Lent #6: Wound

The wound of my people,

   wounds me as well. (Jeremiah 8:21).

 My ATF (Actual Theologian Friend) suggested I read The Hidden Wound by Wendell Berry. The suggestion came after my reading of White Fragility when I complained that I’m too fragile for such shrilled pronouncements. My ATF was right—Berry is the one for me. “Wound” is a good word. It’s a Bible word—a Lenten word.

It’s Berry’s literary tone that draws me in. Like the Prophets, Berry speaks to us poetically: “The wound that hurts the daughter of my people/wounds me as well/Is there no balm in Gilead?/Is there no physician there?” (Jer 8). Our national wound of slavery hurts us all. The wound is too deep to be healed in any mechanistic way—by some sort of political policy or by a training certificate. Whatever we say or do seems trite: “They heal the wound of my people superficially” (Jer 8).

Even the Prophet hesitates to provide a solution: “Is there no balm in Gilead?” Berry takes us to a spiritual place that begins with lament: “My heart is wounded within me” (Ps 109); and moves to confession, “Her wounds are ever before me” (Jer 6). Somehow, the Cross gets us to healing: “By his wounds we are healed” (Is 53 = 1Pt 2:24).