Keeping Secrets

In a frame atop my piano is a photo, taken a number of years ago, from a wedding in which my entire family participated. We’re all dressed in our beautiful Barbie-and-Ken-doll clothes and are smiling happy wedding smiles. Also in the picture is a young adult, one I don’t know personally, but one who is intimately connected with the horrific news swirling around the campus of my Alma mater. The photo is a sobering reminder that there are real people in real pain behind the sensational headlines.

I can’t read the stories; they’re too ugly. I’ve read just enough to have images etched in my mind I wish I could erase. Unspeakable horrors were committed against children. I’m compelled to respond in prayer, though I hardly know how to pray for something so big and so ugly. I beg for God’s mercy on behalf of those who were abused. I pray for healing of mind, body, and soul. I ask that each name be transformed from Victim to Triumph of God’s Grace. I pray for those who minister to students on campus and in the surrounding community.

Powerful men allegedly kept deep, dark secrets for a very long time. When the secrets were exposed, the extent of the damage seemed incomprehensible. The river of grief flowing through Happy Valley is deep, and it is wide. If the charges are true, the lives of those abused, as well as those of a wife, children, grandchildren, co-workers, and friends of the accused will never be the same. There's been a lot of collateral damage.

I keep wondering whether the man under indictment kept his secrets so perfectly and so well that those surrounding him honestly didn’t know; or whether his friends, family and co-workers knew or suspected, but failed to act. I’m having a hard time figuring out which scenario is more disturbing.

If you see something, say something is a slogan crafted in this age of international terrorism, one which asks citizens to be alert and speak up when something seems out of place. Clearly its warning needs to be considered more broadly. The guy in the cubicle next to you may not be plotting nuclear and biological attacks, but he may be contemplating unimaginable harm toward the child next door, or around the block; or in your home, or in mine.

It’s easy to point fingers at those who failed, and failed miserably, at Penn State. But I have to ask, “How many of us have failed to speak up when seeing others behaving in ways harmful to themselves and others?” Have you, have I, confronted the friend who always seems to knock back one more drink than seems responsible? What about the co-worker who always closes his web browser when someone walks near his cubicle? Who pays attention to the young woman hiding in her dorm room at the end of the hall, the one whose wrists are covered in bandages? What of the friend who confides she chats online with an old flame late at night while her husband and children are asleep?

Am I courageous enough to speak up when I see these things? Are you? How many of us want to allow the possibility that the worst we might imagine about another human being could be true?

And what of my own secrets, and yours? The stash of candy kept hidden in the laundry room? The purchase I hope my husband won’t notice? A bad decision made years ago that continues to haunt? Data fudged on a report? Some of the secrets we bury seem small and laughable; others run serious and deep. If allowed to fester and grow, those secrets and our shame are capable of causing great harm to ourselves and those around us. If scripture is true and the ugliness in the headlines teaches anything, our sin will one day find us out. There is simply no such thing as personal sin.

It’s hard being Penn State proud in this moment. I feel like removing the decals from my car and tucking my blue-and-white jacket away toward the back of my closet. This scandal hits a little too close to home for me, but not because I share space with someone in a wedding photo. It hits home because I know I’ve got secrets. You probably do, too. Maybe one of the lessons coming out of Happy Valley is a call to listen anew for the voice of one crying, “Where are you?” Might the grief in this moment help us find courage to expose our secrets to the light of healing grace? Might it teach us to show up in the lives of others and help them find courage to do likewise?

Linking with emily, looking for beauty in the brokenness: