Another awful day

My heart aches on behalf of the victims in Oklahoma.  Once again, 14 years after an F5 killed 46 people, another horrible tornado has torn through Moore, Oklahoma.

I have lived elsewhere for most of my adult life and I was not born there, but I was raised in Oklahoma from the time I was a baby until I left for college.  Growing up I was used to tuning into the TV when the sirens went off.  I remember many times going into my sisters' closet to wait out the storm, hoping and praying that the tornado would not hit our house.  A tornado never got too close to our house, but I have friends who had tornadoes hit within a half mile.  I can remember my friend Cale (who, last I knew, lived in Moore) tell me about crawling in a bathtub with a mattress on top of him as he rode out one storm.  If you grew up in Oklahoma, you have a story. Twister might have been over-the-top but there's enough truth in it to make most Okies recognize what was going on.

I don't understand why these things happen.  I'm not just talking about a naturalistic explanation: Oklahoma has long been 'tornado alley' and there's just something about the way the topography meets the atmosphere that makes it where some places get nailed more often...I understand this.  I'm more concerned about this spiritually...the two extremes, that God causes everything to happen (and though is directly responsible for this suffering) or that God has left the future open, and chooses to not prevent such things (or even that he cannot prevent such things), are not really great options.  People of faith for thousands of years have asked these questions and have made some of the attempts at theodicy some of the most powerful expressions of faith.  But we really don't know.  Yet we have a Christ who takes all these things upon himself, and for that we can always be thankful.

One final thought:  I'm lucky nobody reads this and cringe to make this political...but something that will come up in the next few days is how we, as a nation, pitch in to rebuild Moore.  So, you would think that Oklahoma representatives and senators understand that as much help as Oklahoma often needs in things like this, they really don't have a clue.  Just a quick bit of fact-checking shows that three of the five members of Congress from Oklahoma voted against helping the hurricane rebuilding in New Jersey.  Both senators, the deplorable Tom Coburn and the even worse Jim Inhofe, voted against it.  We sure don't want to waste money on those northeastern liberals, of course.  I'm wondering how quickly the same people will be screaming for federal funds to help rebuild Moore, Shawnee, and whatever unfortunate places get blown away this year during tornado season.  Once again the lesson is this:  we must always hang in this all together.  We're Americans.  We help each other out...unless, of course, you are from the wrong party.

Sympathy to the Congress

I wrote this in April 2011 concerning the difficulty of getting anything done as a broadly diverse Congress; we went and saw 'Lincoln' last night and that Congress of 1865 puts to shame the difficulties that we face today.  Here's hoping that Congress (and the President, as both are equally obstinate in my opinion) can figure this out one of these days, despite the Grover Norquists and Nancy Pelosis of this world.  Somehow, it almost always gets done...

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Imagine, just for a moment, that you have a project for work or for school that is a group process.  Not just any project, though, but one that millions upon millions depend upon.  But doing the project is going to be hard, because not only are you working on it in all your brilliance, but 535 other people are working on this same project as well.  And not only those 535 people, but their staffs of dozens of people.  Yep, this ain't gonna be easy.

So you begin this project, and you soon find out that the other 535 people working on this project (and their staffs) all have differing viewpoints about what exactly you ought to do.  Sure, a few people have similar viewpoints to you, but even your friends each have different things they want to put into this project, even points that have nothing to do with the overall purpose of the project.  You ask them why, and they say "Because the people I answer to want this point to be made!  And if I can't get my emphases put in here, two bad things will happen.  First, they won't let me come back to do this project next year, and second, I won't let YOU put YOUR 'most important emphasis' in here, either."  So soon enough, you agree to their demands, and they yours.  

Then there's the people who are watching you do your project, all having an opinion on what you are doing, but never actually helping out.  They scream and bellyache and tell about how you (or your friends) are surely doing everything absolutely wrong, all the while belittling your character.  Not only that, but even beyond them there are hundreds of news trucks pulled up outside of your office (or classroom) reporting every word you say, demanding even more sound bites, and reporting rumor as if it was fact.  Everybody in the world is watching what you are doing on this project and has an opinion, never constructive.  

But still you carry on, only to find that outside of your close-knit group of comrades, who have mostly the same views that you do, are hundreds of others that disagree enitrely with your take on this project.  What is white to you is black; what to you is absolutely important to them is meaningless, and must be replaced by something you find to be equally wasteful.  You can't disagree on anything, but a deadline is coming, and so soon enough the project must get done.  

You labor on, all the time worried that you have to raise millions of dollars in order to keep you in school or in your job, because if you don't, there are many others who are out there wanting to take your place and willing to spend even more money to be where you are.  Still, you continue to fight for what you right, against all odds.  Even while you are doing your job, though, you are faced with the dangers of people walking up to you in supermarkets and shooting you, because they don't like the job you are doing.  Your project is getting dangerous to your very existence.  

Still, you continue, and if you are lucky (or maybe not!) you get to come back to school or work to continue working on this project, and the tensions between all your comrades is getting even worse.  The deadline keeps getting extended remarkably, but you fear it will never get done.  You give a little bit here others give a little bit there, and finally, amazingly, six months late, the project is finished.  

And of course, everybody hates it.  

Don't worry, though, because next year's project will be due soon.

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This is why I am not a congressman.  They may often be bad at what they do...but most of us can't even imagine the garbage they have to endure every single day.  Pray for them.