After the storm.

Steadfast Southerners

“Faith is not simply a patience that passively suffers until the storm is past.  Rather, it is a spirit that bears things---with resignation, yes, but above all, with blazing, serene hope.”

                          Corozon Aquino

“If patience is worth anything, it must endure to the end of time.  And living faith will last in the midst of the blackest storm.”

                          Mohandas Gandhi

         Birmingham is in the national media in the aftermath of the storm.  The President is coming today to see for himself the extent of the carnage.  In the coverage, the survivors have almost universally praised God for deliverance and told of how their prayers, or those of another, saved them from death.  God is getting the hero’s credit today.  I confess that I always question this---why did God save some and not all.  Were the ones who died in the unimaginable destruction of that terrible storm not praying hard enough, or the right way?  Was God deaf to their cries?  I’m sure their loved ones are asking the same questions.

         The city and the state are quickly organizing to help people affected by the storm.  We are used to being decimated every so often by a tornado or a hurricane.  People step up and help out.  There has been very little in the way of looting, though I did hear yesterday that people were stealing beer from a demolished seven-eleven.  After the storm passes, thirst ensues, I suppose.

         I don’t mean to denigrate people’s faith.  I’m sure I would be saying that God’s grace saved me, too, were I in their shoes.  Another refrain spoken before houses rendered into sticks and rubble has been, “It’s just stuff.  It can be replaced.  We’re all alive and that is what matters.”  I thought, listening to their deep drawls, that Southern people are, by and large, patient and hopeful by nature.  I could see my own parents in their faces—you just take what comes and make the best of it.

Three young people died who were students at Alabama.  Babies, mothers, children, fathers and grandmothers died in the storm.  I’ve no doubt that God loved them, too.  Bad things happen.  Good people are in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Perhaps we should simply grieve for their loved ones, thank God for their lives, and help clean up the mess.

                          Keeping the faith,

                          Jane