Praying the News, Monday, September 8, 2014

When is the right time?

Promises, promises.  Another delay.  When will the good work of friends and colleagues, the pilgrimages of justice-makers and immigrants, the prayers of the suffering and compassionate be rewarded?  When will people who have long been held in slavery in this country, people whose economies we have destroyed, be comforted?  Why does this continue, O God? What more faithfulness do you need?  How many acts of courage do you need before you act?  How long before you act?  How many backs broken by a wall?  Now small children are involved.  Surely, we said, our leaders will act now.  These are children.  We cannot see them as a threat, can we?  We can.  How long, Midwife of Justice, before this ends?  No more sacrifices.  No more blood offerings to appease you.  Maybe you really do require such bloody violence?  End this suffering.  End it now.  No more delay.  Amen.

Praying the News, September 2, 2014

The Death of a Prophet

One of your prophets has died, Tireless Keeper of Truths, and I worry we have no journalist to replace him.  With great courage, Charles kept telling us how our policies and programs led to greater violence.  He walked right into the maw so that he could tell us the truth.  He did it with such beauty and grace, but he always told us the truth.  So who will step up to tell us future truths?  Who will have the courage, the poetic sensibility, to let us know how the purveyors of violence and destruction gain their footing?  Who, God?  Who will do that?  I pray that he was not one of a kind.  I pray that we may take up where he left off.  Thank you for Charles.  May his heart rest in yours as your heart worked in his.  Amen.