Dialogue borrowed from IMDB:
Hawkeye: War isn’t Hell. War is war, and Hell is Hell. And of the two, war is a lot worse.
Father Mulcahy: How do you figure that, Hawkeye?
Hawkeye: Easy, Father. Tell me, who goes to Hell?
Father Mulcahy: Sinners, I believe.
Hawkeye: Exactly. There are no innocent bystanders in Hell. War is chock full of them — little kids, cripples, old ladies. In fact, except for some of the brass, almost everybody involved is an innocent bystander. (From M*A*S*H)
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?
my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer; and by night, but find no rest. (Psalm 22: 1,2)
In an unprecedented surprise attack on Saturday of our Thanksgiving weekend, thousands of Hamas militants from Gaza crossed security barriers into Israel, killing many Israeli citizens and military personnel. Israeli forces have retaliated with airstrikes on Gaza cities, resulting in a death toll in the thousands.
The pictures that have come across all of my screens since that time have been horrifying. I shudder that we humans are capable of this level of terror and violence. One of the “Chat and Chew” women commented to me that she now understood how people could “die in their sleep”. She had gone to bed after watching the CNN, had a nightmare and had woken up with her heart pounding, and gasping for air.
The terror is pervasive and seeps into our minds involuntarily; only to haunt us with images unbidden; when we are quiet; when we are asleep.
I don’t know what to say to all of you about this except that I’m there too.
For me, I have had to choose not to watch the news. I’m ok with reading the news but I haven’t been o.k. with the visual images. I can be informed, and I can understand the horror without having the visual traces etched into my mind.
And the only other thing I can say to you is that….
All of it is wrong. Is evil.
This political terror – these warring nations – this is so contrary to what God wants for our world that it can’t be described any better than
Pure Evil.
I don’t have anything here that is a special word of hope in this situation, so I’m drawing on my friend, Rev. Jessica Heatherington, who has named action as hope. She names it in looking at our eco-crisis; so I’m borrowing her image and extending it to our political crisis. We need to be ‘Action Figures’ in the face of such evil. Action Figures that name this as wrong. All of it as wrong.
And then we all need to commit to prayer. Big time. If you’ve never prayed in your life, now is the time to start. Seriously – and no, I don’t care if you think it looks stupid. I do believe that God can change our hearts if we pray, and I do believe that collectively, we can change the hearts of our world.
And maybe, for your own mental health, you need to turn off your TVs. Stay informed but not engulfed. It’s the choice that I’ve had to make, anyway.
Blessings today, my dear loving wonderful Bethel Community. I am so grateful for you.
And remember you are loved.
~Rev. Lynne
Dear Lynne I find myself thinking of the second World War and atrocities committed then. It seemed that even with eyewitnesses people were able to deny. Today we see the images on our TV screens. Our technology is the eyewitness.There can be no denial.
Now we can only pray. ????