Pure Evil

I recently received an email with this image.  The photo is by NY Times photographer Tyler Hicks, and he took it of a victim of the awful famine in Somalia, a famine made far, far worse by the actions of The Shabab, an Islamic militant group with ties to Al-Qaeda.

I stared at the photo for a long time. I had woken that morning with a to-do list so long and so heavy I had no idea how I was going to even begin to tackle it.  I felt burdened, stressed, challenged, longing for a break, and having one of those days very much wondering if I am up to the task to which I believe God has called me. I also remembered that I never made it to the grocery store to replenish the refrigerator with my most-preferred breakfast foods.

In that frame of mine, I opened my email and saw that the photo.

In a famine where systematic evil–such as a so-called religious group that deliberately helps vulnerable people starve–there is little I can actually do about it. Sending aid pretty well just enriches the pockets of the already fattened oppressors.  I feel my anger rise just at the thought of such injustice.

All I can do is continue to live faithfully, giving as much as I can, teaching everywhere that the people of God must take a stand against such practices, even as risk to ourselves, pray for relief, and seek to handle the things before me with trust in God, with integrity, and with gratefulness.

The photo still haunts me, and I hope it will forever.  No child should ever, ever have to endure this fate.  Just makes me want to punch someone out.  As if I could.  But here is a place for God’s anger to burn, and I trust it does.  This is pure evil.