Prayer Request
A reader asks for your prayerful help, dear readers:
I just found out a couple of days ago that my son, my only child is most likely somewhere on the autism spectrum. With my (admittedly slight) understanding of it, he’s probably not a bad case, but I really have no idea what this means. A part of me is scared that he’s going to be a child his entire life. . . . I don’t think so. I don’t think it’s that bad. But I don’t really know, and I am so terrified, and so broken up. This is the worst news I have had in my entire life, and I’m more confused and frightened than I can explain. I could really use a few people before God’s throne on my behalf.
You owe me nothing. If you don’t, I won’t be upset at all. But if you could post this request, just saying that I’m a regular reader and occasional commenter, I’d appreciate it.
We can pray both for his comfort and his cure.
The fear that one will not love a crippled child or a retarded one was a fear that bedeviled me back in my youth, when I was an atheist and had only my own mental resources on which to draw. These evils do happen, but God gives the soul the power to love abundantly and to put fear aside easily. God grants peace. Love is self sacrifice, not self regard, and to care for a child maimed in mind or body is not only possible, but rich and strange in ways that cannot be put in words.
And miracles happen, and some sufferings are joined with the sufferings of Christ and work to aid the redemption of the world.
And miracles happen, and some sufferings are taken away as if they had never been.