You Can Sit with Me, but Please Don’t Speak

The people we look up to – Dolly Parton, Tina Turner, Prince, Maya Angelou, Rachel Held-Evans, Neil Peart, John Lewis, Betty White, Bell Hooks, Jimmy Carter, Harper Lee, Jóhann Jóhannsson, there are so many – have and are dying. I’m left with a hundred holes. And, I can’t help but consider that when they leave, that leaves me. And all the rest of us. Who will be the giants of our hope and joy and advocacy? Who will be the truth-tellers and megaphones that speak out against racism, misogyny, sexism, genocide, homophobia, patriarchy, xenophobia, classism? Who will be the creators and curators of art and music and the sublime? It can’t be me. I’m too small. Is this what it feels like as we get older, our icons are gone, and we’re the ones left standing? Why do I feel more and more alone as the change makers leave? Their places at the table cannot be filled, and shame on anyone who attempts to sit there. And I want to tell everyone, “This seat belong to…and neither you nor I can sit there. Go find your place somewhere else.” Is this how it feels when the reasons we have to look up are gone and all we have is to look out and down?

For clarification: This is a post of grief. Not one appeased by platitudes, by lists of this who are doing the work now, by lists of the youthful ones. By naming the ones who have secured the baton and are running the next leg of the race. And…Yes, I know what I do for a living. Yes, I’m a priest, and yes, I know that God is always in control and offers hope and a future. We can believe all the good and perfect truths about God and still grieve. To bypass the sadness with “But with Jesus all thing are possible” and “Do not have a spirit of fear…” and “Do not let your hearts be troubled…” is spiritual gaslighting and destructive to our human existence.

Dolly’s passing has hit harder than I anticipated…