AFTER IT POURS, REMEMBER GOD PROVIDES US STRENGTH
More than 30 years have passed since a Colombian volcano sent torrents of scalding lava through the streets of unsuspecting villages below, sweeping up thousands of residents as horrified loved ones looked on helplessly.
One hysterical man, having seen his wife and children swept away, cried out from a hospital in Bogota, “What have we ever done to God to deserve this?”
His cry became a headline in papers all over America the following morning.
With Hurricane Irma threatening to decimate parts of Florida two weeks after Hurricane Harvey did the same to Houston, the echo of that mournful wail in Colombia reverberates at this address, because the question it raised remains quite valid.
The guessing here is that rabbis, priests, imams and ministers will be asked to address it more than once this weekend: Where was God when He was needed?
The Divine role in all of this has even seen cable TV anchors, who normally look askance at any expression of faith, assuring devastated interviewees, “You’re in our thoughts and prayers.”
Really? Isn’t this the same crowd that frets kids might be damaged if they were exposed to prayers in school?
Back to God: What’s His role in all of this?
In Matthew’s gospel there’s a scene in which the disciples, marveling over the Lord’s author-
ity to quiet a tempest in the sea, ask, “What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the seas obey Him?”
Can it be true He exerts such power?
Then why wouldn’t He dispatch floods like the one in Houston to extinguish fires like the ones consuming thousands of verdant acres in California?
The late Ed Madden, a wonderful newsman at the Dorchester Reporter, planned to bring this question to heaven: “Why create a world beset with black flies and other bugs in the summer months when we all want to be outdoors? Why not allot them the month of February?”
Perhaps, as the hymn writer suggested, “We’ll understand it better by and by.”
After his son Aaron died at 14, Rabbi Harold Kushner authored the landmark book, “When Bad Things Happen To Good People.”
“I don’t know why they happen,” he confided. “And it doesn’t matter. I tell grieving families, ‘If you’re mad at God and feel like cursing, do it! The God I believe in is not so fragile that you’ll do Him any harm.
“But when you’ve gotten that anger out of your system, don’t let it be a barrier between you and the healing God represents. Because what I really believe is that He does not send the tragedy; what He sends is the incredible strength to survive it.”
That must be the answer, then and now.