Dear St. John's Community,
Speaking with a parishioner this afternoon, when I asked how she was doing she quoted Kurt Vonnegut, saying: "Laugher and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward."
I said that in fact I'd been feeling like we've been living in a Vonnegut. She added, "Or a Stephen King book perhaps!"
At the very least, we can say that this time has been very mixed. There are beautiful acts that take your breath away, and there are also senseless acts, and worse. The recent racially based killing, violence, and intimidation and weaponizing of the police (against a bird watcher!) have rightly grabbed a lot of attention. We have so much progress that we need to make on so many aspects of our life together. In addition to fighting the virus, we have a lot of work to do.
Touching on the absurdity that Vonnegut explores with his novels, I have found it absurd that even simple acts of compassion are being politicized—like wearing a face mask.
Compassion is compassion, and we need to stand up for it. We may criticize one another, but we should not mock. We may disagree, but we should not hate. This is nothing new, but the testing that we are all facing just makes everything more pronounced—and important.
If being compassionate means being counter-cultural, Good! Being counter-cultural in the best sense is nothing new for Christianity that is true to the teachings of Christ.
Faithfully,
Rob+
