A 10th Sunday after Pentecost Thought to Start the Week Off Right
It's the 10th Sunday after Pentecost and all is not well. Nothing personal here; just a comment on what's been spinning around us all lately.
Mass shootings for one thing: terrible stuff going on and people are on edge. Here's just one example: After the Walmart and Ohio shootings of a couple of weeks ago a motorcycle backfired in Times Square one night. Watch what happened...
Remember that this part of the city is typically crowded and noisy. Sure, the backfire was loud. But under "normal" circumstances, I don't think this sort of panic would ensue. People wouldn't be jumping to the conclusion that it was gunfire - which it wasn't.
Naturally, calls for greater gun control were ramped up. The main stream media leads the charge. For now, we'll leave the issue of whether more gun control laws make sense. But we should acknowledge that too many people shoot innocent people, mostly strangers, for no good reason; and a lot of people are frightened and hurting because of this.
But that's just the most dramatic and immediately pressing issue. There's more going on that may not at the moment seem as immediate and pressing.
Consider the widening disparity between the haves and have-nots. Some call this a "wealth gap." Yes, it's real. The gap between those with lots of money and the rest of us hasn't been this wide since the Great Depression.
In the past, this sort of arrangement has led to social unrest. People begin to understand that fewer folks are reaping the economic benefits of their labor, benefits that were once more equitably shared. This angers them eventually, and can lead to violent disruptions. The last time our country has seen large-scale disruptions was the 1960s: demonstrations, riots, assassinations. Are we headed in that direction?
And let's not forget the deep political divisions that continue to grow. Politicians naturally feast on this, using the strengthening emotions of right and left to gain even more power. But meanwhile those divisions and those emotions are real and are felt by regular folks. They boil over. They become more fuel for social disruption.
There's more we can point to, such as the likelihood of another financial crisis looming just around the corner, possibly accompanied by economic recession here and around the world. Or worldwide human trafficking, along with the continued murder of millions of innocent lives in the womb. We could go on.
Not the most pleasant thoughts for our Sunday day of respite from work and the cares of the world, are they? Sorry. But I think most of us know that burying our heads in the sand isn't going to help anyone.
With this as background, you can imagine how today's entry from The Inner Life of the Soul literally leapt off the page:
"The days are dark, and hearts are heavy with forebodings as to what shall be the end of the questions and problems of our time. Labor and capital, wealth and poverty, stand over against each other with lowering faces; murder is in the air, and the spirits of evil are abroad almost visibly as it were. There are rumors of threatening disease and want, and the mind shrinks back affrighted from the days that seem coming on the earth. What does it all mean, and who shall bring the remedy to the evils of the age."
Remember this was written in 1905!
The first lesson to learn is that what's disturbing about our current world has happened before. Times such as these occur throughout history. There's even a whole discipline of cycle theory that attempts to explain the timing of such times.
Without the benefit of cycle theory, The Inner Life of the Soul uses its Catholic sensibility and notes:
"It is not the first time the earth has stood aghast, and that gloom and desolation have seemed to cover her like a pall."
How do we, as individuals, face the troubles we've seen lately? When, where, and how will we find light at the end of the tunnel?
We, as Catholics, might instinctively look to the Cross to understand our current state of affairs.
"Sin has entered the world, and death by sin. When Jesus Christ came to earth, He came to suffer and to die - to die in unutterable anguish, after a life of poverty and humble daily toil."
As for the light at the end of the tunnel, where else can this be but in Jesus Christ?
"He has left us an example that we should follow...For the joy proposed unto Him He underwent the cross and despised the shame. The same joy is set to-day before the eyes of all His followers. The way to reach it is the way He trod, the way of the cross; and who so humbleth himself shall be exalted; and they who love much shall be forgiven."
We can't control the events spinning around us in these difficult times. We can, however, lift our eyes from this world through Our Savior to the next. In the end, that is how we will find the real light at the end of the tunnel.
Mass shootings for one thing: terrible stuff going on and people are on edge. Here's just one example: After the Walmart and Ohio shootings of a couple of weeks ago a motorcycle backfired in Times Square one night. Watch what happened...
Remember that this part of the city is typically crowded and noisy. Sure, the backfire was loud. But under "normal" circumstances, I don't think this sort of panic would ensue. People wouldn't be jumping to the conclusion that it was gunfire - which it wasn't.
Naturally, calls for greater gun control were ramped up. The main stream media leads the charge. For now, we'll leave the issue of whether more gun control laws make sense. But we should acknowledge that too many people shoot innocent people, mostly strangers, for no good reason; and a lot of people are frightened and hurting because of this.
But that's just the most dramatic and immediately pressing issue. There's more going on that may not at the moment seem as immediate and pressing.
Consider the widening disparity between the haves and have-nots. Some call this a "wealth gap." Yes, it's real. The gap between those with lots of money and the rest of us hasn't been this wide since the Great Depression.
In the past, this sort of arrangement has led to social unrest. People begin to understand that fewer folks are reaping the economic benefits of their labor, benefits that were once more equitably shared. This angers them eventually, and can lead to violent disruptions. The last time our country has seen large-scale disruptions was the 1960s: demonstrations, riots, assassinations. Are we headed in that direction?
And let's not forget the deep political divisions that continue to grow. Politicians naturally feast on this, using the strengthening emotions of right and left to gain even more power. But meanwhile those divisions and those emotions are real and are felt by regular folks. They boil over. They become more fuel for social disruption.
There's more we can point to, such as the likelihood of another financial crisis looming just around the corner, possibly accompanied by economic recession here and around the world. Or worldwide human trafficking, along with the continued murder of millions of innocent lives in the womb. We could go on.
Not the most pleasant thoughts for our Sunday day of respite from work and the cares of the world, are they? Sorry. But I think most of us know that burying our heads in the sand isn't going to help anyone.
With this as background, you can imagine how today's entry from The Inner Life of the Soul literally leapt off the page:
"The days are dark, and hearts are heavy with forebodings as to what shall be the end of the questions and problems of our time. Labor and capital, wealth and poverty, stand over against each other with lowering faces; murder is in the air, and the spirits of evil are abroad almost visibly as it were. There are rumors of threatening disease and want, and the mind shrinks back affrighted from the days that seem coming on the earth. What does it all mean, and who shall bring the remedy to the evils of the age."
Remember this was written in 1905!
The first lesson to learn is that what's disturbing about our current world has happened before. Times such as these occur throughout history. There's even a whole discipline of cycle theory that attempts to explain the timing of such times.
Without the benefit of cycle theory, The Inner Life of the Soul uses its Catholic sensibility and notes:
"It is not the first time the earth has stood aghast, and that gloom and desolation have seemed to cover her like a pall."
How do we, as individuals, face the troubles we've seen lately? When, where, and how will we find light at the end of the tunnel?
We, as Catholics, might instinctively look to the Cross to understand our current state of affairs.
"Sin has entered the world, and death by sin. When Jesus Christ came to earth, He came to suffer and to die - to die in unutterable anguish, after a life of poverty and humble daily toil."
As for the light at the end of the tunnel, where else can this be but in Jesus Christ?
"He has left us an example that we should follow...For the joy proposed unto Him He underwent the cross and despised the shame. The same joy is set to-day before the eyes of all His followers. The way to reach it is the way He trod, the way of the cross; and who so humbleth himself shall be exalted; and they who love much shall be forgiven."
We can't control the events spinning around us in these difficult times. We can, however, lift our eyes from this world through Our Savior to the next. In the end, that is how we will find the real light at the end of the tunnel.
Happy Sunday!
Comments