Date: Sunday, June 05, 2016
I don’t know what to say even after 42 years as a priest – to a mother or father who has lost a child. I do not say: “Your daughter is an angel in heaven” or “Your son is in a better place.” I find myself conveying my sympathy in silence. In our first reading, Book of Kings, a child longed for and prayed for, stops breathing. The mother, now a widow, reproaches the prophet Elijah, a man of God. She asks the question that cannot be answered: “Why?” She must wonder if God is cruel. Elijah directs the mother to give him the child. He then carries the child to an upper room and the prophet himself reproaches God. “How can you allow this to happen?” He stretches over the child as if pleading with God to take his own life to revive the boy. In our Gospel (Luke), a widow in Nain is processing with the body of her dead son and meets Jesus at the gate of the city. He asks her to stop weeping. Jesus then touches the litter/pallet and says: “Young man, I tell you, arise!” These two readings tell us something about God, not divine cruelty or disinterest, but divine compassion and mercy. God draws close to us at times of great loss. God is concerned about the plight of women as widows who are left destitute upon the death of a son. Can we sit back and not be moved by the suffering of refugees fleeing conflict and poverty in the world? Or seeing a mother or father carrying the body of a lifeless child in his/her hands and not ask ourselves if there is anything that we can do to help? There are issues of safety and security. But there are also men and women of good will who are crossing borders to deal with a refugee crisis not seen since the end of World War II. What will God say? What will future generations say about our response? A suggestion: Google Catholic Relief Services to see how the Church is involved and how you/we can assist.