This moment throws a wero at our feet – to name and feel the weight of the tensions we live in as followers of Christ: between the high calling of our lives in Christ, and our need to work this calling out in the context of brokenness and sin; between the propriety of victims’ cry for justice, and the Gospel imperative to restore contrite offenders; between necessary lament, and a clear-eyed confident hope in the transforming power of the Gospel.
How we hold these tensions is key to both our unity in Christ and to our witness before the world. These tensions will no doubt be wrestled with in the coming months and years. But for today – our first and only response to the immense and unthinkable suffering that’s been exposed can only be deep heartfelt lament.
What follows are some resources to support you in this holy task.
An Introduction to Lament
“When we suffer from amnesia, every form of serious authority for faith is in question, and we live unauthorised lives of faith and practice unauthorised ministries.”
– Walter Brueggemann
As we reflect on the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care, Walter Brueggemann’s words challenge us to reclaim the ancient practice of lament. From the writings of the exilic prophets to the songs of the Psalms, lament has ever been the first response for a people confronted with suffering and the glare of the unthinkable. Lament helps us to remember truthfully and holds a space where all can find their place before God: victim, perpetrator, bystander, and colluder. This is the place where we call on God, encounter God in new ways, and find renewed hope.
"In all their affliction, he was afflicted."
Reflecting on Isaiah’s words, Nicholas Wolterstorff says:
In our afflictions, God is afflicted. Over our suffering, God suffers. Over our mourning, God mourns. Over our weeping, God weeps. What the believer sees in beholding the suffering of the world is no less than the suffering of God… So the suffering of the world is also an epiphany of God--sometimes of the anger of God and sometimes of the gift of God, but always of the suffering of God. The God who has covenanted himself to humanity suffers over our suffering…To this epiphany, how else can we respond than with lament and intercession, crying out, "How long, O Lord, how long? Deliver yourself, and us your children.
- Nicholas Wolterstorff
The Royal Commission’s report locates the suffering at the heart of the Church – and the reality that the marring of sin is not confined to ‘the world out there’ but runs deep in our own institutions. So, through lament we give voice to the pain and suffering, as well as our anger and shame to God, entrusting ourselves to God’s help and – in time – God’s healing and restoration. Biblical lament is the language we use when words fail us. Lament has 4 elements which help us to reconnect with ourselves, with others, and with God:
1. We turn to God. “How long, O Lord?” carries the person’s pain. [Ps 13:1]
2. We bring our complaint. Expresses all the anger, frustration, suffering, and questions with humility and raw honesty. [Ps 13: 2]
3. We cry out for help. This cry is itself an expression of hope – addressed to the only One who is able to help and heal. [Ps 13:3-4]
4. We choose to trust God. Christian lament always leads to deeper trust. [Ps13:5-6]
Psalm 13: A Lament
I’m hurting, Lord—will you forget me forever?
How much longer, Lord?
Will you look the other way when I’m in need?
How much longer must I cling to this constant grief?
I’ve endured this shaking of my soul.
How much longer will my enemy have the upper hand?
Take a good look at me, Yahweh, my God, and answer me!
Breathe your life into my spirit.
Bring light to my eyes in this pitch-black darkness.
Don’t let my enemy proclaim, “I’ve prevailed over him.”
For all my adversaries will celebrate when I fall.
I have always trusted in your kindness, so answer me.
Your salvation lifts me up.
I will sing my song of joy to you, Yahweh,
for in all of this you have strengthened my soul.
A Song of Lament – Psalm 56
Sons of Korah Psalm 56 - View here.
Prayers
God of endless love,
ever caring, ever strong,
always present, always just:
You gave your only Son
to save us by the blood of his cross.
Gentle Jesus, shepherd of peace,
join to your own suffering
the pain of all who have been hurt
in body, mind, and spirit
by those who betrayed the trust placed in them.
Hear our cries of distress
over the harm done to our brothers and sisters.
Breathe wisdom into our prayers,
soothe restless hearts with hope,
steady shaken spirits with faith:
Show us the way to justice and wholeness,
enlightened by truth and enfolded in your mercy.
Holy Spirit, comforter of hearts,
heal your peoples' wounds
and transform our brokenness.
Grant us courage and wisdom, humility and grace
so that we may act with justice
and find peace in you.
We ask this through Christ, our Lord.
Amen.
Praise to you, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
source of all consolation and hope.
By your Son’s dying and rising
He remains our light in every darkness,
our strength in every weakness.
Be the refuge and guardian
of all who suffer from abuse and violence.
Comfort them and send healing
for their wounds of body, soul and spirit.
Rescue them from bitterness and shame
and refresh them with your love.
Heal the brokenness in all victims of abuse
and revive the spirits of all who lament this sin.
Help us to follow Jesus
in drawing good from evil, life from death.
Make us one with you in your love for justice
as we deepen our respect
for the dignity of every human life.
Giver of peace, make us one in celebrating your praise,
both now and forever.
Amen.
A LITURGY for LAMENT
In Psalm 88 the Psalmist writes:
O Lord, God of my salvation. I cry out day and night before you. Let my prayer come before you, incline your ear to my cry.
We meet in the presence of God
Who knows our needs,
hears our cries,
feels our pain
and heals our wounds.
Almighty God, our loving compassionate and merciful
Father, Son and Holy Spirit
We come before you today
Together as the church of Aotearoa
To grieve and confess and lament sins
committed in your name and by your people
We acknowledge and bring before you the abuse of the past,
and the abuse of the present
God our hearts are broken.
We long for your healing.
Have mercy on us, O God, because of your unfailing love.
Because of your great compassion, blot out the stain of our sins.
SILENCE
It is love which calls us to lament.
Let our hearts weep with the God who weeps with and for
those whose dignity has been diminished,
And for us in our sorrow and shame.
Lord, we ask you to shine your holy light on the darkness as we acknowledge,
The past and present pain.
The past and present violence.
The past and present abuse,
The past and present neglect.
SILENCE
We confess together
God of mercy,
we have sinned against you and against others.
We have sinned in what we have done,
and in what we have failed to do.
We are truly sorry.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
who died for our sins,
forgive us all that is past
and raise us to newness of life. Amen
God of compassion and mercy, who lives in the midst of all suffering,
We hold before you those who have experienced harm and trauma
by people acting in the name of God and our church.
For those who have been harmed,
we lament the action and inaction of our church.
SILENCE
For those whose abuse was perpetrated by ministers acting in your name,
for the authority misused, and the sacred trust broken.
SILENCE
For those whose faith has been fractured,
whose trust has been eroded,
in you and in your church.
SILENCE
For those who have spoken up and not been heard,
for those who hold their experience in silence,
and the misplaced shame they carry.
E te Ariki kia aroha mai
E te Karaiti kia aroha mai.
SILENCE
God of grace,
Help us to face the abuse of power, which has dishonoured life
And wounded the souls of people who have placed their trust in us.
We come before you in our brokenness and need of healing.
Through your mercy and grace,
We seek your forgiveness for what we have done or failed to do.
Through our Saviour Jesus Christ we pray. Amen
SPOKEN WORD LAMENT
© Sarah Scott Webb 2023
Father God.
We gather today as the stories unfold,
To bring our lament of sorrow untold
As we lament for the broken, the wounded and abused,
The times in the church where trust was misused.
The times where as leaders we got it all wrong,
Our agendas and power became our main song,
and instead of God’s love and a heart to restore them
we wanted more from them than what we want for them.
The times we ignored all the anger and fear
and covered over the broken so that we can’t hear
the cries from the past that impact today.
We don’t want to acknowledge that part that we played
In the hurt and the pain
all done in God’s name.
But …
colonial winds are whispering, there’s stories untold,
of historical trauma, of innocence sold
by the church, a sanctuary turned betrayer,
No longer safe but instead a conveyor
of fear and of shame
all done in God’s name.
The sacred’s been tainted,
innocence betrayed,
The whispers of the violated, in silence, they fade.
Church - do you mourn for hurt that we’ve caused?
The things we’ve done wrong, do you feel deep remorse?
And church, did you weep for the broken trust?
As your cloak concealed sins of abuse and of lust?
Did you weep for the children whose spirits broke like waves,
In the sanctuary, where they sought solace, not graves.
We allowed this to happen,
we just stood by,
And closed our hearts and our ears to the cry
of the hurt, the wounded, the silenced and broken,
whose stories were never allowed to be spoken.
In the silence and suffering, the trauma concealed,
We cry out for justice, for all to be healed.
Lord we stand witness to their pain
as we mourn the souls scarred by things done in your name.
Jesus, your people's anguish,
How could you bear?
How many times did you have to hear
My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
We lament for the broken, those hurt and abused.
We lament for the times our power’s misused.
Lord will you hear us?
Heal us as one.
We cry to you, Holy Spirit please come.
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[1] https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/94307-the-prophetic-imagination
[2] Mark Vroegop in: See: https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/dare-to-hope-in-god.Accessed 26/07/24,09:15
[3] From a prayer produced by the US Conference of Roman CatholicBishops.
[4] Prayer by the RomanCatholic Bishop of St Cloud, USA
[5] See Church of EnglandLiturgies: https://ceec.info/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/in_lament_-_a_liturgy.pdf and the NZ Anglican Prayer Book - https://anglicanprayerbook.nz/index.html#contents
