In God We Trust

Learning how trauma can help us trust in God

03/01/2018

Jeremiah 17:5-10 Thus says the LORD: Cursed is the man who trusts in human beings, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the LORD. He is like a barren bush in the desert that enjoys no change of season, But stands in a lava waste, a salt and empty earth. Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose hope is the LORD. He is like a tree planted beside the waters that stretches out its roots to the stream: It fears not the heat when it comes, its leaves stay green; In the year of drought it shows no distress, but still bears fruit. More tortuous than all else is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can understand it? I, the LORD, alone probe the mind and test the heart, To reward everyone according to his ways, according to the merit of his deeds.

Most people learn to trust in God’s love by first trusting in their parents’ love. By repeated acts of responding to a baby’s cry for food, care and tenderness, a baby slowly learns to trust not only the visible parents he or she can see, but also the invisible Parent whom he or she cannot see, the heavenly Father, who provides for the baby as well as for his or her parents.

My personal trust in my parents and in God the Father took an exponential leap forward thanks to a traumatic event I experienced at seven years old. My family emigrated from India and immigrated to the United States in 1976. (Those two words emigrate and immigrate are so confusing.) This migration was traumatic for the seven year old Fr. John because overnight I lost everything: my home, my school, spicy Indian food, my friends, my church, my playground, my neighbors, my extended family, in short, my whole life disappeared in an instant. But that trauma also taught me to trust in God, because even though I might lose everything else in life, the one Person I will never lose is God. Jesus said in Matthew 24:35, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” God will always be there for us. Indeed, that moment marked my life to such a dramatic degree that I am convinced it was the root of my priestly vocation. How so? I learned to cling tightly to Jesus Christ, the Word of the Father that never passes away, the One you can never lose, and I wanted to teach others how to do that, too. Strange as it sounds, traumatic moments can help us to trust the Father.

The prophet Jeremiah proclaims God’s trustworthiness to the people of Israel. The Chosen People, too, have suffered a traumatic event, perhaps second only to their slavery in Egypt (out of which they “emigrated” under the leadership of Moses). But Jeremiah urges the people to trust during the Babylonian Captivity, where they were exiled for approximately seventy years. Jeremiah tried to help them catch the same insight that I had glimpsed: you can lose everything in life, but you will never lose God. The great prophet wrote: “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose hope is in the Lord. He is like a tree planted beside the waters that stretches out its roots to the stream: it fears not the heat when it comes; its leaves stay green.” My trauma at seven years old helped me to trust in God’s love, and that trust budded forth in a priestly vocation. As the people of Israel trusted in God’s love during their seventy year traumatic exile, they discovered their vocation to be a “priestly people,” praising God who never abandons them. Having learned to trust in God, they immigrated back to Jerusalem. (Catching the difference between emigrate and immigrate yet?)

How high is the level of your trust in God these days? I hope that most of you have grown in trusting the heavenly Father’s love by being well taken care of by your earthly parents. We have seen God’s love indirectly because we have seen that divine love shining brightly in the human love of our parents. Tragically, however, not all children grow up in loving homes where their cry for food, clothing, care and tenderness is not met immediately, and sometimes not at all. Worse still, are instances of the abuse of children, almost unimaginable. How hard it must be for those children to trust – maybe even just to believe – that God loves them and takes care of them.

All the comfort I can offer is my own meager experience, and that of the prophet Jeremiah: you may lose everything else and everyone else in your life, but you will never lose God. Therefore, cling to him with all your might.  Why? Then you, too, will be “a tree planted beside the waters that stretches out its roots to the stream: it fears not the heat when it comes, its leaves stay green; In the year of drought it shows no distress, but still bears fruit.” In other words, in the midst of all the trauma, you might also discover a vocation to be a priestly person, praising God who never abandons us.

Praised be Jesus Christ!