God Won’t Fix This?
By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK
There are two lessons to be learned from the brouhaha that developed over the December 2 front-page headline in the Daily News, a onetime powerhouse New York City tabloid with a shrinking circulation.
(The newspaper was bought several years ago by Mort Zuckerman, who transformed its editorial stance from what might be called blue-collar conservative to establishment liberal. The change may have gained Zuckerman the entrée he sought into the world of television talking heads — he is now a regular on The McLaughlin Group — but it did not help circulation.)
The headline, written for the paper’s coverage of the terrorist attack in San Bernardino on December 2, read: “GOD ISN’T FIXING THIS.”
Conservative critics have been responding effectively to the headline’s presumption that Americans serious about these mass shootings should stop relying on ineffective prayers and begin promoting effective gun control laws. No need for me to add my two cents to their efforts. The partisan politics at work in the News’ treatment of this tragedy is stark and distasteful.
The lessons I have in mind are something different. The first is how intensely the secular leftists in the media dislike Christians serious about their faith. The second, how little the establishment liberals know about what intelligent Christians mean when they use the word “God.” The level of education of the media figures in question makes no difference. They still haven’t a clue. They are like the atheists who think they are delivering a telling blow when they point out that high-powered telescopes can’t find any trace of Heaven.
The front page on December 2 featured the big and bold headline “GOD ISN’T FIXING THIS,” accompanied by photos of Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Lindsey Graham, and Paul Ryan, along with their tweets calling for prayers for the victims of the radical Muslim assassins. The News editorial writers also inserted on the front page the comment: “As the latest batch of innocent Americans are left lying in pools of blood, cowards who could truly end gun scourge continue to hide behind meaningless platitudes.”
The “cowards” the News writers have in mind are Republican legislators who won’t join with liberal Democrats to push for stricter gun control laws, and not — as I am sure you intuited for yourself — those who are making no effort to ensure that people like the assassins are not entering the country. It is selective indignation at its worst.
That said, let us return to what I mean whey I say that the News’ headline reveals both ignorance about and contempt for mainstream Christians. Let’s start by asking what the editors at the News think Christians have in mind when they offer prayers at moments like this. It is not what the front page of the News implies. Catholic school children are taught at an early age not to view God as some Santa Claus figure in the sky who answers our prayers on demand.
We have been taught to ponder the Old Testament story of Job, who brooded over why God would permit him to go through such sadness and distress in his life, even though he always sought to do God’s will. Catholic theologians from the earliest days of the Church have pondered the question of why an all-good and all-powerful God would permit evil to take place. The medieval theologians called it the study of theodicy.
Come on: No grownup Christian prayed in the manner the News’ front page suggested when they heard what happened in San Bernardino.
Jesus Himself prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, “O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt.” He cried from the cross, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” Christians understand that our prayers are not always answered in the manner we think best, but in accordance with God’s plans.
Then why do we pray at moments like the terrorist attack in San Bernardino? In some cases it is merely an expression of our sympathy for the loved ones of those who were killed and wounded, an attempt to be decent and kind, an act of solidarity with our community. In any other instance the editors at the News would understand that. I can’t remember the paper mocking the people who gather in Central Park to commemorate the killing of John Lennon.
But we also pray because we believe in God and in divine intervention. The Bible is full of references to answered prayers and God’s blessings upon His people. Jesus instructed us to ask of the Father in His Name. Are the editors at the News mocking everyone who believes in the power of prayer? Yes, they are. They have revealed themselves.
There was a time when those who held such contempt for traditional Christian beliefs would express themselves only among fellow atheists and agnostics. It seems as if our society has reached a point where they feel confident to attack us openly, just as they produce for mainstream audiences films and television shows that in the past would have been labeled pornography.
Is there any validity to the position that it is insufficient to do nothing more than pray when these atrocities take place? There is some. Catholics believe in contemplative orders of monks and nuns whose mission is to pray for God’s blessings. We see nothing wrong with that. If there is a loving and all-powerful Creator, why should we not petition Him?
If the editors at the News think it childish and ignorant to believe in such a God, why not just say that openly, rather than pretend that they are calling for responsible citizenship? They would not write as dismissively about Jews petitioning God at the Wailing Wall or Muslims bowing to the East seeking favor from Allah.
But only a small number of us are called to the contemplative life. Ordinary Christians living in the world understand that we have a responsibility to act, to “re-establish all things in Christ,” in words of St. Paul that grace the front page of this publication each week. St. James instructed us in his epistle (2:26), “Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” St. John taught (3:18), “My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.” We don’t need lectures by the editors of the News in this regard.
Anyone who contends that Christians believe that it is their duty to withdraw from the world at a moment like this terrorist attack and do nothing but pray, is either ignorant of what Christians believe, or engaged in an indefensible cheap shot to gain political advantage.
It strikes me that the editors of the Daily News are examples of both.