvador.
I remember, for instance, entering a rural shack in the extreme heat and finding an elderly woman sitting alone on the edge of a bed. The shack had little circulation, no fan and sparse furnishings. The woman could barely see or hear and her leg was swollen terribly. My niece, a wonderful nurse, examined her and said she probably had, among other things, untreated congenital heart disease. It likely remained untreated.
Conditions in El Salvador, for me, are a recipe for hopelessness, but you don’t get that impression from Salvadorans, the majority of whom seem resourceful, tenacious and relatively happy.
Still, my experience in El Salvador helps me understand hopelessness, which should help me understand hope. There seems to be a kind of hope that’s superficial, expressed as “I hope it doesn’t snow; that I get a raise; that my candidate wins the election;” or even that “my girlfriend doesn’t get pregnant, or that my Mom survives her breast cancer.”
But hope in the traditional Christian sense is a virtue, which is the way your life conforms to your principles. For Christians and other believers (who are not mentally ill or have other overwhelming problems with which to deal), hope is not allowing hopelessness into your life. It’s trusting that you’re on the right path to God, and never giving up on his/her love. For non-believers, it may simply signify a sense of optimism about the future.
Singer Danny Gokey, who at age 34 had reason for hopelessness with the tragic death of his wife, sums it up well in the lyrics to his song, “Hope in Front of Me.”
There's hope in front of me.
There's a light, I still see it.
There's a hand still holding me
Even when I don't believe it.
I might be down but I'm not dead.
There's better days still up ahead.
Even after all I've seen
There's hope in front of me.
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| Photo by Beatriz Botero |
Tom Pfeffer, my sister’s brother-in-law, was an extraordinary priest who was pastor of a mostly Hispanic parish before he died in April of 2004. Before that, he was pastor of a rural Iowa parish where he noticed on frequent funeral trips to the cemetery a lone grave outside the official Catholic cemetery.
Tom made it known that he wanted to be buried next to the man, also outside the official cemetery. It reportedly caused a stir among some who didn’t want their beloved Tom to be buried in “unholy” ground. But Tom won.
Unlike many of his contemporaries, he didn’t view suicide as a cowardly act resulting from despair. For him, compassion trumped passing judgment. He understood that people can be so down on themselves and their lives that they are driven to take their own lives.
I’m writing about this in an attempt to shed some light on the subject of hope. I’ve had a start to a blog on this subject for some time but just couldn’t get it written because I hadn’t figured out exactly what I wanted to say.
(After reading this blog, Jim Stessman, my friend and former newspaper colleague who reviews these blogs pre-publication, noted that Tom, who was his friend, too, “was a cheerful guy whose face communicated hope.”)
Thankfully, I haven’t experienced hopelessness personally. But many people do, and I imagine it as the worst thing that can happen to you. In the case of hopelessness that results in suicide, it may be the worst thing that can happen to family and friends as well.
I’ve been to places where you would expect to find hopelessness. I experienced terrible poverty while living in South America, but I was shocked about the lack of basic human resources that I found in several later trips to El Salvador.
 |
| Google Image |
I remember, for instance, entering a rural shack in the extreme heat and finding an elderly woman sitting alone on the edge of a bed. The shack had little circulation, no fan and sparse furnishings. The woman could barely see or hear and her leg was swollen terribly. My niece, a wonderful nurse, examined her and said she probably had, among other things, untreated congenital heart disease. It likely remained untreated.
Conditions in El Salvador, for me, are a recipe for hopelessness, but you don’t get that impression from Salvadorans, the majority of whom seem resourceful, tenacious and relatively happy.
Still, my experience in El Salvador helps me understand hopelessness, which should help me understand hope. There seems to be a kind of hope that’s superficial, expressed as “I hope it doesn’t snow; that I get a raise; that my candidate wins the election;” or even that “my girlfriend doesn’t get pregnant, or that my Mom survives her breast cancer.”
But hope in the traditional Christian sense is a virtue, which is the way your life conforms to your principles. For Christians and other believers (who are not mentally ill or have other overwhelming problems with which to deal), hope is not allowing hopelessness into your life. It’s trusting that you’re on the right path to God, and never giving up on his/her love. For non-believers, it may simply signify a sense of optimism about the future.
Singer Danny Gokey, who at age 34 had reason for hopelessness with the tragic death of his wife, sums it up well in the lyrics to his song, “Hope in Front of Me.”
There's hope in front of me.
There's a light, I still see it.
There's a hand still holding me
Even when I don't believe it.
I might be down but I'm not dead.
There's better days still up ahead.
Even after all I've seen
There's hope in front of me.
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