A baby girl died almost two weeks ago. She survived for two months longer than her mother. Now there are three sisters remaining, all healthy and confused, and a father who is HIV positive but doing well with medication. She was known affectionately as Baby Peak.

The day before she died I held her for awhile so her sister could have a break to play. An eleven year old girl who cared for her dying mother, caring for her dying sister, just wanted to cut and glue paper with the other kids. I did ask her to stop and bring a bottle, which she did, and then I fed Baby Peak. She burped contentedly and fell asleep on my lap. I thought, “Maybe if we all work together we can save her.” She had a will to live. She ate well.

Baby Peak and her sister

She died of AIDS. Technically, she died of some unknown illness. She had started on ARV drugs (that fight HIV), but something already had her in its grip too strongly for any drugs to release her. The local hospital had given up and sent her to the orphanage. There was hope but not much.

Taking ARV drugs the evening before she died

The next morning (Monday, February 9) we learned that Baby Peak had died in her sleep. I confess my heart didn’t break when I heard it. I didn’t know how to feel. But I found the older sister, took her hand, and led her to where some children were drawing pictures and folding origami. She joined them and drew a picture of yellow birds and a girl (or maybe it was her mother…). The yellow birds were origami cranes. Later I saw a yellow paper crane resting on the flowers that covered Baby Peak.

The father came on his motorcycle. He has his hands full living with HIV and trying to work. He only keeps the youngest sister, who cries all day when he’s gone. After he arrived there was a brief service, and then a cremation. It all happened so quickly I almost missed it. I didn’t bring out my camera for a change. Not that pictures are bad, but one or two people had their cameras out and that was enough. I wondered what the father was feeling to lose a daughter so soon after losing his wife.

I sometimes teach a seminar about HIV/AIDS to university students in Japan. Recently, I was teaching at a Christian university, so I began by asking: “Is God good? How can we say that God is love when children and babies die of AIDS?” Maybe you think that’s a strange way to start, but I figured that was a question many of them would have, so it was best to bring it out directly. Most of the students were not Christians, and they have probably had their share of trite questions and answers that don’t satisfy.

I didn’t want to give my own answer. My life has been remarkably free from sickness and death, so who am I to act like I have honestly confronted these questions. But I asked my friend Wayne, the director of the orphanage, to give an answer. Here is what he said (which I shared with the class):

I believe that GOD is Love. From a distance PAIN and SUFFERING can appear to be acts of an unjust and unloving GOD but when one realizes that those who have suffered the greatest, are often those who appreciate life the most, then one begins to understand that PAIN and SUFFERING are actually gifts from a Loving Creator. Perhaps your question should be: Why does GOD allow some people to live in comfort? For those who live in the greatest of comfort are often those who find no meaning in life.

Wayne is not the type to try and give “correct answers” (in the Christian theological sense). He just answers from where he’s at, and I appreciate that. The students did, too.

Baby Peak’s death was a dose of reality for us (the Japanese volunteers and me). It was a reminder that people are still dying of AIDS, and if we leave the relative security of Japan and go out to where the poor live “outside the gates” then we may find suffering and death there. We also find life there.

When we push death away and choose comfort, we also push life away and choose illusion.

Coming back from Narita Airport on the train, I felt like I was the only person who could see. Everyone looked lost in various worlds, numb or deluded. I didn’t avert my eyes, like I’m used to doing here, but looked at people wondering how they had fallen asleep and what would wake them up.

Now a week has passed, and I’m intent on keeping my own eyes open.