Conversation Point

Hallowed Ground

Hurricane Katrina came one year ago on August 29.

Remembrances of that day welled up from our national consciousness and onto every newscast, newspaper and website, hoping for a way to come to terms with what we have been able to do to help our fellow citizens and what we continue to do to deal with the great task ahead that remains undone. We have learned some hard lessons, and some good lessons, about ourselves and our country this year. We have also learned something of our faith and how it looks when we put it into practice.

In the days, weeks and months since Katrina blew through the Gulf Coast, we have all heard the stories of the outpouring of support, kindness and love to the storm's victims. Many people who went to help, reaching out to meet immediate needs of food, clothing and shelter, then helping with the physical clean up, became stories themselves. And now, the beginning of the vision of what the future will hold is at hand, a vision of something different than what has been. While the clean up is far from over, the vision must be welcomed, shared, uplifted, in order to carry us beyond this tragedy and bring those most affected to a place of healing and wholeness, a place they can safely call home. We have acted in profoundly personal ways to bring these goals to life and I believe we are a stronger nation for it.

But this is not to dispel or ignore the lessons we have learned and are still working to accept about our country and how it functions in crisis. Katrina made us face some raw realities. We are literally the richest country in the world in terms of material resources, but we are very clear that our government let far too many days go by before getting help to Katrina's victims. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) funds designated for Katrina relief are still tied up in red tape a year later. The Bush administration has given lots of excuses and no clear answers for these mistakes. We will eventually find out the truth, and sooner will be better than later. FEMA is telling us they are more prepared this year. I feel hard pressed to believe this precisely because the wounds of Katrina are still fresh and largely remain unbound. We have been fortunate so far this year in not having another catastrophe to deal with yet. I am not alone in wondering what is taking our government's attention away from its responsibility to bring healing to weary people in what feels like a foreign land. We need to keep asking questions and pressing for answers. Our country was founded on the belief that we each have a say in what goes on and a vote to make that voice heard. Participation in this process and taking action to make our voices heard to effect change are lessons we have reclaimed as the events surrounding Katrina's destruction have unfolded this past year.

As believers in a God of justice, mercy and loving kindness our faith has taught us the simple need to also participate by listening, fully hearing what God's people on the Gulf Coast are telling us. We are clearly to be about doing God's justice in concrete ways to alleviate suffering whenever we can. But we are also to be about caring for one another in this most basic way that God cares for us in listening to and hearing our prayers. Frequently prayer equates with human beings doing a lot of talking, but letting the listening to what God has to say slip through the crevices of very busy lives. Prayer is a conversation in which both components contribute to the whole experience. Without the listening, we are missing out on understanding what God has to offer us, and delights in giving us.

I believe we now have time to hear the voices of the Gulf Coast. We have many reasons not to listen, going back to jam-packed lives as a usable scenario. However, we have more, and much better reasons to pay attention to these people and their stories. Mainly, we are God's people. We have ears that can hear and compassionate hearts to help carry some of the grief with which our fellow residents of God's kingdom are still burdened. We have hope and faith to strengthen these weary souls still wandering in the wilderness searching for the promised land of home. Faithfulness takes time and patience. Faithfulness takes all of us.

God's blessings, Cory

posted by Cory L. Kemp @ 2:04 PM