I have written before about how people find security in a variety of things…for some people it’s a blanket, a community, a phone, locks, a relationship…it all depends on the person, but it seems to me that people don’t want to give up that security, no matter what it is….
We can see the resistance from the first moments of life in a baby’s cries, or in that of a grown woman crying nightly and staying with an abusive man because all she knows is in that relationship. Or as I was reading today about church members not wanting to believe that the janitor murdered their own priest, even though he confessed to the act. Not to mention that it doesn’t sound like it was just a quick act of rage, but a really bloody, violent murder where he repeatedly beat and stabbed the guy. And yet because all of those people would have to think about a man like that being around their children at the school attached to the church and around them every week in church…they would rather just not allow themselves to believe it and live in denial.
What is it about denial that makes some people feel so good? I understand that venturing out can be a very risky and scary thing…but at the same time, not facing the facts can also lead to danger and heartache. This murder for example, what if it was up to the people of that church and they simply didn’t want to believe it and let him come back to his job as janitor simply to avoid the thought that their community found in the church is not as safe and secure as they believed. And then what if it happened again…maybe even to a child next time….
Now granted we dont’ know what motivated the murder…it sounds like there are some suspicious things that had been going on….but that’s still not a reason to take a close look at what is going on because you afraid to lose the security.
