By: Mark McBride
In Krista Tippett's "Speaking of Faith: Where Was God?", she talks to many theologians, philosophers, and other religious and lay people about the question that arises in the minds of people after September 11, 2001.
In this segment, she talks with Richard Mouw, a Christian philosopher and the president of Fuller Theological Seminary. Mouw, while looking at images of ground zero, thought to himself, "Where are you God?" He was struggling with a question that everyone struggles with: The problem of evil. He knew that the psalms asked some of the same questions that were being asked. He started reading the psalms that talked about God being far off. He never questioned the existance of God; he only where God was in all of this suffering. Mouw quotes a psalm, Psalm 38, saying that "The one who dwells in the secret place of the most high and abides under the shadow of the almighty is in a safe place." He goes on to say that the only safe place for us is in the shadow of God. The psalms allow us to ask questions about God, such as when Jesus was on the cross, he quoted Psalm 22, saying "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"
The next person that Tippett talks to is Joan Dehzad, an Episcopal deacon and the executive director of the Institute of New Americans. She says that anger at Muslims is a natural response to this, but that it is based solely on emotion and not reason. She says that we need to use reason instead of emotion if we are going to be angry at someone. All the Muslims are trying to do is to be holy people. The terrorists that attacked the World Trade Center did it out of hatred for America, not for religious purposes. This shows that even though America is made up of many different religions and races, we can unite together for a single cause and be strengthened by one another. She feels the need to protect the Muslims in her community, but that she was in a very different position because of it.
Rabbi Barri Cytron, the director of the Jay Phillips Center for Jewish-Christian Learninng, also spoke on this issue. He said that some of his students had asked him what they could do as a Jew in this situation. He suggested that they read from Jewish Scripture. During times such as these, a Jewish person can only read from three books: Jeremiah, Job, and Lamentations. All three of these books talk about the world being turned upside down, metaphorically. He studied each of these in class with his students and showed to them that although the books were writen hundreds of years ago, they still can be applied to us today. While Cytron and his class was going over Job, they read over Job's life and his questions about it, and also God's responses to Job. They then talked about what God would say to us about September 11, after knowing how he responded to Job's life. Cytron reads a passage from Job 38:
4 "Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?
Tell me, if you understand.
5 Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?
6 On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone-
7 while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels [a] shouted for joy?
12 "Have you ever given orders to the morning,
or shown the dawn its place,
13 that it might take the earth by the edges
and shake the wicked out of it?
14 The earth takes shape like clay under a seal;
its features stand out like those of a garment.
15 The wicked are denied their light,
and their upraised arm is broken.
Patricia Hamplis a poet and the author of A Romantic Education and Virgin Time. She turned to the Psalms in Hebrew Scripture for their poetic literary style. As a writer, she needs to think about the specific words and the type of language that she uses and that is used by others in this situation. She says that in language, there is a connection between the body and the spirit. Hampl grew up during WWII, and she said that after it ended, writing poetry seemed just barbaric. She felt the need to talk to people who have gone through this tragedy to truly understand why she is so hated. She finished her interview by saying that people often turn to poetry because it teaches people to pass between reality and their soul.
Linda Loving is the pastor at the House of Hope Presbyterian Church in St. Paul, Minnesota. He said that during this time, people were "starving" for God's word. We all depend heavily upon God, but sometimes we don't realize it until something like this happens. Then it becomes very clear to us how much we depend on God. People start to wonder; Who am I? Whose am I? Why does this matter? How can there be enough good to overcome this great evil? Loving concluded his segment in Speaking of Faith by saying that God is always stirring people to dig for this goodness and the love for which they were created.
Dan Grigassy, a Franciscan friar and a professor of liturgy at Washington Theological Union, was a good friend of Michael Judge, who was killed in the bombing of the World Trade Center. Grigassy describes him as a person who cut to the core of faith, the gospel, and to the core of his motivations. He showed that God truly is among us and is revealed in the best of our humanity. Grigassy says that it takes something like the attack to show people that God is here with us everyday, not in some outside universe looking at us from afar.
Cynthia Eriksson, a clinical psychologist at Headington Program in International Trauma, said that there was always the question of why innocent people suffer. She said that letting people stay in the "grey area", the uncertainty, letting them greive and rage and ask as many questions as they need to find some sort of comfort in that grey area. That's how God provides comfort in the midst of this disaster. Eriksson said that people turn to God and religion in times of suffering looking for comfort. She wouldn't turn to God in times of suffering, but she turned to a friend whom she trusted to find God for her. Eriksson finished by saying that God's presence and our humanness and caring for each other is an incredible healing factor.
Anthony Ugolnik is a Ukrainian Orthodox priest and a prefessor of English literature at Franklin and Marshall College. Ugolnik said that Americans now know what it feels like to have a great monument destroyed and what it means to get in touch with our own capacity to forgive. He believes that the consciousness of Islam will grow because of this tragedy. He also says that many people ask where God is when some things happen, such as when a child dies in child birth. He would say that when bad things happen to us, God is suffering along with us. He is in pain just like we are because he lost something as well. He concludes his interview by saying that if we think of God as in some place that is perfect and impervious to suffering, we have alienated God, ade him into a stranger. Her is with us every day, right now.
Listen to this program of Speaking of Faith.
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