Psalms help us go to God as we are, not as we think we should be

Published: June 30, 2007

By Judy Hoelzeman

My younger brother was born when I was 15 months old. He was hale and hearty, but my mother developed a blood clot after the delivery and almost died. My distraught father was told to pray to God in these words, “Lord, not my will, but thine be done.” He went into the hospital chapel and prayed those words. He later told my mother it was the hardest thing he ever did in his life. Forty years later, my brother faced the same crisis — his wife’s close call with death. He and his wife, though, prayed quite differently than my father had. They cried, they questioned God’s presence. They begged and pleaded and asked God if they were in some way to blame. They didn’t realize it, but they were praying in the same way the ancient psalmists prayed — with honesty, anger and confusion. The Old Testament psalms are an excellent tool for prayer because they help us express every human emotion. They fall into five categories, but one-third are psalms of lament (or complaint). The laments speak of suffering, loss and pain, and rail against the triumph of enemies and sin. Examples are Psalms 22, 77, 86 (individual laments), and Palms 22, 77 and 86 (communal laments.) (See the Reading Guide of the Catholic Study Bible to learn more.) In everyday life, suffering, loss and pain are the realities that most often preoccupy us and sap our physical and mental energies. Praying the psalms of lament won’t give us a theological explanation for that suffering. What they do, says the late Father Carroll Stuhmueller, is help us let go and place the “bundle of pain” in God’s presence — a big achievement. Most psalms of lament end with an expression of praise. They go quickly from anxiety to serenity as the psalmist promises to live in the hope that God will act. They can lead us to see painful experiences from the perspective of a faithful God, and know that all is not lost after all. For centuries people have been comforted by the psalms of lament because they identify universal feelings and responses: the anger and tension of conflict; the physical pain of illness; the loneliness and alienation of a troubled marriage, the hollowness of grief, the powerlessness over addiction. Praying with the psalms of lament may help us admit life’s realities — the mark of an honest faith. Our model for living in reality is Jesus, whose life was far from stable, fulfilling or safe. Jesus faced painful rejection from his neighbors and was misunderstood by his closest friends. St. Mark portrays Jesus as vulnerable and longing for his disciples’ loyalty. Jesus recognized and faced the confusion, noise, frustration and danger of his life. He never used his divinity to avoid reality. We are called to live like Jesus did. If we thank God for the good, but run from the bad, our faith is not very honest or mature. The psalms of lament offer us a way to present ourselves to God the way we really are, not the way we think we should be. This may be difficult because it is human nature to want to be our best before God. I know my father wanted to be his best before God but I wish someone had advised him to pray, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” (Psalm 22:2) — the prayer Jesus prayed on the cross. Judy Hoelzeman is a member of St. Edward Parish in Little Rock.

This article was originally published in Arkansas Catholic June 30, 2007. Copyright Diocese of Little Rock. All rights reserved. This article may be copied or redistributed with acknowledgement and permission of the publisher.