BEING HUMAN

#BeingHuman. #BrutalHonesty. Excerpts from a personal diary, July 2024. Perhaps someone will find themselves here, and I want those people to know that they are not alone in their vulnerability before Christ.

Sunday, 7 July 2024. Early morning. Misha calls, and his voice trembles: “Taras, his comrades reported. Andrii is critically wounded. Yesterday evening. On his birthday.” The world stopped. Lord, why yesterday? Why on his thirty-third birthday? I gather information drop by drop. A mission. A russian drone. A drop. Critical wounds to a senior lieutenant of the medical service, a military doctor. Evacuation. Intensive care. Coma. God, I do not understand Your ways. Why is the one who saved others now mortally wounded himself? Why do we say that war takes the best, the way so many Christians do when they want to simplify someone else’s grief? I sit in silence and think about what justice means in this world, and whether it exists at all. Andrii devoted his life to saving people, and now he needs saving himself. Is this Your cosmic irony, or a test of faith? Mom is still in the hospital after her stroke. How do we tell them? Dad has heart problems after his heart attack.

Monday, 8 July 2024, morning. An update from the two relatives who went to the hospital. Andrii is still in intensive care, in a coma, and the doctors are fighting for his life. His lungs are not working, so he is on artificial ventilation. Two heart attacks in these days. I write the first public post on Facebook. My hands shake. How can words convey this pain? How do I explain to hundreds of people that our younger brother, who had so many plans, is now between life and death? Lord, You know every breath he takes. Do You hold his life in Your hands? Give wisdom to the doctors. Give him strength, heal him. I think about the life of families waiting for someone from the front. Every call is fear, every message could be the last, and we live from one piece of news to the next, hoping and dreading at the same time. Is this how life is supposed to look, in constant expectation of catastrophe? Why did You create a world where love always comes with the fear of loss? I look at photographs from his last leave. He returned to work on 25 June. There was a premonition. The heart always knows before the mind is ready to accept.

Monday, 8 July 2024, evening. His condition remains critical. Tonight and tomorrow, the third day after the injury, will be decisive. There is shrapnel in his lungs, and tomorrow he may be moved to a safer hospital. God, I trust the doctors, and deep in my soul I know that everything is in Your hands. If You want to leave Andrii with us, do it. If You call him to Yourself, help our family accept it, and let his blood be on the heads of the russians who mortally wounded him, and on the heads of all those russian Christians who supported the invasion from 2014, who say that not everything is so unambiguous, who silently agree with the destruction of our country and our people, and who bless the erasure of both. Why does prayer sometimes feel like a cry into the desert? Why does God seem so distant exactly when He is most needed? I think about our military paramedics, and about how many lives Andrii saved over these two and a half years. Now someone is trying to save him.

Tuesday, 9 July 2024. Andrii was transported by ambulance to a hospital in Odesa. Experienced doctors, and two members of our family are with him. A third heart attack did not happen, glory to God. But there was bleeding, and the doctors are dealing with it urgently. Tonight and tomorrow are still critical. Lord, every hour is a fight for my brother’s life. I hear testimonies from his comrades about his work as a military doctor, about things he never told us. A book could be written out of those testimonies. God, preserve him so that he can write it himself. I feel helpless. All I can do is pray. But is that enough? Does our faith sometimes look like a pitiful attempt to control what cannot be controlled? I pray for everyone who is wounded, for the families of the dead and the missing, for our defenders.

Wednesday, 10 July 2024. An evening update. The doctors hint that Andrii will remain in critical condition for a long time. For us this is a marathon, including a prayer marathon. Deep gratitude to his comrades for giving medical aid in the first minutes, saving his life, evacuating him. God, I understand that a long road lies ahead. Am I ready for this marathon? Will my faith be enough? I do not know. Help me hold on. Help my unbelief. I think about what patience is. A virtue, or simply the inability to change anything? Andrii patiently saved people in a war, and now we patiently wait to see whether he can be saved. I close the previous Facebook posts for a while. Too many comments: everything is God’s will, God takes the best, did he manage to repent.

Thursday, 11 July 2024. We wait. We pray. Lord, in silence I usually hear Your voice better, supposedly. But today You are silent. Why? What does that mean? I remember Andrii as a boy. How he graduated from music school, specializing in clarinet. How he helped in the family printing house in Kornyn. How many books passed through his hands. And now his hands do not move. Did he know then, as a child playing the clarinet, that one day his hands would save human lives in a war? Is there some plan in all of this, or are we just trying to find meaning where there is none? I think about our parents. Mom has not recovered from her stroke, dad has his heart. How hard this is for them.

Friday, 12 July 2024. Today is especially hard. No encouraging news about his condition, and the absence of news is news too. God, I try to understand why people faithful to You suffer. Why the one who devoted his life to saving others now stands on the border between life and death. There is no peace in my heart, only pain and questions without Your answers. I read Job. He asked questions too, and did not understand either. And what happened? You answered him with questions of Your own. Maybe questions are also a form of prayer. Maybe doubts are brutal honesty before You rather than sin. Lord, if You exist, why is our world arranged so cruelly? Why is the history of our people written in blood? Why does good so often lose to evil? Why does Your love resemble indifference?

Saturday, 13 July 2024. A week since the injury. It feels like an eternity. Lord, You gave Andrii thirty-three years, the same number Your Son lived on earth. Is this a sign, or a coincidence? I remember how he studied at Odesa Medical University, how he passed the American USMLE exams with the highest scores, how he dreamed of anesthesiology. How many plans we discussed. And now he is in a coma. Will he come out of it? War destroys more than with bullets, since it destroys dreams and plans and the future. What is the future when the present is this uncertain? Is there any sense in planning when everything can change in a second because of a russian drone blessed by russian Christians? I think about the vulnerability of human existence. We build plans as though we were immortal, and we hold on to life by such a thin thread.

Sunday, 14 July 2024. Today is Sunday, the day we usually go to church. And today I sit and cannot think about what is happening there. I can only plead with God. God, is it a sin that my thoughts are in Odesa rather than in church? Do You understand our pain? Probably You do, since You lost Your Son. But Your Son rose on the third day. And when will my brother rise? No, not in that sense, You misunderstood me. Will he come back to life here, on earth? Why does faith sometimes feel like self-deception? Why does prayer resemble a conversation with emptiness? A short call to the relatives with him in Odesa. Condition unchanged, the doctors say. Is that good or bad? No deterioration, which is good. No improvement, which frightens me more.

Monday, 15 July 2024. Two weeks ago Andrii was healthy and full of plans. He was preparing to work as an anesthesiologist and dreaming of a peaceful life after the war. Lord, how quickly everything can change. How fragile You made our life. How do we value every day, every hour with the people we love? I receive messages from friends and partners, and even from people I do not know personally. They are praying for Andrii. But will any of these prayers help? I think about the paradox of prayer. Millions prayed for peace, and the war continues. Pentecostal and charismatic prophetesses prophesied peace. Thousands prayed for their relatives and lost them anyway. So why pray to You at all? Or maybe prayer is a way to change ourselves rather than our circumstances, a way not to be left alone with our pain.

Tuesday, 16 July 2024. I think about this war and about how it changed all of us. Andrii volunteered in 2014, then again in 2022, to save people as a military doctor. He could not stay aside. God, did he act rightly? Probably he did. Who else would save the wounded? But why is the price so high? What is heroism? A conscious choice, or an instinct? Andrii went to save people without thinking about patriotism or heroism or his own safety. Is that courage, or an unhealthy altruism? Why do people like him always pay the highest price? Why do russian killers and Ukrainian corrupt officials live long lives while the righteous die young?

Wednesday, 17 July 2024. Bad news today. His condition is worsening and his vital signs are becoming even more critical. The doctors are making every effort. I think about mom, still in rehabilitation after a severe stroke. Every day is already a challenge for her. And now this blow. Lord, our marathon continues, as it does for hundreds of thousands of other Ukrainian families. I do not understand Your ways, and I still pray, still believe. Help my unbelief. I pray for the shameful defeat of russia and for a just peace for Ukraine. I think about justice. Does it exist? Is there some universal justice that will finally restore the balance, or must we fight for justice ourselves without waiting for God? If You love Ukraine, why do You allow this destruction? The deaths, the rapes, the torture, the ruins? If You are on the side of a just peace, why has this war continued for two and a half years, no, for ten? Have You already abandoned Ukraine? I hope You are not with russia and not on Putin’s side.

Thursday, 18 July 2024. Today it is especially hard to hold on. I feel my faith wavering. God, is it normal to doubt? Can a person believe and scream from pain at the same time? Thomas doubted until he touched the wounds of Jesus, and I am touching the wounds of my own soul while You are somewhere far away. I think about what will happen when believing people read these notes, and about what they will say. That I am unspiritual, that one should not share one’s questions to God with others, so that people do not blaspheme His name. I have already been told this: such ministers disappoint people in God if they share their inner doubts, and in the eyes of people one must always be strong and unbreakable. God, I ask You to show these people the limits of their self-confidence and their strength. Is that cruel of me? I simply do not want our believers turning into spiritually victorious ones who commit spiritual and emotional violence against other followers of Christ who are in grief. Why do spiritual people so often become cruel? Why does a faith that should carry love breed judgment and devaluation? Maybe the most honest prayer is a cry of pain. Maybe our sincerity matters more to You than correct words. Or maybe You judge me too for not being strong and correct in the eyes of people.

Friday, 19 July 2024. The twelfth day of fighting for Andrii’s life. The doctors supposedly have not given up, and we still hope. But strength is running out. Lord, give me strength not only to pray but to support the others in our family, dad and mom, brothers and sisters. I barely hold on myself. I think about what I wrote earlier, that war has faces. Now it is my brother’s face, pale and unconscious and surrounded by machines. What is hope? Faith in the impossible, or simply an inability to accept reality? When does hope become cruelty to oneself? Lord, if You call him to Yourself, will I be able to remain faithful to You? Will I not become one of those who turn away from faith after a tragedy?

Saturday, 20 July 2024. The last day of hope? Or the first day of accepting the inevitable? At least judging by what the doctors hint. God, I prepare for the worst and still hope for a miracle. You performed miracles before, did You not? Or was all of that only for the Gospels? Perform one now, with Andrii. And if Your will is otherwise, well, as You said in the garden, help us accept that too. We are supposedly Your children as well. Do You remember that? I cannot imagine our family or the world without him. We are six brothers. How can there be five of us? I read the psalms of lament and cursing and think about russians and russian Christians. Can a Christian hate? Does he have the right to curse murderers? Oh, no, that is not allowed now. But David cursed his enemies, and You supposedly did not condemn him for it. Or did You? I think about death. An end or a beginning? A liberation or a tragedy? And for whom, for the one russians are killing, or for those who remain? Where are You? Why are You silent?

Sunday, 21 July 2024. The phone. The phone again, in the morning. “At 6:30 Andrii’s heart stopped beating.” Lord, why? WHY? I cannot write more. Fifteen days of struggle are over. The wounds proved incompatible with life. What now? How do we live on? How do you breathe when the air has run out and you are losing consciousness?

Monday, 22 July 2024. Andrii is on the road from Odesa to Rivne, on his shield. The farewell will be on 24 July at nine in the morning on the Maidan. God, how hard it is to write about him in the past tense. Was instead of is. But for You he still is, right? Or are You on the side of those believers who try to prove to me that Andrii went to war to kill people? Where are You, God? I prepare a draft biography for the city council and the news channels. Thirty-three years of life have to fit on one page. I write the announcement on Facebook about the farewell. I ask believers not to say that everything will be fine and that everything is God’s will, and not to ask about my relationship with God after Andrii’s death. He did not die, he was killed by russians. Abel did not die, he was killed by Cain. Why do so many Ukrainian believers, and not only russian ones, still fear to call things by their names? Why do some ministers blame our family for not covering Andrii sufficiently with a prayer dome? I think about how death changes everything. A few days ago he was wounded, and there was hope. Today he is gone, and there is only memory. What a thin line between is and was.

Tuesday, 23 July 2024. Still editing the biography today. Every word comes hard. “Andrii was born on 6 July 1991 into a large Christian family, the tenth child of eleven. He graduated from music school specializing in clarinet, worked in the family printing house, studied in Lithuania and the Czech Republic, and then at Odesa Medical University.” Dry words, behind which lies so much invisible grief and so many tears of our large family. Lord, how much and how little he managed in thirty-three years. Music, printing, languages, medicine, war. As though he had lived several lives and had not begun to live at all. “In 2014 he volunteered for Azov and took part in the battles for Ilovaisk as a military medic. In 2022 he went again to defend the country. He received several awards for courage.” The hardest paragraph: “The bright memory of Andrii Dyatlik will remain forever in the hearts of those who knew and loved him.” Forever, God? Do You still remember him? Corruption among many people in our government keeps destroying the memory of our defenders. What is memory? Can a person truly die while they are remembered? Is there any difference between physical and metaphysical existence? Why are You silent, God?

Wednesday, 24 July 2024, morning. Nine in the morning. Independence Maidan in Rivne. Hundreds of people came to say farewell. I read the words from our parents: “Andrii was an incredible blessing from the Lord for us. His life was full of love for God and for his neighbors. We deeply believe that our son’s sacrifice was not in vain.” God, give dad and mom strength. It is hardest for them now. The road to the cemetery. All the traffic stops, and people get out of their cars and kneel. Will there come a time when as many people kneel before Christ? Heroes’ Alley. Here Andrii will rest until the day of resurrection. I look at the graves of the other heroes. Each one is someone’s broken heart, someone’s unfinished life. Why does heroism always demand such a sacrifice? So that corrupt officials in Ukraine and in russia can live well here and now? Or to satisfy the madness of russian Christians?

Wednesday, 24 July 2024, evening. I began writing a letter to my little brother: “My dear little brother Andrii, this is my last letter to you. It is hard to believe that you are not with us on this silent planet.” We were six brothers, and now we are five. Lord, how do I let him go? Not forget him, but let him go into Your embrace. In the van on the way to the cemetery I looked at the coffin covered with the yellow and blue flag. The white mourning ribbons, like silent witnesses of our pain. The wooden cross with his name on it, a symbol of the faith we shared. War has names and faces. The procession moves through the central streets, and all the traffic stops. At Heroes’ Alley hundreds more people were waiting. I go on writing: “Andrii, I will never forget you, my little brother. You were faithful unto death, as dad and mom say every day. Wait for us there. Thank you for everything, dear one, for being with us, for loving us, and for leaving so many bright memories. I do not want to and I cannot, and I know I must let you go into the embrace of our Heavenly Father, in order to live through what I still have to live through here, on this silent planet.” God, have You already given him the crown of life that You promised to those faithful to You? Have You given it? Give me a sign that You have. What is eternity? Does it exist, or is it our self-comfort in the face of death? Will we meet again, or is that only a beautiful religious fairy tale for broken hearts? And if eternity exists, will You remember how Andrii saved people in this war? Do You value his sacrifice? Or does the sacrifice of russians matter to You as well, and do You also demand our compassion for those who kill and rape and torture and destroy us daily in the name of Your traditional Christian values?

Did Andrii give his life in vain? How do You look at this? Why are You silent, God? I love you, my little brother. Taras Dyatlik, United Kingdom
23 July 2025