Their Death is NOT Just a Statistic

It keeps happening. This strange, violent, awful way of dying.

I refuse to be reconciled to it, as if it were some phenomenon of social science or an unavoidable fate for certain people.

I keep trying to write this post, but I can't find any adequate way to talk about it. There really isn't an adequate way.

We live in tumultuous times. Our immensely powerful and stressful world pushes forward with a relentless force that continually multiplies itself, enlarges itself, leaping over limits of speed, annihilating space, defying gravity, racing in all directions. We are all riding behind this wild engine, gasping for air and grasping for a place to hold on. We don't really know who's driving or where it's going. Perhaps we are lucky enough to have learned some tricks for hanging on to this crazy train.

But people face all kinds of challenges and make a lot of mistakes. Some of these challenges are complicated by mental disorders that become more exacerbated by this wild ride. They are slipping and having trouble regaining their footing.

They're falling off the train. Too many of them are falling off the train. (But what is "too many"? One is too many!)

From all the noise and the scramble, they find no peace. They only fall into the cold stillness of the ground. And they are hardly noticed.

Suicide has become a statistic.

It will never be just a statistic for me! There are too many names and faces, too many people I love who have been devastated by this awful thing. Too many people who have been lost, or who have had their loved ones ripped away from them.

I know the trajectory of Depression, and how its internal chaos can connive with the recklessness of a toxic environment. I know that we must never give up hope. We must hope in the infinite mercy of God, and recognize all the factors that can diminish or eliminate culpability when a person does something that brings their life to an end.

I have a precious friend for whom I keep that flame of hope burning. Let us keep those flames burning, even though it means that our own hearts will continue to be struck and scarred by the heat.

Let us grieve and hope for our loved ones, and stand in solidarity with others who have lost their loved ones. At the same time, we must recognize that suicide is a disaster that stands at the end of a chain: often a bizarre and complex chain that has lots of links (and we must do as much as we can to understand and try to unhook those links). Still it is a chain that is held by the hand of the Enemy of the human race.

We must oppose this Enemy without compromise. Jesus tells us clearly: the Enemy is a liar and a thief! No compromise. Suicide is never, never the answer...to anything.

Dear suffering people, it is good that you are here. Stay!