Chapter 17: Hope and God

I recently listened to a story on NPR about a lady whose son had died from severe burns. She described the injuries in gruesome detail and talked about his pain and the surety of his death. She was an avowed atheist as was her son. She reached out desperately for solace but found nothing for atheists. Every book or resource that dealt with grief based its premise on some kind of religious underpinning.

What could she possibly say to her dying son? Could she tell him God would help him or that heaven awaited him? As she told her story, I wanted to turn the radio off. It was very painful for me to listen to this. Yet, it was important for me to confront the searing questions she posed.

“When there is no hope, what do you do?”

With no God to turn to, she had to do the only thing that made sense to her. I have eluded to it in previous chapters. I fould a lump welling in my throat as she proclaimed the answer. The only way, it seems, to eleviate such abject despair is to reach out and help someone else. It goes back to the very core of our existance. We must reach out to help one another. We must do things for complete strangers. We must make someone else's life a little bit easier. That really is the only way to find respite from that kind of despair.

And if you take the time to do a good deed for someone, the burden of your own troubles begins to lighten. I tested this theory once when I was in the depths of depression after the breakup of my marriage. I went to work for the church building habitat homes. I can honestly say that the work did much more for me than for the crew. I felt like I was accomplishing something. I felt like I was a value to society. When you are depressed, there is no more effective remedy than getting out, rolling up your sleeves and getting dirty. I highly recommend it. It was one of the things Jesus exemplified by the selfless life he lead. It does not require belief in any God and it works beautifully.

It isn't just the feel good you get from such deeds that benefits you, it is the contact with people who can expand your horizons and make it possible for you to conquer your demons.