05/27/2022
WE ARE IN DEEP TROUBLE IN OUR COUNTRY
By Fr. Richard J. Bretone
We are in deep trouble in our country. There is no other conclusion to draw from the senseless carnage of elementary school children indiscriminately murdered in Uvalde, Texas. The deep trouble that we are in is that too many people, and some of these are teenagers, are filled with such anger and hate, that they will lash out in depraved rage at the most innocent and defenseless amongst us.
Where have we failed as a society? What happened in the last twenty years or so marked by the first horror of the Columbine High School shooting, and 10 years ago with Sandy Hook Elementary School being similarly assaulted?
People will blame the guns, as if they shoot themselves. Others will blame a lapse in standard school-lock-down protocols, as if it is normal to have to keep children locked up, as if prison, to protect them. Still others will blame the video games, or the bullying, or the disintegration of the nuclear family or the social isolation that can twist the human mind.
However, as people of faith, who should we blame?
Our faith informs, or gives us a way of understanding, our world. Do you remember, now here I am really dating myself, the Flip Wilson comedy show? There was a character called Geraldine who was played by Flip Wilson in drag. She was a hip and very boisterous young black “woman.” Every time she would say something off-color or explain why she acted impulsively, she would say, “The devil made me do it!” The audience would laugh hysterically and a good time was had by all.
This comedy betrays a truth that the non-religious people can’t fathom (and even some of the faithful have a hard time believing), we are in a battle over good and evil, now more than ever! There has never been in the modern era (say from the end of World War II until now), that there has been a sense of misplaced anger and existential rage by people feeling excluded or misused and abused.
There is no way, except through Christianity, to formally forgive all the hurts (real or imagined) that some sensitive people experience in their lives. There is no community, except through Christianity, that will welcome a person as a member of a family (perhaps, the only family they may ever have), and assuage their isolation with invitations to participation. There is no nourishment of the soul more powerful than the sacraments of Reconciliation and Holy Communion—GIVEN ANOTHER CHANCE TO CHANGE AND THE POWER TO EFFECT THAT CHANGE! Together, let us pray for the spiritually poor amongst us!
