A TIME FOR DEPRESSION
|
I don't generally feel depressed. And
if so, it doesn't last long. I usually take a nap and it's gone.
|
But I have great sympathy with those
who have fairly frequent feelings of living under “the dark cloud.” We used
to think we could counsel people out of it (using non-directive counseling,
of course). Later we learned to distinguish if we could between pathological
and situational depression. In either case the proper response was referral
to a physician or mental health professional. Trying to help depressive persons
can be depressing.
|
It's an important subject and anyone who
deals with people needs to have awareness of it. In fact, all humans can
benefit from realistic information about it.
|
I'm not going to give a short course on
depression. Many have had far more personal experience than I have. However, the other day Jean commented,
“I think you've been depressed lately.” And I said, “I think you are right.”
So I began thinking about it.
|
There is usually a “why” to depression.
I wondered what the “why” might be for mine.
|
I began thinking of what I had been
reading, or hearing. I began thinking of what has been happening to me or
to people around me.
|
The last two books I have read haven't
exactly been inspiring. The book about the expected depletion of oil and
what part it plays in the whole geo-political morass our country faces in
the mid-east isn't happy. The thought of burgeoning population and all the
obstruction to population control programs put up by Christians is discouraging.
I don't want to get started. Anyway, “The Long Emergency” probably pulled
me down a little.
|
Then I followed with “Collapse,” a short
history of how societies have brought about their own endings. "I am certainly
aware of the fact that is is highly unlikely that the place of American among
the nations of the world has a limited future." To be reminded again how our country
is doing all the wrong things to maintain, or deserve to maintain its place
in the world is disheartening.
|
This past week we have the spectacle
of an indictment of a key political figure in our government. Why do I feel
that this doesn't begin to face the fact that our government of the people,
by the people and for the people is actually hidden from us? Add the influence
of the Christian right that insists on a Supreme Court nominee who has already
decided on issues such as abortion and homosexuality? What about a competent
constitutional jurist?
|
Of course we all have on-going concerns
about people in our own circle of family and friends. We could find plenty
of reason for depression if we allowed it.
|
I have agreed with Viktor Frankl who
deals with the human struggle in “The Unheard Cry for Meaning.” If we find
ourselves angry or weepy or sad, we should look for grief. What is grieving
us? And we should not simply try to wash it away with tranquilizers or whiskey.
(p. 69) Perhaps we should be depressed.
|
So one foggy morning (which I thought
appropriate) I thumbed through parts of the prophetic literature of the Old
Testament. Jeremiah, Amos, Hosea, Micah and Isaiah, for example. Writings
all pertain to the downfall of their country. Prophets tend to blame the
people as much as the kings. They are always unpopular. Always. A prophet
loyal to the king was most untrustworthy. They may have claimed God's direction,
but they didn't have it. I tried not to put names to the big religious figures
now trusted by my own government. A line from Isaiah caught my eye. ”Leave
me alone, let me weep bitter tears, stop trying to console me…”
(Isaiah 22:4)
|
Frankl would suggest we leave the man
alone. Maybe weeping is what is needed. Maybe it is all that he could do.
There is the report of Jesus coming in sight of Jerusalem, looking across
the valley at a city whose fate was sealed.
“When
he drew near and saw the city he wept over it. ’Would that even today you
knew the things that make for peace! But now they are
hid from your eyes.” (Luke 19:41, 42)
|
Comfort him? Give him valium? Give
him a drink? No, let him weep bitter tears. There is a time when grieving is what we
ought to do. If you are not depressed, why not? Let us pray.
— Art Morgan, October 31, 2005
|
|