The world's true horror

There is a lot of darkness to be faced. Terrible things happen in this world, and often to those who least deserve it. I can't even repeat (or link to) what I just read, because I don't want to sensationalize it further, or further make the victim in the story's life about her last moments - she had to amount to more than that. More darkness awaits at home - my father lent me Romeo Dallaire's book about the slaughter in Rwanda, and I expect that to be a harrowing thing to hear about as well. It could - it could ruin us if we let it, imagining the scope of the darkness that runs rampant in the world, blighting creation with something much worse than tragedy.

Thank God for being in Henri Nouwen's writings right now. He says, "It would be paralyzing to proclaim that we, as individuals, are responsible for all human suffering, but it is a liberating message to say that we are all called to respond to it. Because out of an inner solidarity with our fellow humans the first attempts to alleviate these pains can come forth."

The first thing we can do is to cultivate a sense of holiness; this holiness is found in the sovereign dignity of every single person, great and small. We are Holy Ground, as Nouwen asserts, and as the hymn Holy Ground goes.

This is Holy Ground, We're standing on Holy Ground
For the Lord is present, and where He is is Holy
These are Holy hands, He's given us Holy hands,
For the Lord works through them, and so these hands are Holy

What God makes is Holy, and he has made us. He has made the space between us Holy, and all the Earth we walk on. If we live lives that testify to the truth of that, perhaps we begin to drag ourselves, and by example the others around us, out of the mires that are tragedy, cruelty, and darkness. Compassion is the light that overcomes the loneliness and heartbreak, that burst forth like a star in the dark, and lights the way to peace.