Terremoto

For the last month, Cochabamba, Bolivia, has been the whole world to me. Colorful, musical, beautiful. And it has felt stable and secure. There is, of course, a much vaster world out there, deep, wild, and sometimes unsettled. Physically speaking, some Bolivians living in the departments of Cochabamba, Oruro, and La Paz were jolted into awareness of this by a 6.8-magnitude earthquake that struck at 1 a.m. on Friday morning.

Spiritually speaking, the chances are good that you were jolted into awareness of the wider world by another kind of earthquake, when a shooter let slip the unspeakable violence he committed against Muslims in Christchurch, New Zealand that same day, hours before the tremor in Bolivia.

The epicenter of the quake was only 34 miles southeast of Cochabamba. I felt nothing that night. But today I feel unsettled by the killings in the mosques in faraway Christchurch. Because we in the United States have suffered the same sacrilege: our Jewish neighbors in Pittsburgh, and our Christian neighbors in Charleston.

In the aftermath of inhuman carnage, everything looks gray, feels tattered, seems useless. And small. Life doesn’t look so charming today. It feels stale, listless, flat. Our own problems and preoccupations are petty. We can feel helpless or hopeless. If not for the sadness or anger you may be feeling, life may almost come to be meaningless.

But there is a living God, and it seems to me God is saying: Don’t let them do it. Don’t let them take the savor of life from you. After all, ain’t you got a right to the tree of life?

The primary emotion I feel is anger. Still we are sacrificing others instead of sacrificing ourselves. What can I do with this anger against anger itself? This was from the Gospel reading yesterday:

Jesus said to his disciples:

“You have heard that it was said to your ancestors,
You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment. But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother
will be liable to judgment,
and whoever says to his brother, Raqa,
will be answerable to the Sanhedrin,
and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna.
Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar,
and there recall that your brother
has anything against you,
leave your gift there at the altar,
go first and be reconciled with your brother,
and then come and offer your gift” (Matthew 5:21-24).

Sometimes I feel like our sacred liturgies must fall silent. Sometimes I feel like the offerings at the altar simply have to cease while God weeps and rages at human hypocrisy. Muslim, Jewish, Christian. We are all one. Can’t everyone see? What in the world can we do about all the angry, hate-filled people?

We know the answer that comes from the living God. But concretely, I can’t give you the answer that the living God is giving you personally, the words and acts of love, mercy, justice, truth, and reconciliation you are to perform wherever you are. Read the signs of the times. Read the texts that are holy to you. Read your heart. Pray. Then you will know. And you will know the peace that passes all understanding.

At midday prayer today I took consolation from this reading:

Remember these things, Jacob, 

Israel, for you are my servant! 

I formed you, a servant to me; 

Israel, you shall never be forgotten by me: 

I have brushed away your offenses like a cloud, 

your sins like a mist; 

return to me, for I have redeemed you (Isaiah 44:21-22). 

Yes, we can change. We can break the idols of violence. We can resist the godless fundamentalisms of ethnic, national, racial, or religious superiority. We can serve the living God. Then there is the refuge of Psalm 46: 

God is our refuge and our strength,

an ever-present help in distress. 

Thus we do not fear, though earth be shaken 

and mountains quake to the depths of the sea, 

Though its waters rage and foam 

and mountains totter at its surging. 

Streams of the river gladden the city of God, 

the holy dwelling of the Most High. 

God is in its midst; it shall not be shaken; 

God will help it at break of day. 

Though nations rage and kingdoms totter, 

God utters a voice and the earth melts. 

The God of hosts is with us; 

our stronghold is the God of Jacob (Psalm 46:2-8). 

You have been shaken. But you will find the still place again. You grieve. But you will smile again. You hear nothing. But you will hear the sound of music again. You see darkness. But you will see the light again. You have fallen. But you will rise again.