On NOT “Moving On”

Time moves on from the incomprehensible murders that ripped two beloved people (sons, brothers) from our community.  

We grieve.

We desperately want the memories of their remarkable lives to endure.  We don’t want them to leave us. 

We also want the words we speak about them to represent who they were—we want to be faithful to them and for our collective memories to dwell on what their lives were and promised to be.

This is, perhaps, especially true for David Breaux, who had a very public face and message.  Compassion.  We deeply desire to honor his memory by challenging one another to be the kind of people David challenged us to be.  

I have struggled with this myself in every interview I have given and every speech I have been asked to give about him.  My question: “Have I been faithful to what David would have wanted—what David did want—for this community?”  I am left to wonder, but I press on to try to get it “right.”

Perhaps this is why some have focused on David’s words to his sister concerning forgiveness.  By invoking David’s exhortation to her to forgive if something should happen to him for which he could not respond, they are, perhaps,  merely trying to remain faithful to the man they loved—a man who changed their lives. 

And yet…

And yet, that word “forgiveness” is a word that we dare not speak lightly.  It is a word that contains a universe of meaning and nuance.  It may be a word that is too big for us to grasp fully.

Pope’s aphorism “to err is human, to forgive, divine” captures the difficulty of this word for all of humanity.  The great world religions either relegate the capacity to forgive to the deity itself or to humans exercising godlike forbearance.  

Those of us who have been harmed in personal relationships know that it is one thing to say “I forgive you” and quite another to live lives characterized by what true forgiveness would yield. We harbor an absence of forgiveness in practice even as we claim to have forgiven. Our hearts overrule our words.

And this brings us back to David’s admonition to his sister.  There are many victims in this series of crimes—crimes that we fear we will never understand.  The deepest wounds are in those closest to those who died.  The wounds of losing a son or a brother are deep and to organs vital to making sense in the world.  Their healing may never be complete.

Other victims—more distant in relationship—are likely to bear scars only after a long healing process.

For some, forgiveness might be something we believe we should strive for, if for no other reason than David asked us to.  For others, forgiveness is a destination beyond a very far horizon.  We cannot see it.  It may exist.  But we do not know if we can or should go there.  And for still others, forgiveness is a category error—a word that can’t possibly mean what those using it seem to mean. It is not a destination.  We cannot go there, and we should not try.

The problem with normalizing the idea that forgiveness is something we should strive for—to honor David—is that it negates the perspective that many who are deeply wounded have.  In suggesting it is our collective destination, it seems to say, “Get with the program; it’s time to move on.”  That may sound harsh.  But to those who do not view forgiveness as the “destination,” it feels like they are being asked to abandon their grief, get over their pain, and leave their deep wounds as if those wounds should have healed by now.

I know the temptation to push us to “move on.”  How many times when I was a public leader did I say some variation of “How can we help this community move on?” But what if it’s not time to move on?  What if the wounds will not allow it?  What if we cannot shortcut grief?  What if we can’t heal? What if there is no destination but grief itself?

What would David want? 

I think we know.  David would have said: “Have compassion for those who continue to suffer—to grieve. Act towards them with patience, love, and a commitment to their wellbeing.”

Some in our community are ready to take a step that they believe David would want them to take.  Others can never take that step. David would, I believe, want us to walk patiently with those who grieve.  He would want us to invite them to the bench, to offer whatever they need, to patiently mourn with them, and to never suggest to them that it is time to “move on.”