ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGS
November 24, 2022
I jettisoned my Thanksgiving Etching as I read a story yesterday about the mass shooting at a Walmart in Virginia. As I shared the news with my wife, still feeling the pain of the shooting in Colorado Springs, her only words were, “I don’t even know what to do.” I believe the shock and despair leave us emotionally incapacitated and spiritually lost. We stare into a void of powerlessness, feeling engulfed by the immensity of the problem and finding no hope in the complete disconnect of those who wish to pontificate, yet do nothing. Though I wish to grieve for those killed, it’s as if I have worn out my capacity. The well has run dry. Yet just writing those words points to part of the problem. It’s as if the powers and principalities of violence want hopelessness, delight in demoralized spirits. This Sunday begins Advent, a Season in which we will retell a central story in our faith tradition – a story of a God who finds a way of not only entering into the lives of those defeated and disheartened, but to change the trajectory of history through the simplicity of love. Of course, that love was not some overly romanticized emotion, but a life lived with tangible expressions of self-giving and self-sacrificing. I cannot enter Advent letting hopelessness own me. In fact, there is a spirit of renewal beginning to germinate and come to life as I glance to Sunday and beyond. If there is any truth to what we claim this season – that the divine power of the universe took on fleshed and lived among us – then shouldn’t real change not only be possible, but already in the making? Despite the well of my soul feeling dry, I believe the divine reservoir cannot and will not ever run dry. There is hope, but will we live into that hope?
More statistics! More invitations to pray and to feel bad. Is that the extend of what you have called us to do, O God of immeasurable and transformative love? It can feel as if we are hitting the proverbial wall again and again and again. Renew a belief in what can happen through you, God, especially for those of us who are questioning what is possible. Amen.
