“Look Harder”
- Dr. Tom Wagner
- Jun 14
- 8 min read
A well-written song takes you deeply into the experience of its author while awakening something familiar in your own. In this week’s article, Dr. Tom’s tender and deeply human reflection on his mother’s life invites us to remember the people whose love, laughter, and presence have shaped us.
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“Look Harder"
How I Spent Last Saturday Morning
Judging from your cards, texts, and emails, it seems that many of you got word that my mom passed away recently. In fact, we buried her last Saturday. Thanks for all the supportive comments, as well as the prayers for my family. No death is easy, but of all the species of death, Mom’s death was perhaps the least painful. After ninety-three years of a meaningful life, and ten years of dementia, in the words of William Shakespeare, she got to “shuffle off this mortal coil.” Given the diminished nature of that coil, it must have felt like the best jailbreak ever!
Recently, I was listening to an old Carole King song. It struck me how much of herself she was sharing in that tune—so much intimacy! Great lyricists seem to make a wager that if they can plumb the depths of their own experience and tell their story with vulnerability and truth, then it will resonate with the soul of the listener. It’s as if they’re betting that their experience can be a lens through which we can glimpse some dimension of our own experience.
I don’t mean to compare myself with the likes of Carole King, but that’s the wager I’m making this week. I’m going to share with you the reflections of a son about his mom just after her death. What you will read will be the comments I made at the beginning of my mom’s funeral liturgy. It’s my hope that you will hear something in those words that will make my mom a vehicle to take you to your own experience of someone you love. As usual, thanks for reading.
Setting the Stage
The setting for my words was the Catholic Church of the Little Flower in Springfield, Illinois. Mom raised her seven kids and worshiped there for nearly seventy years. She outlived all of her peers, so you wouldn’t expect a well-attended funeral. Actually, a healthy-sized crowd showed up. The warm, responsive pop-up community that gathered on that morning was a comfort to me as I approached the speaker’s lectern. I gave the “Call to Worship” at the beginning of the service. Here’s what I had to say.
A Call to Worship
On behalf of Phil, Mary, Teri, Bob, Mike, and Dan, welcome to the celebration of Mom’s life and her transition to the next one. I’m Tom, I’m her fourth-born. I’m smack in the middle of the pack, three older, three younger. My job is to provide a “Call to Worship,” which amounts to getting the spiritual train on the tracks to get this service started.
Knowing Mom, there are two things she’s noticing right now. The first one’s kind of obvious. She’s noticing you. Not this whole body of people, instead, she is noticing you, Mary Pat and Barbie, the daughters of her oldest brother, Jim. Mary Pat, Barbie, you know as well as I do, that she’s over the moon and can’t believe her good fortune that you’re here. She’s also noticing, you, Mary Denise and Kathy, the daughters of her older brother, Jack. I’m not saying that anyone here has to believe in Purgatory. And I’m not saying that Barb’s in Purgatory. All I’m saying is that if she were in Purgatory, just seeing the two of you, Mary Denise, and Kathy, and just like that, she’d be in Heaven! She’s also noticing you, Jackie and Ari, the daughters of my dad’s brother Jack. At times like this, she would say, “I’ve got to pinch myself to make sure you’re really here!” And I could spend the next hour, looking around this room, until I said every name of every person that Mom would be treasuring, one person at a time.
If Mom were here in her body and fullness of mind, there is no way we could start this funeral on time. She would have to come down and have a little party with each and every one of you, to connect, get caught up, and laugh with you. That was Mom’s nature. Like I said, knowing Mom, that’s the first thing she’s noticing right now: you!
The second thing that she’s noticing is something that’s never happened in the history of the world until today. What is that thing? For the first time ever, Mom’s whole family made it to Mass on time! “So Mom…it makes you think, doesn’t it? (Pause) Hmm! (Pause) It looks like maybe, we, your kids, weren’t the issue with all that lateness over the years?” (Pause) “You ever think of that?” (Pause) I’m just sayin’.
A Biblical Perspective
The spiritual tradition my mom raised us in, that is, Judeo-Christianity with a Catholic flavor, has a fundamental belief that we are all made in the image and likeness of God, with the presence of God pulsing out from the core of ourselves. We also believe that each human being is as unique as a fingerprint. That means that each of us has the capacity to reveal a unique and unrepeatable dimension of God.
So here at the beginning of this liturgy, we’re invited to reflect upon the face of my mom as if it were a porthole into the Kingdom of God to see what kind of unique view into God we can get through her. Another way to say this is that we’re to look into the face of Mom to see what it uniquely reveals about the face of God.
Looking Harder
Do you remember seeing the movie, The Lion King? Remember that scene where Rafiki takes Simba on a walk and has him look into a reflective pool. Rafiki guides him to, “Look harder.” What emerged for Simba was something sacred, something that was actually a part of him.
That’s what we’re doing here this morning. We’re looking into the reflective pool that is my mom’s unique personhood, and we’re being asked to “Look harder,” to see what unique dimension of God comes into view through Barb.
As I look harder into Mom’s face, it’s likely that I won’t see precisely what you see when you look harder and reflect on my mom. That’s because each of you is made in the image and likeness of God, and totally unique, so you are likely to see dimensions of Mom that I won’t see. But here this morning, let me share just a couple of things I see when I look harder into the reflective pool that is Mom.
What the Face of Barb Wagner Reveals About the Face of God
You’d think that ten years of dementia would sort of snuff out what’s most unique in my mom—sort of put a bushel basket over it. But that’s not what happened. In some ways, dementia was a winnowing fan that blew away what was inessential in Mom and left behind only her distilled essence. Let me share just two stories that gave me a glimpse into something that was always there with Mom.
A Story in Memory Care Revealing Barb’s Essence
A couple of years ago, a full eight years into my mom’s sojourn with dementia, I was sitting at a table with her and our dear family friend, Father Ossola, and his caregiver, Mike Armstrong. Both Fr. Ossola and Mom were in the same memory care facility for five years together. At one point, Mike says, “You two have been friends for over fifty years!” Without missing a beat, Mom says, “Who said anything about being friends?” With that, Father Ossola erupted into laughter, and Mom busted up laughing too. So did Mike and I. Right in the midst of dementia, that bright light of her humor flashed again. Mom was always looking for a laugh around every corner, either perpetrating the humor or being the best audience for it ever. When my sister, Mary, was having a high school party back in the day, and rain was ruining everything, Mom ran out and bought an assortment of permanent markers and set everybody loose to graffiti up our unfinished basement walls. That began a twenty-plus-year tradition of an accumulation of graffiti from every party.
I clearly remember my oldest brother, Phil, a child-comedian in his own right, making Mom laugh so hard that she wasn’t able to mete out the corporal punishment she was intending to inflict on him. Her shoulders would start quaking, then the smile would break over her stern demeanor, the next thing you know, she was in a little puddle of her own laughter alongside her intended victim.
In her obituary, a friend of hers was quoted as saying, “Barb would have a little party with you whenever she saw you.” Looking through the porthole that is my mom, what comes into view is a God who is always looking to have a little party with you. Through Mom, what emerges is the truth that all the world is full of the laughter and humor of God. There’s suffering too, but that suffering never snuffs out the abundant laughter and humor that is shot through all of reality.
When I “Look harder” at Mom, here’s another thing that comes into focus. Just two months ago, I came to her memory care facility for a visit. She was sitting at the lunch table with a couple of colleagues. One was sitting with her baby doll, the other had a stuffed Curious George animal on her lap. Mom was holding court. She was gesturing with an extended index finger, clearly making a point. She was nodding, smiling, and laughing. Her colleagues were smiling along with her—laughing, nodding—knowingly, and appreciatively. And not a word of what Mom was saying was making any sense.
Mom was doing what Mom has always done—what she was born to do—she was connecting with those women. They were connecting with her. The words didn’t matter.
A Call to Worship
Here at the beginning of this service, the invitation to you and me is to “Look harder.” Don’t be surprised if, through the course of this liturgy, what comes into view, through Mom, is the laughing face of God. Don’t be surprised if you not only see a “God wink,” but a full-throated, shoulders-quaking, eyes weeping, “God belly laugh.” You might see that laughing face through teared-up eyes of your own, but it’ll be laughter nonetheless.
Today, in this liturgy, it also wouldn’t surprise me at all if you met a God who simply, and humbly, just really wants to connect with you. The words really don’t matter that much…come to find out. So over the next hour or so, let’s “Look harder” together.
This week's music is the communion meditation song that was played at Mom’s funeral:
Please share with the SMC community your thoughts and/or reflections in the comments below.
Sunday, August 2 @ 3:00
Resilience & Creativity: A Concert and Conversation with Royce Martin
New York Times–praised, Berklee-trained pianist, composer, and creator of “Swagtime,” with work featured on MAX and Hulu.
To the entire Wagner Family my prayers and thoughts go out to you all in this time of missing. I had the pleasure of being in your mothers company while we were in college. She was always present with a twinkle on her eye. I lived watching Tom and Bob always trying to get her goat. She would react as if she was mad but so the time she was laughing. Just love watching the love between you all.
The beauty of your mom is so apparent in your pictures, your words, your own laughter. Praying for you and yours in the midst of your loss.
As usual, Tom, your “words create worlds,” as Abraham Heschel said. many times over the course of his rabbinical vocation. He also wrote “Never trust a spirituality that omits laughter,” which is certainly evident in the personae of both you and your mom. She is at peace and it sounds like she was peace-bringer on so many levels.
God bless your family, Tom