Here are a few thoughts on the present state (and cause) of our budget crisis. It’s fair to say that today big budget deficits are and have been driving our national debt into dangerous territory. They are projected to be $744 billion for Fiscal Year 2014, raising the total national debt to nearly 415 trillion.

That’s an amazing amount of money. Since we were running a surplus as recently as the Clinton administration, what happened? Where did all that red ink come from?

Between 1980 and 2009, the national debt grew from $700 billion to nearly $8 trillion. Of the past five presidential administrations, the only one during which there was no net increase in the national debt was Bill Clinton’s.

Where did it go? The two greatest increases in the debt were during the 1980s and the 2000s.

• During the Reagan administration we cut taxes while engaged in a military spending race with Russia and raised the national debt by $2 trillion:
• During the Bush administration we did these things:
  1. We increased spending on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (without a plan to fund them);
  2. Increased spending on Medicare prescription programs (without a plan to fund them)                  

             Taken together these two items added $4 trillion to the debt.

1. Plus we made dramatic cuts in taxes, which, while not directly adding to the deficit, decreased our income and ability to pay on it.

The highest our national debt has been in relation to the Gross Domestic Product was after the Great Depression and World War II, when it reached nearly 109 percent.

During the present administration, the national debt, in relation to the GDP, increased from 54 percent to around 80 percent, largely due to automatic increases in things like food stamps, welfare, and unemployment insurance, that kicked in after the Great Recession, plus the continued costs of the unfunded prescription drug programs and lingering unfunded wars which it inherited.

So, here's the present problem. The task of reducing the current $14,000 trillion debt (nearly $45,000 for every breathing human in America) is truly daunting. It can only be done with a combination of budget cuts and tax increases. Cuts alone will not haul the water.

The largest expenses are Social Security, Medicare, Welfare ($745 billion in 2011) and the military, which total $2 trillion of the $3.6 trillion annual budget.

All of the expenses (veterans’ services, interest on the national debt, public health, education, transportation, government operation, etc.) add another trillion dollars. That leaves only $600 billion for everything else.
There's surely some fat left in those numbers, but starting with Al Gore's "Reinvention of Government" program in the Clinton Administration, a lot of excess "Waist, Fraud and Abuse" (the catchphrase used by budget cutters) has disappeared. Today to make any meaningful reduction would require cutting down past muscle and bone and into the realm of self-mutilation and amputation. In other words, without raising new money, a budget surplus cannot be achieved without hurting old people (Social Security) sick people (Medicare), poor people (Welfare), and the military. Democrats have a historic (though languishing) aversion to cutting entitlement programs and Republicans have an odd, near-sociopathic hatred of anything that lowers military spending. So, changes will be difficult.

The only real option for closing the deficit gap is raising taxes, which also usually elicits howls of protest, especially from the very wealthy and from the lower middle class who have been led to believe that if taxes are cut on the wealthy, they will (eventually) benefit from it.

Two factors have conspired to shrink the government’s tax income.

1. There is less and less money coming in from the more affluent. Over the last twenty-five years, they have very successfully lobbied Congress to lower and keep low the tax rates on all upper brackets. The top maximum tax rate is now 39.6 percent (up from a low of 35 percent) down from around 70 percent in 1980 ­— a period of economic prosperity for all.
2. There is less and less money coming in from the middle class. For roughly the last twenty-five years their numbers have been decreasing and the median income has been going down, resulting in declining tax revenue from that source.

And, again, when the upper income brackets pay less in taxes and the lower income brackets have less income, one result is a weakening of the ability of the Federal Government to pay the bills, driving us to borrow more and more money.

Today there are probably only three broad proposals that will balance the federal budget and pay down the national debt:

1. Apply means testing to cut Social Security and Medicare costs by reducing benefits to those who don’t need the full amount, and critically scrutinize and trim military spending.
2. Increase tax rates on the upper income brackets.
3. Encourage more equitable sharing of the profits produced from growing productivity with the middle class, which will boost the economy and create more income tax revenue.

Also, counter-intuitively, channeling money back into the hands of the poor and middle classes is cost effective and will actually do a little to lower the deficit. If the poor and middle income brackets have more money in their pockets, they will pay more in income and sales taxes and will pay more to the local merchants who will hire more staff and buy more products, which will in turn raise the amount their recipients will pay in income and sales taxes. It’s called the “multiplier effect.” People who live on the edge don’t hoard their incomes stimulus money, they spend it and that helps the economy. Wealthy people tend to hoard or invest their windfalls, which is not awful, but it doesn’t give as much bang for the buck in terms of helping the over all economy. Economic stimulus actually helps the economy grow and because it multiplies and raises the incomes of others and increases tax revenues, it actually does little harm to the deficit. That idea is of course considered satanic and evil and blasphemous to the Rush Limbaugh-Tea Party-Fox-Republican front, but it is nonetheless true and has been born out by a number of studies.


The crux of this discussion is what should be the role of government. Shouldn’t it be to do the most good for the greatest number instead of serving the interests of just a few? Just a thought.

The Budget Crisis

Here are a few thoughts on the present state (and cause) of our budget crisis. it’s fair to say that today big budget deficits are and have been driving our national debt into dangerous territory. They are projected to be $744 billion for Fiscal Year 2014, raising the total national debt to nearly 415 trillion.

That’s an amazing amount of money. Since we were running a surplus as recently as the Clinton administration, what happened? where did all that red ink come from?

Between 1980 and 2009, the national debt grew from $700 billion to nearly $8 trillion. Of the past five presidential administrations, the only one during which there was no net increase in the national debt was Bill Clinton’s.

Where did it go? The two greatest rises in the debt were during the 1980s and the 2000s.

• During the Reagan administration we cut taxes while engaged in a military spending race with Russia and raised the national debt by $2 trillion:
• During the Bush administration we did these things:
  1. We increased spending on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (without a plan to fund them);
  2. Increased spending on Medicare prescription programs (without a plan to fund them)                  

             Taken together these two items added $4 trillion to the debt.

1. Plus we made dramatic cuts in taxes, which, while not directly adding to the deficit, decreased our income and ability to pay on it.

The highest our national debt has been in relation to the Gross Domestic Product was after the Great Depression and World War II, when it reached nearly 109 percent.

During the present administration, the national debt, in relation to the GDP, increased from 54 percent to around 80 percent, largely due to automatic increases in things like food stamps, welfare, and unemployment insurance, that kicked in after the Great Recession, plus the continued costs of the unfunded prescription drug programs and lingering unfunded wars which it inherited.

So, here's the present problem. The task of reducing the current $14,000 trillion debt (nearly $45,000 for every breathing human in America) is truly daunting. It can only be done with a combination of budget cuts and tax increases. Cuts alone will not haul the water.

The largest expenses are Social Security, Medicare, Welfare ($745 billion in 2011) and the military, which total $2 trillion of the $3.6 trillion annual budget.

All of the expenses (veterans’ services, interest on the national debt, public health, education, transportation, government operation, etc.) add another trillion dollars. That leaves only $600 billion for everything else.

There's surely some fat left in those numbers, but starting with Al Gore's "Reinvention of Government" program in the Clinton Administration, a lot of excess "Waist, Fraud and Abuse" (the catchphrase used by budget cutters) has disappeared. Today to make any meaningful reduction would require cutting down past muscle and bone and into the realm of self-mutilation and amputation. In other words, without raising new money, a budget surplus cannot be achieved without hurting old people (Social Security) sick people (Medicare), poor people (Welfare), and the military. Democrats have a historic (though languishing) aversion to cutting entitlement programs and Republicans have an odd, near-sociopathic hatred of anything that lowers military spending. So, changes will be difficult.

The only real option for closing the deficit gap is raising taxes, which also usually elicits howls of protest, especially from the very wealthy and from the lower middle class who have been led to believe that if taxes are cut on the wealthy, they will (eventually) benefit from it.

Two factors have conspired to shrink the government’s tax income.

1. There is less and less money coming in from the more affluent. Over the last twenty-five years, they have very successfully lobbied Congress to lower and keep low the tax rates on all upper brackets. The top maximum tax rate is now 39.6 percent (up from a low of 35 percent) down from around 70 percent in 1980 ­— a period of economic prosperity for all.
2. There is less and less money coming in from the middle class. Their numbers have been been decreasing and the median income has been going down, resulting in declining tax revenue from that source.

Today there are probably only three broad proposals that will balance the federal budget and pay down the national debt:

1. Apply means testing to cut Social Security and Medicare costs by reducing benefits to those who don’t need the full amount, and critically scrutinize and trim military spending.
2. Increase tax rates on the upper income brackets.
3. Encourage more equitable sharing of the profits produced from growing productivity with the middle class, which will boost the economy and create more income tax revenue.

Also, counter-intuitively, channeling money back into the hands of the poor and middle classes is cost effective and will actually do a little to lower the deficit. If the poor and middle income brackets have more money in their pockets, they will pay more in income and sales taxes and will pay more to the local merchants who will hire more staff and buy more products, which will in turn raise the amount their recipients will pay in income and sales taxes. It’s called the “multiplier effect.” People who live on the edge don’t hoard their incomes stimulus money, they spend it and that helps the economy. Wealthy people tend to hoard or invest their windfalls, which is not awful, but it doesn’t give as much bang for the buck in terms of helping the over all economy. Economic stimulus actually helps the economy grow and because it multiplies and raises the incomes of others and increases tax revenues, it actually does little harm to the deficit. That idea is of course considered satanic and evil and blasphemous to the Rush Limbaugh-Tea Party-Fox-Republican front, but it is nonetheless true and has been born out by a number of studies.

The crux of this discussion is what should be the role of government. Shouldn’t it be to do the most good for the greatest number instead of serving the interests of just a few? Just a thought.

Join Us for a Witness for Peace Delegation to Mexico

Looking for the Roots of Migration

Oaxaca, Mexico

September 16 – 25, 2013

This is an opportunity to explore first-hand the economic and political roots of the migration of

millions Latin Americans into the United States. What causes people to uproot themselves from their histories and homelands and take a long, painful, costly, and dangerous journey into a foreign land where they seldom know the language and are often greeted with hostility?

We will explore this question by visiting and experiencing the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca, where many of the forces for migration are stark and clear. The good news is that Oaxaca is a beautiful state of 2 million people and you will fall in love with the people, the land, and their history. The bad news is that nearly half of the Oaxacan population has left the state going north, seeking food for their families. Why is it that each year many people—both men and women—leave Oaxaca and travel to the United States?

What to Expect:

• See the real reasons for migration to the U.S.
• Stay in the homes of families directly impacted by their relatives’ migration North.
• Gain knowledge of ways US policy affects migration patterns
• Meet people resisting destructive byproducts of NAFTA and other “free” trade policies.
• Visit a local shelter for migrants moving to or from the US
• Meet with returned migrants who have experienced life in the US justice system
• Visit a local women’s cooperative that provides alternatives to migration
• Discuss ways to act in solidarity with people from Oaxaca and immigrants here in the US

Cost:

$950 + airfare (arranged on your own).

This covers all of your expenses “on the ground” in Oaxaca, including transportation, food, and lodging. Scholarships and fundraising opportunities are available.

For more information or to apply please contact:

Stan Duncan

standuncan@post.harvard.edu

781-504-6875

Click here to download a printer ready version of this flyer

Cosponsors of “Roots of Migration” Delegation:

The Justice & Witness Commission of the Massachusetts Conference of the United Church of Christ, the Mission and Justice Committee of the South East Area of the MACUCC, and Jubilee Massachusetts

Proper 06 – Year C

1 Kings 21:1-10 (11-14) 15-21a

Naboth’s Vineyard

This is another confrontation between Elijah and the royal family of Ahab and Jezebel. As you may recall (from last week’s reading), Ahab had already angered Yahweh when he married Jezebel, who was a foreigner from Sidon, and for giving Sidon’s state religion of Baal worship legitimacy in Israel (1 Kings 16: 31-33). The previous conflicts reflect this apostasy, but here the issue is injustice as well as theology: the abuse of power in order to secure land. The two themes together make a larger point that is worth noting, which is that idolatry produces injustice. The worship of other gods inevitably results in abuse of others. When one worships Yahweh, one respects the covenant of creation.

At the beginning of this story, Ahab is vacationing in his northern palace, up in Jezreel, near the Phoenician border. The official capital of Israel in those days was down in Samaria, but after they were married, Ahab and Jezebel built a second palace up in the northern region of the country, probably to be close to Jezebel’s family and to the business opportunities that proximity would afford him. While there, one day he happens to look out of his window and he sees a farm owned by a peasant named Naboth.

He goes and talks to Naboth and tells him that he would like that land for what he calls a vegetable garden, though as we will see, it’s more likely he wanted it for export crops, not summer tomatoes to sell at the local farmers' market. He makes Naboth what appears to be a generous—or at least fair—offer. He even offers him silver, which sounds nice, but actually may have been useless to an agrarian peasant.[1] In any case payment of any kind didn't interest Naboth and he refuses. According to Israelite cosmology, Naboth is the land and the land is Naboth. It's false to make a distinction between them. So, both legally and theologically he can't let go of it. As he puts it in his brief response to the offer, the land is his “ancestral inheritance” (some translations have “heritage”), and the Lord would “forbid” his giving it away for any purpose.

This passage from Numbers 27:4-11 makes it clear that land must remain in the family. Note the frequent use of the word “inheritance” (emphasis added), which refers to land, not the family's bank account.

⁵ Moses brought their case before the Lord. ⁶ And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ⁷ The daughters of Zelophehad are right in what they are saying; you shall indeed let them possess an inheritance among their father's brothers and pass the inheritance of their father on to them. ⁸ You shall also say to the Israelites, “If a man dies, and has no son, then you shall pass his inheritance on to his daughter. ⁹ If he has no daughter, then you shall give his inheritance to his brothers. ¹⁰ If he has no brothers, then you shall give his inheritance to his father's brothers. ¹¹ And if his father has no brothers, then you shall give his inheritance to the nearest kinsman of his clan, and he shall possess it. It shall be for the Israelites a statute and ordinance, as the Lord commanded Moses.”

When thinking about the role of Jezebel in all of this, it's important to note that she was not some nice girl he met on college break at one of the tourist beaches outside of Sidon. She was the daughter of Eth-baal (whose name, interestingly, means “with Baal”), who was a ruler of Tyre and the head of one of the ancient world's largest import-export institutions.

So, when Naboth turns Ahab down, he goes back home again (probably back to Samaria) and evidently just pouts. One might dispute that term being used of a King of Israel, but the text says “He lay down on his bed, turned away his face, and would not eat.” It's hard to read that and not say he goes home and pouts. It's possible he was also murmuring “Mommy” under his breath, but that can't be verified for certain. Jezebel, on the other hand, chides him sarcastically for his spinelessness. “Do you now govern Israel?” she asks, meaning something like, “Hey, aren't you the boss here, or did they vote you off the island for being a wuss?” She then sets out a plan to have Naboth murdered and his land taken from him.

The background of this story is that North Israel (where this story takes place) was rapidly coming under the economic influence of aristocratic mercantilists with trading ties to the powerful Phoenicians of Tyre and Sidon (remember that Jezebel was an heiress of a major multinational import/export family from Tyre). Archeological findings in the region have found that wealthy merchant families in Tyre and Sidon (and their Israelite wealthy wannabes) had been dispossessing north Israel peasants from their land for at least a generation leading up to the time of the marriage of Princess Jezebel to King Ahab.[2] The text in 1 Kings says simply that Ahab wanted the land for a vegetable garden. Behind that innocent statement is probably the darker reality that he (and his wife) wanted it for its potential for wine exports, most likely to Carthage.[3]

Naboth, citing the theological logic of the Jubilee, says that he simply cannot sell it. He can't because technically he doesn't own it. It is tribal property, an “ancestral inheritance,”[4] owned by the entire family and by God, and God would “forbid” his selling it (1 Kings 21:1-3).[5]

Naboth and other Hebrew peasants understood their land to be a gift of God and they were only stewards of it, their job was to “redeem” it, while the Phoenicians, reflecting a more urban, city-state individualist view of humanity, believed that land was just a commodity and could be bought, sold and stolen by anybody. Leviticus 25:23-24 puts the theology succinctly: “The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; with me you are but aliens and tenants. Throughout the land that you hold, you shall provide for the redemption of the land.”

It was an early conflict between theology and economics. [6] According to Brueggemann, “the vineyard could not be without Naboth belonging to it. Naboth could not be without this land. That close and inalienable land linkage is likely reflected in the Jubilee practice (Leviticus 25), a social, institutional guarantee that this connection of land and family is indispensable for the functioning of society.”[7] One side in this dispute believed in a family-based monotheism which by necessity produced a kind of primitive trade protectionism along with capital controls, while the other side believed in a competition-based henotheism which produced winners, losers, and economic dislocation. Historically, it is very likely that this small story was preserved in the biblical tradition because it was later seen as a paradigm of protest on behalf of Yahweh ownership of land and on behalf of a whole class of dispossessed, oppressed people.

Israel leading up to this time had been a radically communal society. When persons lacked land, and the sense of self worth that came with it, they also lacked personhood. It was an egalitarian world based on land, community (tribe), and allegiance to Yahweh. Tyre and Sidon, on the other hand, were individualist societies, and saw land as something which could be separated from its owner by wealthy merchants, powerful land barons, or kings. By the logic of the community, you can’t steal from someone in the family, because the family is you. An ancient midrash on this passage says,

“A man has no right to sell his ancestral field so that he can get ready capital wherewith to buy cattle, or mobillia, or slaves, or to raise sheep or goats, or even to conduct business therewith. The only circumstances in which it is permitted is if he has become penniless.”[8]

So, Ahab pouts and refuses to eat, in part because of course he is a pansy, but in part because he understands Yahwistic faith: one cannot conceive of stealing land from someone else because we are all a part of the same family and created by the same God. On the other hand, Jezebel cannot conceive of not stealing it, because we are not the same.

She first calls for a fast. Fasts were proclaimed in order to announce that something important was about to happen. It was religious, but it was also political. Fasts were usually called when there was about to be a battle, or a coronation, or a trial, etc. Following that, Naboth is brought into the Assembly (either open air or in the largest public building of the village), and set at the head of the room alongside two “scoundrels” she has chosen to bring false charges against him. At this point there is no evidence that he has heard anything about the charges, and may not even have understood the purpose for the gathering. In fact, the exact nature of the charges is left unclear, but they at least include blasphemy against God and king, which was a capital offense because it is tantamount to treason. There was more than one document filed in Samaria and brought to Jezreel, so she may also have been charging him with something like breach of contract. She may have either claimed that he had sold it to Ahab or that he promised the sale and now denies it. There was at least some evidence that they had discussed the sale of the property and that Naboth had invoked God's name in the conversation (which is often used in legally sealing transactions), and that could have been used against him.

In any case the people gathered in the assembly side with the two paid witnesses and they pronounce him guilty, and then, following the law, they take him to the edge of town and stone him to death. The land reverts to the king, as the representative of the people as a whole, and all should be well. And as for Ahab, “As soon as Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, Ahab set out to go down to the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, to take possession of it” (v. 16).

Note that Jezebel is not more evil than Ahab, she is just less troubled by the social impropriety of violating Israel's humane social contract. Note too, that Ahab fasts when he doesn't get his way, and Jezebel calls for a nation-wide fast to eliminate Naboth and get her way. In both instances a religious ritual which was created for spiritual cleansing is being used for evil purposes.

But before he can take possession of the land, Elijah appears and proclaims: “Thus says the Lord: You have killed, and also taken possession!” (Dennis McCann, says that in spite of the translation in the NRSV, what Elijah says is a declaration, not a question.)[9] Elijah doesn't say more about the crime, because Ahab understands his sin. He quotes God's impending punishment, but what is important is that “you have sold yourself to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord” (v. 20 emphasis added). Ahab may think that Elijah is his enemy, but in the end, Ahab’s worst enemy was himself.

---

[1] The text is usually translated “money,” but the word is keseph, or Silver. For many among the currency classes (though maybe not peasants) money and silver were synonymous.

[2] Clinton McCann, Texts for Preaching (Philadelphia: Fortress Press), 1994, p.362

[3] See “Search for Phoenician Shipwrecks,” Biblical Archaeology Review Vol. 12, No. 5 (Sept./Oct 1999), p 16; and James D. Newsome’s Hebrew Scripture essay for Proper 6, Ordinary time 11, in Texts for Preaching: A Lectionary Commentary Based on the NRSV-Year C (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press: 1994) pp. 282-284.

[4] The Hebrew word is nahala and could also be translated “sacred patrimony” or “heirloom.”

[5] See Walter Brueggemann, “The Prophet as a Destabilizing Presence,” in A Social Reading of the Old Testament: Prophetic Approaches to Israel’s Communal Life, ed. Patrick D. Miller (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994) pp. 221-244.

[6] Brueggemann, A Social Reading of the Old Testament, p. 239-242..

[7] Brueggemann, Ibid., p. 239.

[8] Barrett, C.K., ed. The New Testament Background: Selected Documents, Rev. Ed. (NY: Harper and Row, 1989), pp. 7-8.

[9] Clinton McCann, Texts for Preaching (Philadelphia: Fortress Press), 1994, p.384.

Moore, Oklahoma, May 20, 2013

Early Monday afternoon, on May 20, an EF5 tornado, the largest recorded in US history, moved slowly through my home state, with winds up to 300 mph, and creating a path of horror roughly a mile and a half wide. All tolled, somewhere between thirteen to fifteen thousand homes were completely destroyed, flattened beyond recognition. Hundreds were injured, dozens died, many of them children. The Plaza Towers Elementary School was one of the places where people were most concerned because many children were trapped inside the wreckage for almost two days. Thankfully, only nine children died, when it could have been many more, but each one was a child of God and loved by grieving parents. The death toll overall was amazingly low given the horrific destructiveness of the storm, but that’s poor comfort to the families and friends of those who were lost. 

* * * *

For many years I lived with my family in Oklahoma City, down in the south west corner, right on the border with Moore. All of my (now grown) children went to Moore schools and I called them this week to see how they were and tell them I loved them. They’re all gone now, but I have two cousins who do live in the area. One of them lives in Norman, just below Moore, and she had the roof of her home blown off. She’s now staying with her sister in Dallas. Another lived right in the center of the storm and she lost her entire home. Everything. The neighborhood looks like piles of firewood. She’s now living with her aunt in another town several miles away.

I have two purposes in telling you all this. The first is to help you get a feeling for real people with names who died or lost so much in this tragedy. When people die far away it's terrible, but we don't feel so much for them because we don't know them. I don’t know anybody in Syria, or Palestine, or Afghanistan, and it is hard to understand the true impact of suffering and loss until you know somebody there and grieve for them. The people of Moore and the people in the bombings in Boston last month are not statistics but good people, kind people, ordinary people, and they have lost a lot, and will continue to suffer a great deal for a long time to come.

The second thing I wanted to say is that God did not create this horrifying tornado, the worst ever in modern history. There is a perverted, cruel theology that says that if someone dies it is because God did it, either to punish us, or to teach us a lesson. Of course, the infamous Westboro Baptist Church issued a statement saying that God killed all those people to punish the “Oklahoma Thunder” (a local pro-basketball team) because they were so tolerant of fellow-player, Jason Collins’, coming out as gay. They also said a few weeks ago that God killed and maimed dozens of people in Boston to punish it for being such a liberal town.

I think we all know that talk like that is madness, but I also hear it more gently put by good Christian people all the time. They say, “God had a reason for 'taking' my mother.” Or, “Why did God 'take' my father?” But that belief is wrong. God doesn't kill people. Storms, tornados, disease, and human sin kill people. God is not in the destruction, but in the healing. God is not in the breaking, but in the mending.

God did not cause a teenage drunken driver to kill my father and his fiancée years ago on a highway the week before their wedding. God did not cause my step-father to suffer and die of a series of ghastly strokes that weakened him until he could only die to find relief.

God is indeed in the midst of suffering, but as its resolution, not its cause. God is in its healing. God is in the relief workers, the doctors, the volunteers, and in the heroic acts of people who saved their neighbors and pulled survivors from their shattered homes. God is in the relief agencies, like the Red Cross and Church World Service, who showed up the morning after the storm with emergency supplies and health and nutrition kits. God's act of creation is for good, not evil, and when the creation falls, God is in the pain too, working for the best possible outcome of the destruction.

I am worried about my family members and I’ve called them all, but so far I’ve only reached those who were well and lived further away, and they are the ones who have given me reports. I also prayed to God for them, not with anger but that they could reach out to God's spirit and experience strength and courage in it, whether in this world or the next.

There’s one picture I’ve seen again and again in the press reports about Oklahoma. It’s a scene of a young woman walking away from the ruins of the grade school that was damaged so severely. She has a child in her arms and they are hugging each other tightly.

Just in back of them is a huge tree, gnarled and ravaged, filled with sheet metal debris blown onto it from the sides of the school that was destroyed. It looks blackened and abused, but it’s still standing. It is just to the side of what once was the Plaza Towers school. There was another tree like it in front of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, which withstood the terrible bomb blast in 1995.  Somehow those trees give me hope, or at least comfort. Perhaps it is because they seem to stand for standing strong. In some way they symbolize the God of all creation who is unbent and unbowed by the destruction of creation all around them. Like the trees, God too has suffered, right in the midst of their suffering, right alongside their pain, and in the end, battered and bruised, God never releases a tight hold on the earth.