“It is within us that the roots of wickedness are to be found” (Flahault; Verso, 2003.)
However, the lesson of continuing, persistent trust and conviction through a time of testing and pain can be resolved through wisdom and alertness, that a situation that seems to be against us, we can accept and embrace, turn it around and use it for the benefit of our well-being; that when we get knocked down by insults and circumstances, we get back up; when we are told to go away, we get down on our knees and beg; to go about our every-day activities offering whatever we can where we can, in the knowledge that some are much worse off than us.
Today, not only do we continue to see pictures of public disobedience, both in the media and in our own communities; where families are abused physically and their properties stolen from under their eyes, and we clearly see the anger and the desperation of police officers, the rising number of teenagers and children suffering from depression and mental illnesses, the disarray of community life, and the continuing flouting of the rules of authorities.
Added to these is the strong sense of loss, loss of loved ones, loss of jobs, loss of future plans, loss of the ability to think clearly because life seems to have become a dark hole into which most of us are thrown and we don’t know how to climb out. These situations create feelings of deep grief, deep fear, and deep anger; feelings that will stay with us for a long, long time to come. How much more can we take?
To those of us who are watching helplessly, we can pray that as the people in Ukraine look through the ashes and the rubbles of explosions and graves, and bury the bodies of loved ones in their backyard, and look at the faces of people around us who do not know how they can continue to pay for food and rent, and as people clean up the flood waters in their backyards, and whatever else may be causing us deep grief at this time….
….that we may have the grace to recognise something in the chaos; a remnant of a memory, a picture, a piece of jewellery, a spoon, or hear the cry of a new-born baby, and in these, see hope.
Rev. Eseta Waqabaca-Meneilly
(Uniting Church in Australia.)
Recent Comments