Faults

There's a part of me that says what's the use. Haiti will be as much of a basket case after this particular act of God like all the others recedes into myth. Pity the land that is made a colony of the French. Crap institutions. How blessed a thing, to be exploited by the British. On the other hand. American exceptionalism. British Empire exceptionalism. Israelite exceptionalism. None other. The poor are always with us -- most especially if they live in a culture of utter corruption ... as distinct from just the manifest corruption inherent in the human condition.

I haven't watched the news at all. More chaos. More of the same. Just more concentrated, in time and location. It matters, theoretically and actually, but I don't know any Haitians, so any compassion I might feel is theoretical, regardless of how genuine. And catastrophe victims aren't really my particular cross to bear. It must be a good thing, to not bleed for every wound that overtakes humanity. So I count myself blessed. It's what callouses after all are for.

So when Pat Robertson says Haiti made a pact with Satan 200 years ago, well, I don't need to have an opinion. One of the ways God deals with humanity is through its nations. Maybe it's true. It's no dumber than Danny Glover's statement on exactly the same topic: The earthquake came from God as a judgment because Haiti didn't do enough to save The Planet at the Copenhagen Climate Summit. As if the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere could have done anything at all. Could it even afford airfare to Denmark? At least Robertson had biblical support. God after all has acted that way, in the past. I'm surprised though that Robertson thinks he has access to the archives of Hell, to know the private arrangements between slaves and Satan. As for Glover, I'm surprised he believes in God. Must be Goddess, he means.

We race around, if only mentally, trying to find meaning. Why why why did this thing this horrible thing occur? Sin, private or public? A cursed creation? Entropy? Randomness? Job and David and every human being capable of thought has looked for an answer. Jesus gave the answer. Why do towers fall on innocent victims? So that non-victims will repent. We are all object lessons, one to another.

Take addicts, drug addicts. California legislators, among the more morally corrupt people in the world, are pushing for legalized pot. So they can tax it. Yes, to profit from drug sales is a sound fiscal policy. Of course. Is abortion taxed too? I just wonder, is all. It's a service, so it should be. But regarding addicts, I was given cause to enunciate in my own mind that there is nothing at all, ever, under any circumstance, that one can say, or do, or cause to be done, that can change an addict into not an addict. There is no formula, no thing, no performance, that is the thing to do. Wisdom is doing what is appropriate. Sometimes it's appropriate to understand helplessness. Sort of a Zen thing, where non-action is most dynamic. The still small voice, heard, where the Voice from the whirlwind is meaningless.

God is not all-powerful. I think I actually looked it up, long ago, that the Bible never says God is omnipotent. If it says otherwise, it would be the only contradiction in the Bible. Because, say, God cannot lie, or forswear himself -- he cannot violate his own nature. He cannot violate our free will. We get saved, if we do, because we accept what is offered. Chosen, yes, and choosing. Not a contradiction. Not even a paradox. Just something we can't understand. That's probably why God wants us to be like little children. We have to accept some things, not because faith is valuable in itself -- it's just necessary if we want serenity.

What's the number of Haitian dead? Up to five hundred thousand, but that isn't likely to be right. Fifty thousand? Now two hundred thousand. Out of a population of ten million. So half a percent of the population, or two percent, killed in a single blow. One and a half million, or six, if it were the USA. Seems like a lot. But everyone dies. We just prefer that the horror be distributed more evenly across time. We prefer our grief to be decoupled from horror, for all that when we are overwhelmed we become numb. A madman or bureaucrat might propose that we get the killing and dying done all at once -- more efficient and statistically less traumatic. But something in our actual humanity argues against this sort of logic. God, taking the long view, allows both perspectives free expression, that we may chose between them as we please.

I'm sure he cares. It must be that he wants us to care as well. That, and that we should repent.

J