What Can Gene Wilder's Widow Teach Christians About Talking To Bereaved or Suffering Nonbelievers?

 You might have heard recently that Gene Wilder died. I do not intend to make this about him, even though I think he was brilliant in the original version of “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” What's interesting to note, though, is that his widow posted the above sign in her yard. She wants hugs instead of platitudes. She'd rather remember the happy times than be told that her deceased husband is in a better place. If you remember a funny story you heard about Gene Wilder and encounter his widow, share the funny story because that's more likely to make her smile. 

She's apparently an unbeliever and, like all unbelievers, she does not believe that there is an afterlife. We get this life and that's it. Atheists believe that God won't directly intervene in Earthly events because God doesn't exist. So when they help someone who is grieving, sick, injured or carrying a burden that the other person is really not strong enough to bear, they're doing it out of their own sense of morality. They recognize that direct intervention means more to people in danger than somebody's automatic assumption that God will take care of it with or without their help. Instead of telling people that they'll pray for them, atheists try to understand their situation and ask, “What can I do, right here and now, to make your burden more bearable?” 

Take a meal to the grieving widow. Make a donation to the deceased person's favorite charity even if it isn't ostensibly Christian. Share a happy memory. Remember that platitudes about a better place are clichés that do not necessarily comfort the ones left behind. The deceased is missed regardless of whether the bereaved believe that they are in a “better place” or not and there is no shame in grieving even if the process takes a while. Do this without the incentive of rewards or the threat of punishment in the afterlife and you'll be acting like an atheist. 

When you can act like an atheist, you aren't sending the impression that God is the only thing holding you back from committing serious sins. Jesus doesn't have you in a half-Nelson because he's trying to prevent you from assaulting a homosexual couple you saw kissing on the sidewalk. People won't assume that you're going to be caught molesting little boys in a couple of years tops if you even say a single word about sexual immorality. You aren't killing people, refusing them service, or refusing even to help them when they get themselves backed into a corner through not fault of their own and then blaming them for refusing to believe the same things you do. This happens because atheists believe in self-control and know that there will be no forgiveness if they commit serious crimes. 

When you act like an atheist, you look at the real world and wonder how you can make things better in this life. You can make the conversation about practical real world results. If you aren't participating in a sexually immoral lifestyle, you can worry less about the risk of a condom breaking. If you got raped and now you're pregnant, adoption is an option. Make it a dialogue. Do more listening than talking. Put down that sign you've been waving at a protest and see if you can start a conversation with the women going to Planned Parenthood without sounding aggressive. Maybe they really are just going in for a mammogram. Maybe they're just a scared young mother who is exploring options, of which abortion is only one.

Most importantly, don't make the issues about you and your little container. You're married and have four kids that you can afford to send to a private Christian school; a single mother with one or two kids might not have that luxury when the father was killed in a car accident and she's struggling to put food on the table. You do most of your shopping at Fresh Market and buy only organic and Fair Trade food; a SNAP card recipient is living on Ramen noodles that he picked up at Wal-Mart. You donate grocery bags full of food to your church's food bank and a hungry family with young children is turned away from that very same food bank because that family includes “two daddies.” A devoted churchgoer with Lou Gehrig's disease is asked not to come back to the church after he's been hospitalized for several weeks due to complications related to his ailment. Each person's story is different, and much of the anger that evangelists encounter come from people who are sick of being preached to about a better place when all they need is a practical way out of their current situation. 

This is why people are ditching Christianity. When polled, 58% of the young adults who stopped attending church say that they stopped due to issues with their pastor or church. 26% said that church members seemed hypocritical or judgmental. 20% said that they didn't feel connected to their church. 15% said that church members were unfriendly and unwelcoming. And this is coming from a Christianity Today poll. What does this say about the church if these are the reasons that young people stop attending? 

These young adults are people who aren't stupid. They're going to wonder about the motives of the people they see in the church. If a hypocritical and judgmental Christian is perfectly willing to gossip about the faults of everybody in the world but herself, is she trying to cover up something that's going on in her own private life? What can we assume about a person who is willing to condemn a young man to Hell for struggling with homosexual urges instead of offering a sympathetic and nonjudgmental ear when that young man might just need somebody he can talk to? Can the modern Christian church welcome the homeless person who might not have any nice clothes to wear to Sunday worship services and invite them to a soup supper afterward? What can we do to reach out and make that important connection with people who might not have gone to church for a while because they felt unwelcome or they just didn't think it was helping with difficulties they were going through? 

You may remember Jesus' parable about the seeds that were sown in a variety of types of soil. Some seeds fall on good soil and produce good fruit. Some seeds don't grow very much because they landed in rocky soil. Some seeds fell among weeds and were choked out by the weeds. The weeds are distractions. That's when we need to ask ourselves, “What might be distracting this person? Would helping that person remove the weeds of distraction now help him or her become more receptive to our message at some future point in time?” Would giving the recently bereaved widow a hug and letting her cry on your shoulder, leaving out the platitudes for now, give her time to deal with the thorns of fresh grief without adding more thorns? Would getting a drug addict into a rehabilitation program help him to clear his head and become more receptive? Would having your church's food bank give food to the single-parent families and the ones with “two daddies” give your church a reputation as a place where people's needs can be met regardless of whether those needs are spiritual or physical?  How can we convey our message in a way that it won't be choked out by the weeds of distraction and people who are going through difficulties in their lives won't dismiss it as something they've heard before and won't help with their particular situation anyhow? 

Atheists usually aren't bad people. Many of them are people who had bad things happen to them and they doubt that God cares or even exists. It's possible for Christians to inadvertently send the wrong message to these people. Can we come up with a message that says that we understand their grief for somebody whom they don't think they'll see again? Can we remember the good times in a world where Willy Wonka can make us smile while reminding us that we can inherit the chocolate factory – a child's fairyland version of the “better place” – by avoiding character flaws like gluttony and greed? At the same time, can we acknowledge the other important message in the movie – that Willy Wonka knew he wouldn't live forever and wanted somebody who could look after the Oompa Loompas, the vulnerable members of society, after he was gone? When bad things happen to good people, who can the good people turn to for a hug and a good memory that will make them smile? 

Author's note to Steemit: I meant this for another blog, but decided to post it here instead to see how Steemit works. Peace and high fives.