A State of Mourning

While most of us are not yet prophets, we also know the presence of a great love, a love that includes the entire world. Awakened by that love, we too are aggrieved in the face of human oppression. A voice within us calls out, “This is wrong and cannot stand.” We yearn for a world in which all can flourish

          Nahum Ward-Lev, The Liberating Path of the Hebrew Prophets: Then and Now

          (Orbis Books: 2019), 4–5, 11.

 

Our mourning invites us beyond our own heart’s desires into the heart of a world that is both as fragile as glass and brimming with the promise of healing

          Jan Richardson  Wisdom’s Path

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seven days in Lent

seven days marked by violence

as bodies were torn and lives ended

 

seven mass shootings in seven days

Atlanta

Stockton

Gresham

Houston

Dallas

Philadelphia

Boulder

 

for reasons known, for reasons unknown

someone picked up a gun

and turned it on others

shattering bodies

violently ending the life of a precious soul

 

many of us mourn

our hearts joining with other hearts

our hearts joining with the heart of the world

 

our hearts crying

that a precious child of God

that someone sacred

 

should be treated with such disdain

and so carelessly destroyed

while working, playing, eating, learning

shopping

 

what does it take to turn a child of God

into one who uses power in such a way?

 

it is not just those who caress their guns

and use them to cover their deficits

it is also those who raise a hand and strike

a lover

a child

it is those who wave the symbols of hate and oppression

in the face of the oppressed

 

it is those who use their color, their wealth, their position,

to marginalize and minimalize others

 

how have we gotten here

to this place where we see an enemy rather than a friend

where we see a faceless stereotype

someone dehumanized

faceless?

 

why does it happen over and over and over and over again

this random soul wandering through the aisles of a story

seeing a person casually ending their life

their hopes

their dreams

and changing forever the lives of those who loved them?

 

Why do we as a nation simply shrug?

Why does our congress send thoughts and prayers and refuse to act?

Why do right wing people in congress not only fail to act, but actively participate in this culture of hate and death?

Why does the NRA insist that the right of that person, who just killed innocents,

to carry a gun is more important than the right of those who were killed, to live?

 

This is a time for mourning

A time for our hearts to cry out at this violence

This abuse of power

This loss of life

This violation of love

 

It is also a time for prophets

For people who are so aggrieved at this momentous sin

To stand up, and speak out

 

“This is wrong and cannot stand!”

 

This love of guns is wrong!

Allowing people to carry highly deadly weapons at almost any time, into almost any place, is wrong!

 

Racism is wrong

Hate mongering is wrong

Lying is wrong

Telling the “big lie” is wrong

Misogyny is wrong

Greed is wrong

 

The way of thinking and thus doing

That oozes out of our national mindset

Is wrong

 

And it cannot stand

 

This toxic individualism

This worship of power and violence

This lust for domination and wealth

 

Wrong

 

We need to see that it is wrong

Feel that it is wrong

Say that it is wrong

 

And do something about it

Something more than thoughts and prayers

 

The Old Testament prophets often lived their prophecies

They often paid a price

They often failed to bring change

 

But they stood, and the spoke

And they put their lives on the line

 

And so must we

With our hearts hurting

And our souls afire

 

We must stand and say

This is wrong

And it cannot stand