By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK
Hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, wreaking havoc and destruction. Wars spiritual and physical. Disease. All of these and more with death in their wake. We find ourselves in the midst of so many crises, natural and supernatural, wondering which way to turn first, how to make things better or feeling there is nothing we can do. Except pray.
And pray we do. For the American civilians left for dead in Afghanistan after a failed pullout, resulting from lack of foresight and planning, and for 13 military sacrificed in the effort, we pray.
Some U.S. civilians attempted to get to the airport before the U.S. pulled out but had to return to their places of hiding after failing to find a way onto the airfield. Some of the last aircraft reportedly departed with empty seats. So many crimes of omission. Those still trapped in Taliban-dominated Kabul most likely now have targets on their backs.
Our military were sent into a dangerous situation, with little protection, and fatalities resulted. But they were sent in to get our own citizens out first and were not given the support they needed to accomplish the mission. For our military dead, we pray.
Commanding our military to withdraw from enemy territory before they have rescued all our American citizens is also a betrayal of the military themselves and a moral injury to their highest ideals of mission and service which demand they put their lives on the line
Natural disasters, acts of God, are difficult enough, and come when they will. We are at their mercy. But to suffer the outrage of the neglect, the indifference or the malevolence of elected and other leaders, resulting in danger or death for fellow citizens and other human beings, is unconscionable.
The U.S. had 20 years to plan for an exit but, despite that, a total chaotic mess resulted. Human lives were no doubt unnecessarily put at danger and some were tragically lost. Upon hearing of the fate of our deceased Marines, a soldier and a sailor, I ruefully walked out to the flagpole on our church property, originally erected as a memorial for our military, and lowered the flag to half-staff.
Betrayal is the word for the crime committed by those who are specially charged with the protection of others and who fail in that mission through neglect, omission or commission. Incompetence or neglect on the part of those who are charged with the physical and spiritual safety of others sometimes goes unpunished and uncorrected. The suffering of those under their dominion are our special concern in prayer.
Ultimately, as we know by faith, our Lord’s cross is always the ultimate answer and recourse for those who suffer injustice, and for all who care for and pray for them, followed as it is by His Resurrection which brings our redemption and restores our life. We persevere in faith when we approach all suffering and the mystery of iniquity, which sometimes is its source, through the wisdom of the cross.
“The cross is the unique sacrifice of Christ, the ‘one mediator between God and men.’ But because in his incarnate divine person he has in some way united himself to every man, ‘the possibility of being made partners, in a way known to God, in the paschal mystery’ is offered to all men. He calls his disciples to ‘take up [their] cross and follow [him],’ for ‘Christ also suffered for [us], leaving [us] an example so that [we] should follow in his steps.’ In fact Jesus desires to associate with his redeeming sacrifice those who were to be its first beneficiaries. This is achieved supremely in the case of his mother, who was associated more intimately than any other person in the mystery of his redemptive suffering. ‘Apart from the cross there is no other ladder by which we may get to heaven’ [St. Rose of Lima]” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 618).
The suffering saints and martyrs, like St. Rose and so many others, must be our companions of the cross, having first themselves been so faithful through their own participation in the Lord’s cross which found its divine approbation in their achievement of heavenly glory.
Faith, then, is never put aside. And in times of crisis, uncertainty, and death, faith must be our first recourse and source of strength for the sake of seeking the one goal which alone is worth any suffering which we may be called to undergo in this short and sometimes painful earthly sojourn.
Our Lord was betrayed, and the cross was His earthly fate. But He was never betrayed by the Father, whose faithful love ever accompanied Him and upheld Him through everything He suffered, even death. The communion of love He enjoyed with the Father was indestructible in the face of the greatest evil of which human malfeasance or evil was capable.
We are made sharers with Christ, and in His suffering for our sake, beginning with the moment of our Baptism, descending spiritually as we do in a death to our sins beneath the waters, and rising out of them with new life through grace. Beyond that we elect to share in His life by the way in which we approach all suffering, by means of faith and therefore also love. Our Lord’s love is “to the end” and so must ours be if we are to die and then also rise in Him.
“By embracing in his human heart the Father’s love for men, Jesus ‘loved them to the end,’ for ‘greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.’ In suffering and death his humanity became the free and perfect instrument of his divine love which desires the salvation of men. Indeed, out of love for his Father and for men, whom the Father wants to save, Jesus freely accepted his Passion and death: ‘No one takes [my life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.’ Hence the sovereign freedom of God’s Son as he went out to his death” (CCC, n. 609).
Sinful men are unwilling to care for others or to take responsibility for their choices. It cannot be that way for us who have been baptized in Christ who is Love and who calls us to love others, as well as ourselves, to the end.
Whether flood waters or the violence of war, or the betrayal of men who retreat and leave fellow countrymen behind enemy lines, no matter the danger, hope of life is ever ours, and our prayer for others no matter what they suffer, in divine love which alone is stronger than death.
“Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, jealousy is cruel as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a most vehement flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If a man offered for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly scorned” (Song of Solomon 8:6-7).
Thank you for reading and praised be Jesus Christ, now and forever:apriestlife.blogspot.com
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