Our Church Has Cancer

Earlier this summer my brother was diagnosed with a brain tumor.  Surgery was invasive and scary as you would expect when dealing with the brain.  Following surgery, the healing process has involved all different kinds of therapy, drug regimens, rehab, and will continue for some time.  A month after the initial surgery, a serious infection had developed.  They tried medications and IV treatments, but to no avail.  They had to make a quick decision to go back in, identify the infection, and cut it out.  There may be more, they may have gotten it all, or perhaps there will be a reoccurrence.  The final outcome is not known for certain.

When there is an elephant in the room, it’s usually best to acknowledge the beast.  There is no hiding the fact that our church has a disease.  There was a cancer inside at some of the highest levels.  It appeared to have come to the forefront with the scandal of a few years ago.  At that time the disease was apparently identified and treated.  There was more underlying infection, however.  After a while, it came to light and we are in the midst of treatment for the currently diagnosed problem.  Where will things go from here?  The outcome is not known for certain.

Before my brother’s diagnosis, there were clues that things weren’t right.  Occasional confusion.  Sometimes statements that didn’t make sense.  Aggression and denial when confronted about the issues.  Different family members disagreed about what to do.  Some were in denial about any problems.  Others pushed to explore the issue extensively until we could get to the bottom of it.  Even after diagnosis and surgery, there were disagreements about how open to be with others.  My brother would obviously take quite some time to recover.  In the meantime, he wouldn’t be able to do the things that we might expect as normal.

It is obvious that something has been awry in our church for quite some time.  Some of the explanations haven’t seemed to make sense.  Different levels of leadership have taken different approaches in their dealings with the problems.  Even now, with most of the issues apparently out in the open, it still seems like there isn’t a consensus, and potentially even an attempt to not be as open as possible.

As my brother begins his road to recovery, we wonder when he will ever be back to 100%.  When he returns to ‘normal’, what will that normal be?  Will he ever be as he was? We question how long the tumor may have been impacting his thinking, words, or actions.  Was his previous normal, not even as it should have been?  No matter how long it takes, or what the final results are, isn’t he still my family?  No matter if any of his negative words or actions during his illness were caused by the tumor, or were truly his own will, does that make him any less my brother?  It is often difficult to be around him at this point.  Right after surgery, after the tumor was cut out, his brain obviously experienced trauma.  The simple fact of going to visit him, being a loyal family member, and showing my support, set me up for difficult conversations, stress, and long hours.  I suppose I could have easily avoided it all by simply walking away.

I don’t know if we are in the stage of recovery yet, or still trying to identify and work through various infections, but our church is in a rough state.  We can look back in recent or past history and probably note some instances where we were hurt.  We can look at the facts now, and realize that the recovery is going to be a large burden on us, even though we had no involvement in causing the disease.  In the end, the church is still THE church.  It is still truth.  It is still our path to salvation.  The Eucharist is still the Body of Jesus even if the consecration is performed by sinful hands.  In fact, I will guarantee the sacrifice of the mass is presented by unworthy, sinful men.  Does that make Jesus any less real?  When we get through this will we ever go back to ‘normal’?  What is that normal and do we even want to go back?  All I know for sure is that things are going to be difficult for the faithful, but I’m not going anywhere.

Pray for the church, and if you have a chance, pray for my brother.

Written by: Matt Buehrig             Inspired by: Greg