What do you do when your sacred space has been violated?!
One of the most basic needs of man is to have some place where he feels safe to go to pray and congregate with trusted friends. This is one of the main reasons we have churches, synagogues, mosques and temples. Yes we go there to pray and listen to the word of God, but we also go there because we know that generally we can be safe there. These are usually one of the first places where we go when disaster strikes and we need comfort from God and our friends. Other than locking yourself in your bedroom to be alone when bad things happen, where is the first place you usually turn? To your place of worship.
So what happens when that place of worship is violated? There was a tragic event which happened yesterday in Pittsburgh which brought to mind this very question. And yet before I get into this event and the reality which it created, I would like to go back 4 years to when this happened to me.
My 2nd marriage was not a good marriage. Had the priest who married us not had ulterior motives of showing up another priest who refused to marry us (and who would later go on to being made an Eastern Orthodox Bishop) it probably would not have occurred. But because one priest had a personal agenda against the priest who advised us not to marry, he jumped at the opportunity to marry the ex and I when he found out that his adversary had banned the two of us from communion until we were married. Thus began the disaster that would take 7 years to build to a crescendo. And what a crescendo it built to! As a philosopher who has studied natural law, I know that there are natural laws which govern the way all things happen. Even when we try to avoid and disobey these rules they still exist. The consequences of disobeying natural law are never pretty. You can call it natural law, you can call it karma, you can call it whatever you want. The fact is it exists and when you disobey its rules eventually you will be forced to pay the price. I knew that my second marriage was in complete disobedience to the natural laws, and yet I allowed greed and lust to rule over what my reason told me was wrong and entered willfully into that marriage. So it really was no surprise to me when I woke up one day in 2014 to find that my wife had left me and my entire world that I knew had been turned upside down.
It did not surprise me one bit that this happened. The writing had been on the wall for some time. However, what hurt was the way in which it happened. Those who encouraged the ex-wife to leave were all Eastern Orthodox Christians and members of my own parish, including the maid of honor, the priest who married us, and his Archbishop, who up until that time I had been in good relations with. The very people who I trusted and viewed as friends and spiritual leaders had turned on me. Not a single one of these people asked me what was going on and not a single one was willing to listen when I tried to tell them my side of the story. To make matters worse, the priest outright lied to the Archbishop about what was going on and the Archbishop never gave me a chance to speak my side of the story, no matter how many times I reached out to him to do so. And so I woke up one day in 2014 and found that I could no longer feel safe in Church. My safe place, my place of refuge from the chaos of my life, had been violated. Yes there were other Eastern Orthodox Churches that I could attend, however the way in which many important members of the Church turned on me and were not even willing to listen to both sides of the story left such a huge wound in me what I no longer trusted the Church. And so I found myself spiritually alone, with little guidance that I trusted, to navigate the treacherous waters of the post divorce world. But more than being alone, I found myself feeling guilty for what happened, feeling unlovable and unwanted. Even though I was the one who was trying to preserve the marriage and was working to make things work, and both she and the church were the ones who were working to destroy the marriage and to break the prayer of “What God has united let no man tear apart”, it still left me feeling guilty, dirty and as if I had the mark of Cain on my soul. I had been violated, and yet I was the one feeling guilt because of the violation! Much like happens when a person is sexually violated by another and yet it is always the person who is violated that ends up with the guilt and shame. Yes, there were a few priests here and there who I trusted, but none of them lived any where close to me. And even with these men it took a lot of work to trust that they were still on my side. Where do you go when you can no longer go to your safe place? Who do you turn to when your sacred place has been violated? It took me the better part of 4 years to even begin to heal and live again. I found love and acceptance in my dogs. I found solace in the work that I do and in the new friendships that I began to form in the time since the disruption of my life. Yes it still hurts. Yes, I am still talking about it, but I survived.
This question was brought to my mind Saturday morning when I began to read about a tragic occurrence which happened here in Pittsburgh. Saturday morning I was reading a discussion group for ride share drivers in Pittsburgh when someone posted that there was an active shooter situation in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh and police were advising every one to avoid the area. This is one of the areas in Pittsburgh where I drive the most, and honestly one of the places where I feel the most safe. The situation had not yet broken the news and so I anxiously awaited to see what the news would say. The information which followed as the day went on was enough to make anyone mourn. A gunmen opened fire on a synagogue in Squirrel Hill and killed 11 people, including a few police officers and injured many others. It was Saturday morning, the Sabbath for the Jewish people, a time when they gather to pray and come into community with their fellow believers. And yet a hate filled person decided that he would violate their sacred place and turn what should have been a joy filled morning into one of pain and horror. To make matters worse the gunman had posted his hatred of the Jewish people and his intentions on social media not long before going on his terror spree.
And so now the people of this synagogue are left feeling many of the very same emotions that I was left feeling. With pain from what happened, with guilt and shame that it happened to them, even though they had done nothing wrong! Had they had their way, yesterday morning would have been a normal Saturday morning of prayer, community and love. Instead it was violated. To make matters worse, while much of Pittsburgh will go on with living our normal every day lives, the members of this synagogue community will need to return to their place of worship next Saturday in order to continue their communities life of prayer and service. They will need to find a way to see beauty in a place that has very recently caused them pain. Hopefully they will find this beauty and love in the presence of their fellow believers and in the community of the City of Pittsburgh itself. I know this can not undo the horror of yesterday, but I hope it can at least bring a beginning of healing.
A side thought to what happened yesterday is this. With one notable exception, every other time when I have read about tragic events occurring which has involved the loss of life, it has always been some place far away. Berlin, Paris, Columbine, etc. The only other time it has been some place close to home was when the flood killed about 90 people in Shadyside, Ohio in June 1990. The flood happened in the valley that was immediately next to my house. But even this flood and it’s aftermath did not effect me all that much, as the day after the flood occurred I flew to Germany to spend 2 months visiting a friend. Thus my family was effected by this flood, but I was not. And so this is the first time when something tragic has occurred in the place that I live and work. It is no longer “that happens there but not here.” No, it happens everywhere and the sad reality is that eventually it will effect everyone. May God have mercy upon us all and help us all heal from the tragic occurrences which happen in our lives. May God especially have mercy upon the members of Tree of Life Synagogue in Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh who yesterday were subjected a senseless violation of their sacred space.
