HOPE THAT LIVES ON DESPITE THE PAIN
Hope that lives on despite the pain
By Rev Peter Good the Methodist Minister in Omagh. He is also superintendent of the north west district of the Methodist Church in Ireland and co-chair of the Omagh Churches Forum.
COMMUNITY grief is similar to family grief. Just as the first anniversary of a bereavement is a difficult time when there has been the loss of a family member, so Omagh and area, as a community, is bracing itself for August 15 1999, one year on from the bomb.
This weekend belongs to the bereaved and the injured and to their families and close friends. Some will want to be involved in planned gatherings to reflect and remember together. Others will want to be away from the town and community. We need to understand the different ways individuals will choose to commemorate the atrocity that hit Omagh and the surrounding area and Buncrana and Spain. Twenty nine dead and unborn twins and not forgetting the victim of the ambulance crash in Belfast, and so many maimed and injured. It is understandable that
those feelings of numbness and sadness, felt so keenly last August, have returned to burden us.
In the aftermath of the bomb there was a very real sense of how we needed each other, we needed to support and comfort each other.
This proved to be no shallow sentimental emotion, but something that provoked us to action. The church leaders, who had a year before set up a Church Forum, gave themselves freely to the task of pastoral ministry and to leading in services of reflection.
A Trauma Team was set up for counselling and medical staff at our hospitals and GPs worked overtime to be available when needed. The
police, so involved on that fateful day, continued to play a part in the long process of recovery. The district council was alert to responsibilities for its citizens, working alongside many community based groups.
Together with all this, ordinary people lent listening ears and gave time to be with those most hurting and grieving. All this has not stopped. A first anniversary seems to make the tasks more urgent, for the hurting and grieving has not gone away.
There was, and still is, gratitude for all the expressions of sympathy. Some came and visited, many wrote letters, all prayed for us. We are grateful that such expressions of caring have not ceased.
Those most bereaved and injured have shown the most amazing determination and courage. Of course there is the anger that anyone could have perpetrated such a foul deed and, humanly speaking, get away with it. There is frustration too that violence has not yet fully ceased and that no resolution of our conflict has yet been agreed. But life must go on and each day is faced with hope.
The first anniversary may allow us to move on towards some new normality. New normality, for things will never be quite the same again.
There has been a growing awareness that we are not by any means the only community suffering from violent acts of barbarity. In the immediate days and months we were, perhaps understandably, focused on our own plight. Now we are better equipped to understand others' grief and to enter more fully into others' pain.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German Christian who spoke out against Hitler during world war II and paid with his life. He wrote these words: "If once again in this vexed world You give us, The joy we had, the brightness of Your sun, We shall recall what we have learned through sorrow, And dedicate our lives to You alone."
We take every opportunity to say "thank-you" to the many people, from both near and far, who. have prayed for us. And we thank our God, whose compassionate nature we see in Christ Jesus, for giving us strength in our weakness, for giving us hope in our despair, and for constantly replacing our fears with his peace.
By Rev Peter Good the Methodist Minister in Omagh. He is also superintendent of the north west district of the Methodist Church in Ireland and co-chair of the Omagh Churches Forum.
COMMUNITY grief is similar to family grief. Just as the first anniversary of a bereavement is a difficult time when there has been the loss of a family member, so Omagh and area, as a community, is bracing itself for August 15 1999, one year on from the bomb.
This weekend belongs to the bereaved and the injured and to their families and close friends. Some will want to be involved in planned gatherings to reflect and remember together. Others will want to be away from the town and community. We need to understand the different ways individuals will choose to commemorate the atrocity that hit Omagh and the surrounding area and Buncrana and Spain. Twenty nine dead and unborn twins and not forgetting the victim of the ambulance crash in Belfast, and so many maimed and injured. It is understandable that
those feelings of numbness and sadness, felt so keenly last August, have returned to burden us.
In the aftermath of the bomb there was a very real sense of how we needed each other, we needed to support and comfort each other.
This proved to be no shallow sentimental emotion, but something that provoked us to action. The church leaders, who had a year before set up a Church Forum, gave themselves freely to the task of pastoral ministry and to leading in services of reflection.
A Trauma Team was set up for counselling and medical staff at our hospitals and GPs worked overtime to be available when needed. The
police, so involved on that fateful day, continued to play a part in the long process of recovery. The district council was alert to responsibilities for its citizens, working alongside many community based groups.
Together with all this, ordinary people lent listening ears and gave time to be with those most hurting and grieving. All this has not stopped. A first anniversary seems to make the tasks more urgent, for the hurting and grieving has not gone away.
There was, and still is, gratitude for all the expressions of sympathy. Some came and visited, many wrote letters, all prayed for us. We are grateful that such expressions of caring have not ceased.
Those most bereaved and injured have shown the most amazing determination and courage. Of course there is the anger that anyone could have perpetrated such a foul deed and, humanly speaking, get away with it. There is frustration too that violence has not yet fully ceased and that no resolution of our conflict has yet been agreed. But life must go on and each day is faced with hope.
The first anniversary may allow us to move on towards some new normality. New normality, for things will never be quite the same again.
There has been a growing awareness that we are not by any means the only community suffering from violent acts of barbarity. In the immediate days and months we were, perhaps understandably, focused on our own plight. Now we are better equipped to understand others' grief and to enter more fully into others' pain.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German Christian who spoke out against Hitler during world war II and paid with his life. He wrote these words: "If once again in this vexed world You give us, The joy we had, the brightness of Your sun, We shall recall what we have learned through sorrow, And dedicate our lives to You alone."
We take every opportunity to say "thank-you" to the many people, from both near and far, who. have prayed for us. And we thank our God, whose compassionate nature we see in Christ Jesus, for giving us strength in our weakness, for giving us hope in our despair, and for constantly replacing our fears with his peace.
Further Information
Publisher: THE IRISH NEWS
Ref: IN/0311
Published Date: 14-Aug-99
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