“From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.” (Matthew 11:12)
And if this is true for the kingdom of heaven, how much more is it true for our earthly kingdoms?
Words fail us in times of overwhelming grief. I have been unable to voice my feelings over yesterday’s tragedy at Virginia Tech. Instead, I have found myself weeping over the past 24 hours at the strangest times and places. A word, a thought, a song, even a stupid, sentimental commercial on TV; these have all caused tears to fall unbidden from my eyes.
As a pastor, I have already seen and experienced far too much of death’s power. I have seen too many families and friends mourn the loss of their loved ones. And I have seen too many men and women and children try to pick up the pieces of their lives after they have said goodbye to their friend, their mom, dad, brother, sister or child.
The latest assault on life was at Virginia Tech, and I mourn the loss of every life, including the life of the killer. But ours is such a violent world, and it is incredibly sad and depressing to think that yesterday’s killings are but a small footnote in the history of this world’s violence. From Cain’s murder of his brother Abel, to Jephthah’s slaying of his own daughter, and to Jesus’ execution on the cross; the Bible does not hide from us the great evil we can do to each other.
And though Jesus came as the Prince of Peace, the peaceable kingdom has not yet arrived. Massacres and holocausts are commonplace, with so many occurring in just the last 100 years: the genocides in Armenia and the Sudan, the Holocaust, the fire bombings of Dresden and Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and ethnic cleansing in the Balkans, to name just a few). And then there are the millions of senseless murders, of which the killings at Virginia Tech are just the latest, which wrench minds and hearts from our everyday activities to consider once again our mortality and the inhumanity that we are so capable of visiting upon one another.
In the face of such things, I can only offer my sorrow for the victims, my empathy for their friends and families, and my prayers for all of us and this mad world on which we live. God have mercy. Please, God, have mercy.
———
God of all mercies and of all consolation,
you pursue us with untiring love
and dispel the shadow of death
with the bright dawn of life.
Give courage to all in their loss and sorrow.
Be their refuge and strength, O Lord,
reassure them of your continuing love
and lift them from the depths of grief
into the peace and light of your presence.
Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ,
by dying has destroyed our death,
and by rising, restored our life.
Your Holy Spirit, our comforter,
speaks for us in groans too deep for words.
Come alongside your people,
remind them of your eternal presence
and give them your comfort and strength.
All Amen.
———
Funeral Blues
W. H. Auden
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead.
Put crepe bows round the white necks of public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my East and West.
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever; I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.
———-
Dirge Without Music
By Edna St. Vincent Millay
I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go but I am not resigned.
Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.
Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.
A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,
A formula, a phrase remains, but the best is lost.
The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love,
They are gone. They are gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled
Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve.
More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.
Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.
Technorati tags: death, sorrow, grief, Virginia Tech
