Kyrie Eleison: This nation needs mercy not finger pointing

I’ve never been one to ascribe suffering to the selective punishment of God. Perhaps I’m wrong about that. Perhaps, as happens in the Old Testament, God doles out justice upon places using natural disasters. But that’s not the way I see it.

I believe that humanity has always been a hot mess because we keep tripping over our sinful nature. The way I see it, if God wanted to strike us with a natural disaster every time we earned it, hurricanes, tornadoes, famine, pestilence and plague would be all we ever knew.

As I said, I just don’t know–I could be wrong.

Actually, I don’t think it matters if I’m right or wrong about that. But I feel strongly that I am right about this: It does nobody any good for holier-than-thou evangelical leaders to point fingers at certain groups of people and assign the blame to them when disaster strikes. In fact, not only does it not do anyone any good, it does irreparable damage–more damage than any hurricane, earthquake, or flood. These false prophets come out of the woodwork during every disaster and pin the blame for natural calamities on gays or abortions or whatever the hot-button, political agenda-driven topic of the day happens to be.

Can we just stop that–for God’s sake–can we just please stop that?

Instead of assigning blame, can we sing the Kyrie Eleison? We need some mercy.

God have mercy–we need it badly.

When we are beset by tragedy, one of the positive things that often emerges in the wake of the disaster is human kindness. People, for a time, tend to drop their petty squabbles, roll their sleeves up, and pitch in to help their brothers and sisters in need. These times often reveal the best within us. Sinners and saints, believers and non-believers, come together and become the hands and feet of God Almighty. They become the embodiment of Kyrie Eleison–God’s mercy revealed through his fallen creations.

Kyrie Eleison–God have mercy.

We see it on social media when people who, just days before, were at each others’ virtual throats in political arguments, now become joined in unity, sharing ways to help people they’ll never meet.

We see it in caravans of folks from red and blue states alike traveling hundreds of miles to help clean up and rebuild.

We see it in the millions of dollars anonymously pouring into charities like the Red Cross.

Kyrie Eleison–God have mercy.

And then…some sanctimonious blowhard gets a platform and spouts hateful rhetoric about God’s punishment of some cherry picked “sin” being made manifest by the disaster.

And the division and hatred seep back in even as the flood waters recede.

Kyrie Eleison–God have mercy–this nation needs mercy.