I look forward to lent if for nothing else but for the
Office of Readings. I read the Exodus
story with the excitement and imagination of a young boy. It is an adventure
story packed with magical events and intriguing plots all woven around quite a
cast of villains and heroes. I have an entire 21st century mini-series
using the plot worked out in my mind. Someday.
This year as I read about the plagues, the hard hearts of
Pharaoh and the Israelites, the trepidation of Moses and the interventions of
G-d, I am focused on the emergence the zika virus. As amazingly set to music by Handel, we hear
again, “He spake the word and there came all manner of flies…..and the locusts
came without number….”
Did the pestilence have to come? Certainly not. Had the whole lot been open to G-d’s
insistent call, the story would have been so very different. Flip to another culture and another time and
reread Oedipus. Same message. Different
format. Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Translated to our
time, in this context: Power, greed, narcissism embolden us to believe we can
control the expression of G-d.
One of my favorite classes to teach it the “Politics of
Green.” It is a hybrid course that is based in political ecology. There are many Pharaohs building pyramids in
our time. How long will politics and
economic theory drive the agenda that is leading the world to destruction? What are today’s plagues? Zika is the latest of several I can easily
name: Coal slurry in the Elk River, West
Virginia; autism; HIV; cancer clusters; destruction of the Amazon rainforest, The
Bhopal Disaster. We manipulate food
sources without regard for the longitudinal impact of the genetic
modifications. When do we melt our hard
hearts and see that creation is a precious gift? This can only happen when we turn toward and see the face G-d.
Here the Catholic in the Diaspora can join easily with the
voice of Pope Francis. Laudato
Si call us all to account. This document cries out with a clarion call
to change the heart of stone and awake to the destruction we have wrought on
our earth and upon each other.
On each day of creation, G-d saw that it was good. “The
earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.”
Do we believe it is good enough?
"Harden not your hearts ....."
Two versions to consider
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