For People with Bishop Rob Wright
For People with Bishop Rob Wright
#7 We Believe!
Sorrow doesn’t mean you’ve lost faith; it means you’ve loved deeply enough to tell the truth. Naming our losses can be both spiritual and practical. Psalm 137 shows what happens when a community refuses euphemism, resists denial, and chooses to face reality with courage. That choice isn’t about wallowing; it’s about setting the stage for healing, responsibility, and real hope.
In this episode, Melissa and Bishop Wright have a conversation about what we learn from Psalm 137. They discuss the tension between emotional performance and emotional honesty, and why the psalms offer a vocabulary for the full range of human experience: doubt, trust, anger, and gratitude. They unpack how the power of a single voice can serve the entire community by helping others see afresh. Listen in for the full conversation.
Read For Faith, the companion devotional.
You know, lament is not always consensus. And sometimes we need people to be brave enough to lament so that the rest of us can see afresh, can see anew. And so lament by some actually ends up being community service. I think the psalmists and the psalmists among us can help the rest of us see that in terms of establishing a reasonable floor height for the community, maybe we need to look again.
Melissa:Welcome to For People with Bishop Rob Wright. Im your host Melissa, and this conversation is inspried by For Faith, Bishop Wright's weekly devotional that goes out every Friday. You can find a link to this week's For Faith and a link to subscribe in the episode's description. Over the course of this next season, Bishop Wright has been framing his devotions and our conversations around the theme We Believe as we make our way through the lectionary. Bishop Rob, you named this week's devotion. We believe sorrow is a part of life.
Bishop Wright:Let me just read the actual meditation to you so people all have that, and then we can have a conversation about it.
Melissa:Fabulous.
Bishop Wright:We believe sorrow is a part of life. That's what we believe. And we know that to deny feelings of loss and sadness will injure us and our society ultimately. When the psalmist, Psalm 137, sings, By the waters of Babylon, we sat down and wept when we remembered. He's saying he sees the actual facts on the ground over the preferred facts. He's leading his community in something a lot more difficult, a lot more mature, and a lot more holy than simple expressions of anger, rage, and even violent acts, which have become too frequently our default responses to seasons of sorrow and loss. That's Psalm 137, verse 1.
Melissa:Wow, Bishop, so having you read read that, two different things jumped out at me. The first one saying that feelings of loss and sadness will ultimately injure us and our society if we're not able if we deny it.
Bishop Wright:Yeah.
Melissa:And then that's juxtaposed by or complimented by the fact that Jesus here wasn't really getting caught up in the weeds. Like he was, he was really going deep on a mature level, um, in about telling the truth, right?
Bishop Wright:Yeah.
Melissa:So we have to we have to tell the truth and we have to take time to lament. We haven't been doing so well at that.
Bishop Wright:No, we don't want to lament uh because denial and euphemism about reality is a is a much safer way to hold reality, right? Um uh John Meacham, uh our great national treasure and historian, said that uh the trick is when thinking about history, whether our personal history or whether we're talking about our national history, our community's history, is not to venerate it, not to look up to it, uh, neither to look down on it, but to look it square in the face. And uh I think there are occasions in our personal life and certainly in our national history and our community's history where we've got to look what is in the face, and we've got to not squint or turn away. And so the point of Psalm 137 is just giving voice to lamentation, just saying we've loved and we've lost. Look, the blues, the blues music, and you know, uh wonderful country music is a great gift to us because it wants to exercise how we really feel. My dog left me, and so did my wife. Uh, nobody, nobody loves me but my mom, and she might be Joshin. You know what I mean? I mean, uh sometimes life is like that. And and you know, the point is we're ultimately more healthy when we can cough that up, when we can say that. And in fact, I would say uh healthy because if we don't actually grieve, then somehow we deny that we loved, right? And then somehow we're we're underprepared for joy's visit, right? So we shouldn't get locked into this performance uh of denying or not calling uh a thing its name. In fact, that's holy, that's spiritually mature, that's psychologically mature. So what scripture is doing here in Psalm 137 is saying that we have been taken away as captives by another nation. Our traditions, our food, our language, our women have been raped, our young men have been killed, and now we've been reduced to this uh this status of slave. And not only that, Psalm 137 goes on to say, not only that, but now our captors want us to sing them a psalm, right? And so, you know, insult to injury. And so, in some ways, this is a defiant act because he is endeavoring, the psalmist is endeavoring, to call the you know, the community together and say, we remember when we were in power, we remember when we were whole, we remember when we were healthy, we remember when we were secure. And to do that uh as a captive is an act of defiance. Uh, so I'm going to look at reality, I'm not going to be afraid of reality, and I'm going to believe that. Now, this is the best part of this whole thing. I'm going to believe that there is God still, despite my present situation and circumstances. So for my part, I can stare grief in the face, I can name loss. Yeah, it's a big deal.
Melissa:It is a big deal. What I love about the Psalms too is that oftentimes the psalmists and the psalmist often will take responsibility for their own crap. Right? Like they name that the psalmist often will name when they've they've missed the mark, and yet they still give glory to God. And sometimes I feel like we're always about the blaming and the shaming game rather than taking responsibility for our own contributions towards the system that we find ourselves in.
Bishop Wright:Yeah, that's right. I mean, and this is why I say, you know, um, it's easier to fend off reality than to take up the responsibility of reality, right? Um, so not only taking up the responsibility, but also um understanding that life has these terrible, terrible lows, and that uh figuring out how to live through all of that with a good dose of faith um is is really the art of living with God. And so we see this on display in the psalms. You know, sometimes in in one of the psalms, uh we we wonder where God is, and then like two verses later, we say, hooray, there is God, and then we go back to the next verse and we say, wait a minute, where'd you go, God? And you know, um, and so what I love about the Psalms, and I've said this before in the podcast, is that they're emotionally honest. I mean, Psalm 137 says we weep. Um, and you know, I one wonders when we think about our own nation, if if if all of this um bluster and saber rattling uh that we're doing isn't because we can't process the fact that we are becoming less exceptional in a lot of categories. And so we have to continue the performance of sort of being the nation. Now, let's be clear here, uh, in terms of gross domestic product, uh, in terms of uh the strength of our military, uh the potency of our military, in terms of uh of lots of wonderful things that I personally enjoy as an American citizen. Yeah, it's fantastic, it's wonderful. But then there are parts of our common life which are not so great. Um, the amount of poro on the rise, um, you know, uh our uh crumbling infrastructure, our paralyzing uh uh national uh sort of debate uh in terms of legislation, getting legislation approved, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Um, the state of public education, the state of public health, um, you know, the care of our elderly, and there's a lot of categories that we are not so great in. And, you know, what the solace gives us is the ability to love and at the same time name the losses. And so uh patriotism sometimes in America these days can really be sort of uh a shell uh of what I think people are intending because they can't nuance it. We have to say that all is well when the truth of the matter is love for the nation should say, yeah, we love the nation, but we've got a lot of categories uh that we really need to lament. We need to lament um gun violence. We need to lament what's happening with our young people, we need to lament what's happening with our veterans when they come home and the absence of care that they get. There's a lot of things that we need to lament, but uh the system wants to say that uh you can't say those things because that's disloyalty. And so the psalmist is saying, um, no, we can actually give voice to things because we love, uh, right? It's because we love that we have to give things voice. And I think that's just a word for a lot of us. Uh, when we personally lose, move out of the national into the personal. When we personally lose or loss, uh, we try to blunt the grief, fend off the grief, diminish or deny the grief. When it's just a season of life. And we don't have to do it by ourselves. We can lean on the community.
Melissa:I agree with all of that. I'm what I'm really wrestling with, Bishop, is how to be and what to do about it in that season of Lament, because you've said the word reality a number of times now. And I'm not quite sure that many people agree on what reality even is anymore. Like if we can't agree on certain things, like where is the commonality? What I don't know. That's I don't know how to be or or what to do.
Bishop Wright:Sure. Well, I mean, when have we ever agreed about everything, you know, in human history, right? So I think that's not a realistic goal. I I think what we have to say is that we grieve. So I grieve. I'm a veteran, uh, and I have two sons now uh who are enlisted in the military. And I grieve, uh, I celebrate and rejoice in their service to the country uh and that they want to serve. I rejoice and I rejoice. I had that experience as a young person. And yet I look around in the Diocese of Atlanta, Middle North Georgia, and beyond, and I look at the state of the services that are provided to our veterans, and I lament that. I lament that we can't do better for the families and the young people who come home to us who are in need. I lament that. So I don't know that everybody has to agree on everything, but I do know that God has given us two eyes, and in my case, with glasses, four eyes, and I do know that we can look out and we can see for ourselves. Um, you know, lament is not always consensus. And sometimes we need people to be brave enough to lament so that the rest of us can see afresh, can see anew. And so lament uh by some actually ends up being community service because some of us might not want to see certain things, right? I mean, before I was uh before I was bishop, frankly speaking, I didn't spend a lot of time thinking about the death penalty, right? When I became the bishop, I didn't spend a lot of time, and but then it was people who had had um who had dedicated their lives to overturning the death penalty who helped me to see. And it was their great love of life and lament that we did this in Jackson, Georgia, uh, which is in the Diocese of Atlanta, uh that caught my attention and pierced perhaps even my numbness or certainly my too busyness to the thing. And so I think the psalmists and the psalmists among us can help the rest of us see that in terms of establishing a reasonable floor height, right, for the community, um, maybe we need to look again. Um, so yeah, I realize that we can't, but we can't allow this idea of once we reach consensus about the need for lamentations, that we all get to that. That that can't work. It's always been uneven. And that's why the prophets, Jeremiah by name, what we call the weeping prophet, uh, is so important. Uh because uh uh whether it was in season or out of the season, whether people liked it or not, Jeremiah lamented. It lamented the direction of the nation, lamented it out loud, invited other people to see the gaps uh in our our fidelity to God.
Melissa:Bishop, do you have any insight on how and how we might be able to put lament in a community practice way better than we typically have, at least in the last few decades of my life that I recall or remember?
Bishop Wright:Yeah. Well, you know, we know how to do it occasionally, you know, when when uh a national figure dies, you know, we we do, we we take up those kinds of things. We as a community, we pray. Um sometimes we'll we'll bring the flag down to half mast. Um uh we'll have a day off, a day of remembrance, we'll take flowers and or candles, we'll do vigils, et cetera. So that's that's part of it. Uh, but I would like to see us be able to practice that uh in in regular congregations um and in you know in appropriate settings. Um, you know, in some ways, given the rapid loss that we're experiencing in a lot of places, and especially as we think about the average age of the average person in some of our congregations, we may need a space for that. You know, in the in the Episcopal Church, for instance, we have the season of Lent, uh, where we are not only saying we're sorry, but we lament our infidelity, right? But we can also in Lent uh also lament lots of other things. We can lament the the um the direction of the nation. We can uh lament the direction of uh of our callousness uh toward one another. We can, you know, we can uh we can lament the fact that the storage industry uh is growing where charity is shrinking. Um so we're hoarding more than helping. Uh, you know, so so I I think really we're only bound by the imagination of the people who gather us uh in terms of who are exerting spiritual leadership. But we shouldn't only rely on the on the bishops and the priests and the deacons and the pastors and the elders. Uh some of us realize out of a great sensitivity uh that we've got to say something about things. Here's what I know. Personally, people default, people do lament lamentation or lamenting, whether they know they're doing it or not. I've been to cocktail parties where people talk about headlines and then inevitably after we've talked for a little while, people say, ah, well, what are you gonna do? Well, uh just giving voice to all the negativity and everything up till then um is a sort of an informal uh lamentation or lament. Uh I think what we have to do, though, uh that we don't do in social settings, that we could do perhaps in congregations, is then give it to God, uh, you know, cough it up ourselves, and then offer it up to God uh for God to use it as fodder for uh God's redemptive purposes.
Melissa:Bishop, we believe sorrow is a part of life, and there are a number of things that I am personally grieving and mourning. So I'm curious if you have any last thoughts that you'd like to share with our listeners before we bid everyone a do on what you might be lamenting at this time.
Bishop Wright:Oh, absolutely. I mean, I've in some ways giving you a cue of all that about all the things that I'm lamenting. And and you know, if if someone's listening and saying, wow, this this episode is really bumming me out, let me just say this. Uh uh, I'm sorry, and I'm sorry about this, and I'm grieving this, and we have lost this, really is a is a great turning point for us personally uh and for us uh community-wise and culturally. I mean, think about the sincere I'm sorry that you've said uh to another person, right? It is taking responsibility for the moment, acknowledging something, uh uh coughing it up, getting it said out loud. But then then the next chapter begins. And that's the good news of this. This is this is not just about sort of uh being uh uh, you know, sort of a slave to emotions. No, not at all. That's not the point. The point is uh for our mental and spiritual health uh to say these things out loud. Uh it's a confession of love and having lost. And at the same time, it's uh it's a petition. It's to God to say, can you help us with this? We're overpowered uh by all of the grief in our life. And so uh, yes, we believe that sorrow is a part of our life, but it's just a season uh and it's not the end. It's a step in the process to turn around.
Melissa:Thank God for that. Bishop, thank you, and thank you, listeners, for listening to For People. You can follow us on Instagram and Facebook at Bishop Rob Wright or by visiting www.forpeople.digital. Please subscribe, leave a review, and we'll be back with you next week.