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from Gustave Dore’s illustration for the Paradiso of Dante’s Divine Comedy
My heart is filled with sorrow. Another mass shooting, albeit mobile, in Texas which has chosen by its horrific gun laws to be the center of gun violence in our nation. More lives terribly changed by the insane lack of gun control in Texas, Second Amendment be damned for ever. More empty homes, more lives changed by the wounds that have ripped flesh and psyche, emotional wounds that will never scab over. The selfishness of the gun lobby and gun enthusiasts attack the very soul our nation for nothing more than money, for profit. Our nation has lost its soul and I don’t know if it will ever be regained from the forces of evil that have it in their grasp.
The song below was composed the night following the insane shooting death of Philando Castille, a man of peace gunned down by a police officer in St Paul for merely being a man of color. I expect that kind of behavior from the police of the deep South. I never expected that kind of behavior from what I once considered a more civilized place, or so I thought, like Minnesota. Of course, I have been proven wrong time and time again in the ensuing years.
The music is not pleasant. The beginning is harshly dissonant, an aural description of bullets ripping human flesh and the horror that is perpetuated not only on the victim but on the victim’s family. The middle section is a hymn for the those who have died so violently by gunfire. There is a section of what composers would describe as development, in which the melody of the hymn is assaulted by the dissonant melody of the first theme, only to have hymn overcome the dissonance. However, the music ends ominously with the cluster chord that began the song.
Here is my prayer for the victims of another catastrophic weekend in current American history.
For the Victims of Gun Violence in the USA, Psalm Offering 1 Opus 7, (c) 2016, Robert Charles Wagner. All rights reserved.
REFLECTION FOR THE 22ND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
YEAR C
With further destruction of innocent human life in the State
of Texas by gunfire, and the lies perpetuated by the governor of that state,
who signed into law the complete obliteration of gun control laws in the state,
it is very hard to write this reflection.
The primary focus of Sirach’s reading and that of Luke’s
Gospel today is focused on the virtue of humility. Time and time again in
sacred scripture, God makes it very clear that it are those who are lowly and
humble that will be elevated to greatness by God, while the proud and the
powerful will be reduced to nothing. Read these words of Mary in her canticle
from the Gospel of Luke:
“My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my savior. For he has looked upon his handmaid’s lowliness; behold, from now on will all ages call me blessed. The Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is from age to age to those who fear him. He has shown might with his arm, dispersed the arrogant of mind and heart. He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones but lifted up the lowly. The hungry he has filled with good things; the rich he has sent away empty. He has helped Israel his servant, remembering his mercy, according to his promise to our fathers, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.” (Luke 1:46-55, NAB)
These words are not just
isolated to that of Luke’s Gospel. Everywhere we look in the Gospels we find
the embodiment of humility in the person of Jesus. Humility is not just
something found in the Christian Testament, but is the backbone of the Hebrew
Testament. We find Mary’s words predated in the mouth of Hannah in 1st
Samuel. We find them throughout the Psalms and the prophets. How many times in
sacred scripture do we find human beings exalting themselves only to be justly
cast aside by God. King David, himself, was brought to his knees by his pride
and the sin that his pride caused. Over and over throughout scripture the proud
have been humbled. We might think that eventually us humans would finally get
the point. But no, we continue over and over to turn a deaf ear to the virtue of
humility. And, over and over, we have been brought to our knees by our own
pride.
We can’t turn on the news
without hearing some politician falsely boasting that they have the best intellect,
the best words, the best policies, and ideas the world never has ever heard
before. Of course, this is not just isolated to politicians. We hear the same
from sport heroes, industrialists, intellectuals, professionals and specialists
caught up in their own self-promotion, their own self-glory, and all the other
lies they want to hear about themselves.
What does the virtue of humility teach us. It teaches us that the gifts that we have are not something self-made. We live in a world where the myth of the self-made person is perpetuated to the detriment of all humanity. Scripture teaches that all good comes from God. Our gifts and talents originate in God, who has called us to use those gifts for the sole purpose of using them to benefit others. My father, a brilliant mathematician and mechanical engineer was a prime example of a man truly gifted, but acknowledged that the gifts he had were solely attributed to God.
My dad worked as a mechanical
engineer and salesman for Westinghouse Air Brake Company. He was often called
as a professional/expert witness in lawsuits involving deaths cause by the
collision of railroad trains and cars, trucks etc. Dad would be asked whether
the train could have stopped in time, preventing the collision. The
mathematical formula to determine this was flawed. So dad, in his spare time,
developed a mathematical formula that took in variables like the number of cars
an engine was pulling, the speed of the train, the condition of the tracks, to
determine whether the train could have stopped in time to prevent the
collision. His mathematical formula was tested by the railroads and they found
that the degree of error in the formula was plus or minus 5 feet. The previous
degree of error in other formulas was plus or minus 100 plus feet. Dad copyrighted
the formula, and it is the formula used to this very day in courts of law to decide
the outcome of many lawsuits involving train/vehicle collisions.
I asked dad whether he made any
money off his formula. He told me, “No. From the very beginning, it was never
my formula. It all belongs to the Holy Spirit, who inspired me to come up with
it. Because it never belonged to me, it belongs to all people.”
If there was ever a virtuous man
alive, it was my father, who never felt compelled to boast of having the best
words, the best policies, and abilities never ever seen by the world. My dad’s
life was a living parable of humility, and it was in his humility that his
greatness was revealed to all who knew him. To use Jesus’ image in the Gospel
today, Dad was content just to be able to sit at the table, never needing to
seek out the high place at the table.
If we are truly humble, we will
recognize that the gifts we have didn’t originate in us, they originated in the
God of love who created us. And like my dad, when we use those gifts humbly in
service of others, the greatness of God will be revealed in our lives for all
to see.
