"Hope begins in the dark, with the stubborn hope that
if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn
will come. You wait and watch and work; you don't give up."
- Anne Lamott
It was a late afternoon in mid-August, and I was gathering
my thoughts for this piece, when the blackout hit. As news
reporters (at least those who could still broadcast)
described the chaos in Manhattan and other cities throughout
the Northeast and Midwest, our nation's worst fear--a new
terror attack--was reawakened. By the end of the day, the
sense of vulnerability that so terrified us two years ago
had spilled into every street. As eyes met, uncertainty
flickered across every face.
Few people
I know have recovered from the shock of the event. They may
no longer be talking about it, but privately they'll admit
to a sense of lingering dread. Similarly, in Europe and
elsewhere, unprecedented killer heat waves and wildfires
have left people on edge and wondering at how quickly we are
making our planet unlivable.
President
Bush was right: the blackout was unmistakably a wake-up
call. To me, it is yet another example of the way God is
still trying to pry open our hearts and speak into our souls
through the tragedy of 9/11. Once again, we are being
forcefully reminded that our faith in technology--in
ourselves--is badly misplaced. It is clear that the
questions we began asking two years ago have not yet been
answered.
With this
anniversary my thoughts are not so much with those who were
snatched from us. They are in a place where we all long to
be. My thoughts are with the living--those of us left
behind. I think of those hit by the harsh reality that their
loved ones are among the victims whose remains will never be
identified. I feel their pain as they struggle against the
temptation of anger--anger that those they were closest to
never received a proper farewell.
Ever since
9/11, people have said that things cannot go on as usual;
that life will "never be the same again." For those who lost
loved ones, that has been proved to be an inescapable fact.
For the rest of us, it ought to be true, too. But has it
been, or has it become a cliché? If we truly honored the
dead and their families, wouldn't our words be accompanied
by actions? Wouldn't our attitudes, choices, and priorities
show the change?
It's been
said by many others, but it must be said again: we Americans
still have it too good. Not even 9/11 could shake the faith
we have in ourselves. We believe we are invincible, that the
good times are here to stay--no, that the good times will
get even better. We have become hardened and indifferent to
the needs of the rest of the world. Our success--and our
greed for greater success--has solidified into a frightening
arrogance. We have become deaf and blind to a growing
worldwide resentment against us.
But it is
not too late to reverse all this. It is not too late to open
our eyes and look squarely at the rest of the world's
misery. It is not too late to dismantle our arrogance and
allow ourselves to be taught by the weak, the suffering, and
the poor. Perhaps they can teach us what we have avoided
learning for so long: that our time on earth is short.
Through them we can learn, as Simone Weil once recognized,
that "if we accept death completely, we can ask God to make
us live again, purified from the evil in us."
As I
recently reflected on the lessons of the last two years, I
came across a meditation by Alfred Delp, a priest hanged by
the Nazis in 1945. In it he ponders why God keeps us "in
this chaos, where all appears endlessly hopeless and dark."
Delp surmises that maybe it is because, again and again, we
seek comfort in false security, and in the "false pathos"
that makes us think we can "avert any danger."
We think
we can "banish night, halt the internal quaking of the
universe, harness everything and fit it into an order that
will stand." If we really wanted to prevent catastrophe, we
would wake up and shake off this fog. And yet we slumber on,
unshakable and obstinate and superficial. And again and
again, God himself must intervene...
To Delp,
waking up means realizing how helpless and wretched we are.
But it also means something positive: it means becoming
aware of "the golden threads that pass between heaven and
earth."
For me,
these golden threads are the truly good things of life--the
friends and family members we have; the relationships we
share with them; the thoughts, words, and deeds of love that
make life worth living. And as the second anniversary of
9/11 passes, perhaps we ought to spend more time considering
such things, rather than dwelling on collapsing towers and
falling planes.
How
quickly we forget the treasure we found in each other in
those moments of terror! Every day offers us countless
opportunities to find it again; every day we pass them by.
If we took up even one--if we were able to relieve the fear
or despair of even one person, we would find such happiness
that we would not want anything else from life.
I often
wonder how many more tragedies it will take before we learn
to truly love each other, and before we grasp how happy we
could be if we cared for those around us as well as we care
for ourselves.
But I
believe that we are slowly learning. There is hope. I saw it
the first night of the recent blackout, when the spirit of
compassion that transformed Manhattan on 9/11 was
reawakened. Strangers asked strangers for help. Businessmen
helped old people across the street. Twenty-somethings
helped children find shade. People shared water, and taxis,
and private cars. Just like two years ago, we found out how
much we needed each other. Yes, there were those who took
advantage of the situation. There was greed, and
desperation. Here and there, price gougers tried to make a
fast buck. But they were in the minority, and I am sure that
this is a result of 9/11. Before that day, there would have
been many more. But now we know better. We have learned
something after all, and we are changing.
?© 2003 by
Johann Christoiph Arnold
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[Johann
Christoph Arnold is an author and minister with the
Bruderhof Communities (
http://www.bruderhof.com ). Read more of his articles
and books at
http://www.ChristophArnold.com .]
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