Homily of Archbishop Daniel Pilarczyk, Archbishop of Cincinnati
for
September 4, 2005,
St. Mary, Hillsboro, Ohio
I had a homily all prepared for today that was based on the readings from the word of God presented by the church for this twenty-third Sunday of Ordinary Time. But as I watched TV and read the newspapers, I decided that the terrible events of the last week or so in the southern part of our country might include some message for us, that these events might include some word of the Lord for our instruction. So that(s what I(m going to talk about this morning.
The first thing about Hurricane Katrina and the destruction that it brought about is that it is literally incomprehensible. It(s so immense that we can(t get our minds around it. It is simply not understandable. All that unbridled power, all that wild energy, all that devastation inflicted on this part of our country in the matter of several hours. What does it mean? What is the significance of it all? What did God have in mind when he caused or permitted all these terrible things to happen?
We will probably never have an adequate answer to that, at least not this side of the grave. But one thing is clear, and that is that God was in this somewhere. We don(t know how. We cannot say in detail what God was trying to accomplish or what God was trying to teach us. But our faith assures us that somehow the Lord was in all this and that therefore somehow there is blessing in all this. We have to hang on to that conviction, difficult as it may be. And our experience of God, our dedication to God, our indebtedness to God - that is to say our faith - enables us to keep a hold on our conviction that God is here somewhere.
There are a couple of other things, though, that are a little clearer and that call for a some reflection on our part.
One is the fragility of the world in which we live. Here was a great city (and many smaller ones), put together with all the ingenuity that the human mind is capable of. Big buildings, immense sports arenas, state of the art flood control projects all gone, all ruined, all wiped out in less than a day. We tend to think that we do pretty well in taming nature and in providing shelter and even a measure of architectural elegance for ourselves. But it(s all vulnerable. Even the most impressive human accomplishments can be blown away by the wind or submerged in the water in ways that their makers never imagined. We live in a fragile world and if we think otherwise, we are fooling ourselves.
Another aspect of the present situation that calls for some reflection on our part is the thinness of the veneer of civility and civilization that covers us. In a matter of days a reasonably law abiding part of our country has become a moral jungle: theft, murder, rape, total unconcern for the rights and the persons of other people have become the norm. It doesn(t take much to turn ordinary people into criminals. The potency for lawlessness is just beneath the surface. And that(s not just true of people who live in Louisiana and Mississippi. It(s true of us all, everywhere. We are not only vulnerable to forces from outside us, but vulnerable to forces from inside us as well.
But there is still one more facet of the present situation that calls for mention, and that is the immense and obvious desire of people to be helpful. Our telephones at the archdiocesan office building have been ringing incessantly all week with calls from people who want to know what they can do, to whom they can contribute money, how they can get food and clothing to those in need, how they can share their personal living space with people who no longer have a home. A lot of initial effort has gone into organizing works of relief and assistance, not as a result of big promotion efforts, but simply in response to a spontaneous expression of the desire to help. The veneer of civilization may be thin in us human beings, but there is also an element of loving and caring that is part of us as well. It doesn(t always show. Sometimes it takes a catastrophe to awaken it.
What, then, is God telling us through the events that we and our brothers and sisters in the south are living through? How are we supposed to respond to it all? First and foremost, we must ask God to strengthen our faith, to firm up our conviction that, in spite of it all, the Lord is in charge and that the Lord is kind and loving. Next, maybe we need to reawaken a sense of humility about ourselves. We need to test the validity of our confidence in human achievement and our satisfaction with the intensity of our moral convictions. God is teaching us that our world is weak and that we ourselves are weak - weak in many ways, and that the only appropriate response to that weakness is our conscious dependence on the grace and the strength of the Lord. Last of all, we need to thank God for the strain of goodness that He has put into the hearts of each of us as we search to find ways to carry out the will to be helpful that almost everyone is experiencing these days.
The Lord is kind and merciful, patient with sinners and eager to bring us closer to himself. As we look at the destruction that is in our midst, we remind ourselves that the Lord is in it somewhere, and that the Lord is continues to call us to look for Him even in confusion and devastation.