I'm a priest of 35 years — not a pollster, not a politician, not a policeman. A priest's thoughts, observations and insights shouldn't be like everyone else's. Mind you, there comes a time in the spiritual life when you stop caring about everyone agreeing with you. This is my lament — my hope. Why post it then? Sometimes people write and say about a post: "You know, I never thought about it that way before." And while there are so many people spewing hate all over the internet, I think the cyber-world can handle this:
I'm feeling a lament for this young man and so many others like him who are crazed with racial hatred. I feel shame that there is so much divisive abhorrence of others in our country.*
Sadness that this young man dropped out of school in the 9th grade and that there was no rush to find and save him — like the Gospel woman who turned the house upside down to find the lost coin. (Luke 15: 8-10)
A lament that the president of our God-Fearing country has had to address the nation fourteen times after a massacre of some sort. And shame that some Americans hate him for it.
I'm feeling a lament for this young man and so many others like him who are crazed with racial hatred. I feel shame that there is so much divisive abhorrence of others in our country.*
Sadness that this young man dropped out of school in the 9th grade and that there was no rush to find and save him — like the Gospel woman who turned the house upside down to find the lost coin. (Luke 15: 8-10)
A lament that the president of our God-Fearing country has had to address the nation fourteen times after a massacre of some sort. And shame that some Americans hate him for it.
I'm feeling shame that via CNN the whole world is watching our exceptional country devolve into gun violence and death. Empires and great countries collapse from within.
I'm feeling sadness for the unwilling, stubborn, obstructionist, elected politicians who refuse to take-on the control of deadly weapons sales and who hate those who do raise their voices. Saint Catherine said, "Shout like you have a million voices." Too many good people are silent.
I'm feeling shame for the people of this country whose only agenda and vote is to defend gun rights. Like the Second Amendment is more sacred than a verse from the Holy Gospel.
Lament for those people and places who continue to fly a flag whose history has become one of disgrace and who lie and call it only a flag of pride and heritage. Changes in gun laws indeed — but all the more the changing of hearts. A lament that religion often fails in this regard.
Lament that there is so much fuss and fury in defending that flag while so much of the world is burdened with crushing problems beyond imagining. Lament that some Americans don't care.
Lament that there is so much fuss and fury in defending that flag while so much of the world is burdened with crushing problems beyond imagining. Lament that some Americans don't care.
Lament for the self-proclaimed Pro-Life people who fiercely defend the right of the baby to be born (I get it), but who don't see our national veneration of guns as a life issue.
I'm feeling shame for the nation's clergy of all the denominations (especially conferences of bishops) who won't speak to this issue because they're afraid of the money-denying anger of the gun worshipers in their pews.
I'm feeling shame for our idolatrous and conscience-diminished country: that gun and weapons manufacturing, sales and ownership is enshrined and worshiped. The people who composed the Second Amendment could never have envisioned the weapons available to citizens today. I feel a deep sadness that so many ignore this.
I'm feeling shame that in our country there are still places where there are no background checks for gun customers. If the life of one child is saved!
I'm feeling deep shame that in our country there's an NRA — flooded with money, high level connections, lobbying influence, huge membership and loving-admiring support — but if it's any other group: Catholic Church, Jewish whatever, gay rights, black rights, women's rights, environmental protection — there's bitterness and resentment.
I'm feeling joy and hope when I hear people in Charleston roaring their hymn about overcoming the darkness of violent hatred.
I'm feeling hopeful when I hear the relatives of victims saying immediately to Mr. Roof, "You hurt me. You hurt a lot of people but God forgives you, and I forgive you." These could possibly be the first words of healing and salvation this broken, desperate young man might hear.
I'm glad and felt a ray of hope when the South Carolina politician (who had five years in office) said, "I didn't do my job" in trying to have the confederate flag removed from the state capitol lawn. And glad the interviewing reporter was stunned into fifteen seconds of radio silence, not knowing how to handle or respond to such honesty!
I'm feeling hopeful as on Sunday the Mother Emanuel Church bells rang as if it were Easter morning — the church packed with brave, singing-souls: like a landscape scorched and despoiled by fire, blooming from the ground-up the next spring.
I feel hopeful and joyful because Christ is Risen! And the African American Christians gift-ed the whole country on Sunday with this announcement — like the Easter women running to tell the frightened men. And Jesus has trampled down all the power of arsenals and empire, power-abuse, lies and loathing. Now we wait in joyful hope for the full realization of his victory — glad for the rays we detect already in the lives of saints and good people everywhere.
I feel hopeful and joyful because Christ is Risen! And the African American Christians gift-ed the whole country on Sunday with this announcement — like the Easter women running to tell the frightened men. And Jesus has trampled down all the power of arsenals and empire, power-abuse, lies and loathing. Now we wait in joyful hope for the full realization of his victory — glad for the rays we detect already in the lives of saints and good people everywhere.
I feel hopeful when I meet people who know we're not the Confederate States of America but the United States of America. **
The psalm says: If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts. I'm hopeful if even one hater hears that verse and in some reflective, conscience-raised way, takes it in.
I'm glad that the powerful preacher-man took Isaiah 54:17 as the basis of his Mother Emanuel Sunday sermon: No weapon forged against you will succeed.
The psalm says: If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts. I'm hopeful if even one hater hears that verse and in some reflective, conscience-raised way, takes it in.
I'm glad that the powerful preacher-man took Isaiah 54:17 as the basis of his Mother Emanuel Sunday sermon: No weapon forged against you will succeed.
*While I was chaplain to a school for young people in trouble for fifteen years, I asked a boy from a southern state about racism at home and what has happened to it after the years of Civil Rights legislation. He answered, "Oh all of that is still there; it's just quieter now." He was speaking too of his parents who were not yet forty.
**I was on a seven hour flight from Dublin to New York years ago when as a young priest (and the Irish in those days were overly kind to the clergy) I was bumped up to first class. We weren't in the air fifteen minutes when the pretty lady next to me asked where I was from. When I indicated New York she launched into a monologue history lesson against the north as if the Civil War was still being fought full-flood. Somehow I thought it was my priestly duty to listen politely for those many hours despite the worst headache of my life. Today I would ring for the flight attendant and declare that I was too close to the front of the plane and that to avoid air sickness I would need to be returned to my humble seat in business class.
