“Could I accept the idea that good things come out of a catastrophe?”

Sue Bender

“Acceptance,” Chapter 12 in Sue Bender’s Everyday Sacred: A Women’s Journey Home wrestles with finding good in bad. Out of the ashes a phoenix rises. Every cloud has a silver lining. Make lemonade out of lemons. We are never given more than we can handle. It’s all good. The list of cliches that dance around the truth of both the beauty and cruelty of life are endless. When speaking about her friend who had lost her home in a fire, Bender reflects, “I always begin my talks about how the fire forced you to look at what really matters. Just as going to live with the Amish had forced me, ever so much more gently, to question all my assumptions about what goes in to a good life.”

I think about the good that can come from catastrophe. Though it has hard to see any potential upside when we are upside down and flailing. Gasping for air while reaching for glimpses of humanity and love in a world filled with toxic air. I think about my desperate desire to find the good, because I truly believe we find what we seek. What is grief right now? How much time do we need to mourn and grieve? What does grief and mourning look like as we try to move forward? It has made me think about accountability and reconciliation being part of acceptance, and eventually, the good. It has made me think about healing being part of the good. These questions hover on an individual and global scale.

Within all that is, I think about acceptance writ large. Acceptance of fear as a companion to faith. Acceptance of challenge as an opportunity for strength. Acceptance of anger as an antidote to cynicism and paralysis. Acceptance of grief as a symbol of love.