PARADOXICAL

“By His wounds, we are healed.”

Crying is our first and last language.

We were born into this world crying. We cry in our helplessness.

Then we learned how to talk. Nay, we were taught the language as it was invented. Thus began a form of unlearning. We were limited by the definitions and words we were brought up in.

Even now as we grow up, we use words to tell others that we are in trouble but we still cry when we find ourselves unable to find the right words.

According to a lesser-known psychoanalyst who was a contemporary of Freud, crying is our “first language.”

“When we are locked in a conflict between desire and frustration, we suffer. As our way of expressing the inexpressible, we resort to crying."

There are two kinds of cries. The cry that relieves and lightens and the cry that makes us even more exhausted.

Crying can be a form of prayer. We resort to it when we can no longer express our sorrows. This is the cry that relieves.

This is different from weeping that exhausts, out of self-pity. In this type of crying, there’s something we find hard to accept.

In contrast, cry as a form of prayer paradoxically strengthens. “Unless you accept your weakness, you won’t become strong.” This is the kind of cry we are dealing with here.

Crying is our last language in the sense that we resort to it when no one is able to understand us and what suffering we are going through, when no words are fitting enough. This kind of cry is akin to the 'speaking in tongues' phenomenon.

Crying is not a sign of weakness but a gift from God.

Crying makes us more human. A cry to God makes us become fully human.

As God-become-man, Jesus also had moments of crying. He went through the motions of crying, from birth to the different moments in his life.

The cry was also Jesus’ last prayer at the cross -- when He could no longer find the words to express the sorrows and pains He was going through. Jesus cried the cry of the unredeemed world, the cry of God-turned-man.

But thanks to this cry, our cries need not crush us. Thanks to this cry, our cry can also become a cry of joy.

(This is loosely based on a retreat I have attended given by a nun in Greenbelt last Holy Wednesday.)

posted by Resty Odon  # 4:58 PM