I am thinking of faith now/ and the testaments of loneliness/ and what we feel we are/ worthy of in this world. – David Whyte, from "The Truelove"
I never met him, but you and I think we know "the type." He was one of those sidewalk preachers who wander the streets shouting sermons to disinterested cars and the deaf sky. He must have experienced agonizing loneliness and fear until he discovered something one day.
My friend, Tom Bagwell, told me about him. Some people called him "Rainbow Man" because he preached a particular gospel. This man, whose name I don't know, told everyone that rainbows protect us from evil. Perhaps, like Joseph in the Bible, he believed that a coat of many colors was a special thing. In his case, he believed that rainbows would protect him from some of the nightmares he must have experienced. And if they would help him, maybe rainbows would help everyone.
While rainbows are a rare occurence; imagining them is not. When my younger sister is in pain from occasional bouts of vertigo or chronic back pain, she likes to imagine her favorite spot, a town called La Jolla on the coast of California south of where she and I grew up.
In the movie The Sixth Sense, the boy lead, played by Haley Joel Osmet, surrounded himself with Christian icons to protect himself from the visions of dead people that plagued him. It was the only thing that brought him comfort.
We all seek "rainbows" to transport us from the pain or boredom that sometimes invades our lives. This is, perhaps, the gift of stories – whether told through books, movies or songs. Imagination can tranport us.
The world before the eyes of caregivers often holds the saddest of stories. Nurses encounter the pain of their patients. Hospice workers work every day with people living their last days. Social workers at the Sexual Abuse Center in Nashville seek to bring comfort to women who have been raped. The staff of Brightstone, Inc offers respect and love to adults with developmental disabilities.
After days and nights of dealing with such hard reality, it's no wonder we seek the comfort of stories. Perhaps, rainbows do in fact, protect us. Like hope, rainbows rise out of dark skies to spill beauty into our lives.
What do we feel, in the words of Whyte's poem, "we are worthy of in this world?" We are all worthy of peace. Pain brings loneliness and isolation. We are all wrothy of Love.
Compassionate caregivers are prisms through which the rainbow of Love travels They create beauty that dissolves fear in the hearts of those who, right now, may see only darkness.
-Erie Chapman
Journal of Sacred Work 
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