Status Updates From Hurting Yet Whole: Reconcil...

“…disability is an open minority that any of us might join at any time, especially as we get older.” p. 162

“Wholeness must embrace our current brokenness, or it is not wholeness, but nostalgia.” p.167

“This is my hope-that there is light at the end of this tunnel of death. That when I have lost everything that makes me who I am, I will still remain, because I am held up by something more solid than my self, than my body, than my very consciousness. I am held up by a love as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).”

p.147

"This understanding of God's world and our role in it has helped me to let go of the desire to ‘go back' to some idyllic past where I had no pain and things were ‘as they should be.’ I certainly grieve my losses. Yet I don’t believe that God will push the reset button…Rather, this ‘better world' will involve transformation, not a rewind, of our pain. The way out is not back, but through.” p.45-46

“Being fully human is to inhabit the wild mysteries of our bodies and trust that, because Christ was a body, and still is a body, we don’t need to fear this place. We can say, it is good, because Christ meets us here.” p. 29

“[As people with chronic pain], we need to get better so that others don’t feel so uncomfortable, confused, or threatened around us… it’s as if they need that positive cap on the experience in order for it to be contained; otherwise they fear that the darkness and suffering will seep over onto them, that they’ll catch the pain.”

“When I was in pain, the illusion that I am an individual independent of others faded and the truth that I need others in order to survive came into focus.”

“God, through Jesus’ incarnation, shows us that the goal of life isn’t to transcend our bodies and their limits, but to be fully human within them.”

“In person, we can’t hide that we are fragile, sensitive people who are deeply affected, often hurt, by the actions of those closest to us… We can see our bodies as liabilities, revealing those tender parts that we prefer to keep hidden. OR we can see them as God-given points of connection that tell the true story of who we are, even when we can’t put words to it.”

“Patients come to the exam room as a collection of symptoms to be analyzed, leaving behind their stories- the ways they’ve lived through their illness, their reasons for getting up in the morning and having purposeful lives despite debilitating pain and limitations…in the process, we lose one of the key ingredients to healing- a sense that we are not isolated, that others are with us, for us, in our journey.”

“We’ve always had trouble with spiritual uncertainty and tried to ascertain whether we have God’s favor or not by looking at our bodies or material circumstances for ‘proof’ that we are blessed, that we are God’s elect.”