Broken Body, Healing Spirit by Mary C. Earle

Author:Mary C. Earle
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Church Publishing Incorporated

Literal Interpretations of Illness

Just as in the early church lectio was accomplished through recalling and remembering Scripture, so too with the experience of falling ill and living with illness. We are invited to recall and remember. The text in this case is the text of the body, particularly this afflicted body. The body—wedded to the soul and shaping us as unique persons—is itself a living word, spoken into being by the God in whom we live and move and have our being. This living text of the various microcosms of our organs and bodily systems is also a living metaphor, a figure of divine speech that invites our listening. Yet that meaning cannot and should not be assumed, prescribed, or dictated.

Like any rich and intricately detailed text, the body cannot and should not be reduced to one layer of meaning. Have you ever had a high school English teacher who proclaimed the one—and only—meaning of a poem or story? Alternative meanings were not acceptable. Have you ever experienced the literalism of some within the Christian community as they interpret Scripture? Both cases are examples of reductionist thinking, where meaning has been reduced to a sound bite, hindering us from knowing the deeper, fuller meaning. When we read on only the simplest, most literal of levels, we often miss the point.

Sadly, this sort of interpretation has also invaded the realm of health and spirituality. Guides to interpreting illness are everywhere, leading those who are ill and vulnerable to simplistic and sometimes guilt-ridden ways of reading their experience. Some authors, for example, imply that emphysema results not so much from environmental toxins or cigarette smoking, but from not breathing one’s life. Breast cancer signals trouble with womanhood, and so on. While there may be clues about the text of an illness in the organ affected, it is harmful to reduce the experience to this level of direct cause and effect.

From within Christian quarters, a different kind of fundamentalism can reign. This is the kind of belief and practice that subjects the sick person to continuous, smug evaluation. Comments such as “You know, if you just prayed harder, your bipolar disorder would be healed” or “God has given you the cancer so that you can learn a lesson” have behind them a theology that has little to do with the Trinity of Love. These comments are based, rather, on fear and uneasiness with mortality. It is fear and anxiety that tend to force us into simplistic interpretations, whether we are interpreting Scripture, our lives, or our illnesses.

Again and again, I hear from those under my spiritual direction and from those who participate in my classes that these sorts of comments abound. Because a person who lives with physical or mental affliction is already experiencing a degree of distancing, these comments can be especially injurious. However, when two or three persons whose lives are marked by illness come together, they can support one another in Christ by peeling away interpretations that are false and misleading, if not downright punitive.

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