Who Are We To Be?

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be the light, compassionate, Ephesians, imitators of God, kind, love, massacre, murder, pray, St. Paul, Thanksgiving, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Tree of Life Synagogue

I’m happy this morning for a tiny bit of good news: The Boston Red Sox won the World Series last night! (Sorry, I was born and half-raised in Newton, a suburb of Boston, and it’s generally impossible to get that heritage out of a girl!) I consider, however, as I revel in that news, how complex we are – able to entertain that kind of celebratory feeling at the same time as sensing such anguish for the people of Pittsburgh who are suffering the heinous crime of the Tree of Life Synagogue massacre. One hardly knows how to hold it all, especially because the murder of those innocent people follows on the heels of two other incidents of senseless killing in the same week. Things seem to be devolving into a deeper darkness with each day’s news. The questions now come from a place of near-frozenness: When and where does this stop? What will it take to cause a course change?

My answers all seem theoretical but the only option. Gather together. Love the people you know with a mighty love and the people you are just meeting in the same way. Be the light that you wish to see in the world. Do small things in a big way, fueled by compassion…

I read it all this morning in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians – exhortation from 2,000 years ago and still relevant! Brothers and sisters: be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another as God has forgiven you…Be imitators of God, as beloved children, and live in love…Immorality or any impurity or greed must not even be mentioned among you, as is fitting among holy ones, no obscenity or silly or suggestive talk, which is out of place, but instead, thanksgiving…Live as children of light.

May it be so in our day. Let us pray.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Cry Heard in Ramah

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children, Herod, jeremiah, massacre, Matthew, parents, prophecy, Ramah, sorrow, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, violence

Today is not a happy remembrance in the calendar of Church feasts. It is the commemoration of “the Holy Innocents,” the victims of Herod’s massacre of all the baby boys under two years old. Herod was determined to eliminate the possibility that someone – a “new-born” king (Jesus) – would usurp his power. Since he had no idea of where that child might be found, his rage prompted the terrible deed that left so many mothers bereft. It was a fruitless gesture, as violence always is, because Jesus and his parents were well on their way to Egypt when the massacre occurred.

This violence is replicated in our time whenever war and senseless killing happens around the world. I see in my mind’s eye faces of Syrian children in the bombed-out buildings in Aleppo. Closer to home are the images of Sandy Hook just five years ago this month. Although murder is always difficult to endure, the tragedy always seems more horrific when innocent children are killed almost before their lives have begun.

I am praying for parents today, especially for mothers who have lost a child for any reason or no reason at all. For those whose children die because of senseless violence, drug abuse, war, starvation, traffic or other accidents, suicide…so many causes that leave a gaping hole in the hearts of those left behind.

The poignant message of today’s gospel, which Matthew (MT 2:18) saw as
the fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy, calls for our prayer for the sorrowing today. We cannot ignore the pain of his words that speak to the cry heard in our own day around the world: “A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation; Rachel weeping for her children, and she would not be consoled, since they were no more.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Innocents

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aid, distress, innocent children, Magi, massacre, St. John the Evangelist, St. Stephen, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, triduum

Today is the third of a triduum of feasts, three days following Christmas (unless Holy Family Sunday intervenes as happened yesterday). I learned this calendar early – somewhere in elementary school, I’m sure – because of their proximity to Christmas and I always thought it an unfortunate choice on the part of the Church. The feast of St. John the Evangelist (12/27) is fine but the other two seem out of place in this season of peace and good feeling. First (12/26) we hear the story of the stoning of Stephen, the first martyr, and today (12/28) the gospel of Matthew recounts the “massacre of all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity two years old and under” by Herod because the Magi had failed to report to him where they had found Jesus, whom Herod wished to destroy. All those innocent children, slaughtered for no reason other than a king’s hubris and fear for loss of his earthly power!

My reflections stray from Herod but remain with all the innocent children killed in our time by violence, either targeted or randomly, or through neglect. The numbers are staggering in the USA and even more horrific in countries where famine and war know no exceptions in the age of victims. Clearly, dark and light exist together in our lives. Sorrow and joy are not mutually exclusive. How is it then that we can maintain our equilibrium? Surely, ignoring the darkness is no solution; it only leads us deeper into the isolation of futility. Thinking like this always reminds me of the slogan, “It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.” So today, I will consider what I can do to alleviate something of the distress of children either in my community or somewhere in the world. The possibilities are endless and include donations to organizations like Free the Children, Doctors Without Borders, and Bread for the World, volunteering at our local soup kitchen, shopping for our local food bank or writing to political leaders about changing the gun laws. I cannot forget the value of taking opportunities to be kind and encouraging to children of all ages and most of all to pray for them every day. They are our hope; let us be theirs.