The Bible tells us in Matthew 5:43-48 to love our enemies. It explains that it is not enough to just love those in your life whom love you back, or of whom it comes natural to love. There are people even now who we come in contact with in the daily confinds of our lives, who we find it difficult to connect to. We may not understand them, we may find them constantly on our nerves, or we may just find them challenging to be around. Those people may not be considered our enemies, but they do pose a challenge for us to like them, even love them. Carl Morse touches on that challenge in his poem "How to Watch Your Brother Die."
The poem is about a man who travels to see his gay brother in the hospital in his last days of life. He is assumably dying from aids, although the poem never says this directly. We can see that the man never quite knew how to realte to his brother. When his brother told him he was gay, the man didn't know how to react. It made this relationship a real challenge. So he stuffed his emotions, and ignored the issue. It appears he really didn't talk to his brother much after that. He ignored him too. The man mostly dialogues with the brother's lover, as he tries to understand and learn more about who his brother really was. They exchange words over coffee in the hospital cafeteria. The man tries to relate, but I perceived this attempt as rather uncomfortable and awkward at first. The man tells the lover he is "extremely good-looking" and even apologizes saying, "He doesn't know what it means to love another man."
As you read the poem, the narrator is constantly mentioning the different actions he's taking. It is almost as if he is on auto-pilot and numb to what is really happening. But as the poem continues, we see the narrator begin to show his feelings. He begins to show is anger. He grows loud at border patrol guard who won't allow him to bring in drugs that may save his brother. He sees the hatred in that man's eyes. He's angry at the way he sees his brother is being treated, and he is angry about the unfortanate circumstances in general surrounding his death. He may even be angry that he too didn't treat his brother as he should have, or at least regretful. The last line of the poem states that the man is flying home from his brother's funeral reminiscing about the past and thinking about hugging his children, of which are not a challenge to embrace or to love.
Who in your life poses a challenge for you? Is it a co-worker? A classmate? or even a family member? As a Christian we are called to love our neighbors, even as we love ourselves. The man in this poem couldn't reconcile his feelings that what his brother was doing was wrong with his feelings of brotherly love and affection. So he just ignored the situation. This poem made me cry. Mostly becasue I saw the hate others have toward homosexuals, and the way they just have to get used to it. That look of disgust in someone else's eyes is something they see regularly. I too have a sibling who is gay. I understand the strange challenge as a Christian to, as they say, "love the person, but hate the sin." I understand the uncomfortableness of not knowing what to say in certain situations, and I understand the deep hurt that my sister feels, that no one accepts her. It can make one not want to accept themselves. She would much rather be a drug addict than a lesbian in any given Christian circle, because at least then she would be treated with more dignity.
This poem poses a challenge to us. How are we going to respond to the challenge to love in our own lives? I guarentee there is someone in your life, whom you don't agree with. Life is filled with much judgment and condemnation. We judge people if they are too pretty, or not pretty enough. If they have to much money and are frivolous, or if they don't bother to work and use the system. Some of us have a parent we just can't seem to relate too, or a boss we don't respect. There is someone in your life that is a challenge to love. That makes you uncomfortble and is just easier to ignore. But as a Christian, if we truly want to follow the teaching of Christ we must love not only those in whom it is easy, or those we don't agree with, but also those who truly are our enemy.
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