Unshaken faith

Unshaken faith
John Chathanatt, S.J.

How to believe and witness the living and hope-giving God in the midst of a devastating earthquake which has claimed thousands of lives? Why this, on us? Why so many people? These questions loom large in the minds of many persons. What is God doing in the earthquake? Yes, what is God doing in the earthquake? What signs should one read in an event like this? How to read them?

First, the event must be taken in its totality -- not merely the quake and the houses destroyed and the dead buried underneath, but also the reactions of the victims, their support of one another, their courage, and the compassionate responses of the country and of the world at large. All this is the ``event'' and God is within it! This event is telling us that the gift of love is not just a matter of fulfilling a duty by just taking care of some of the afflicted ones. It is a call to solidarity, to tenderness towards the bodily broken ones. It is also a call to look into the various structural aspects involved in such a tragedy.

The world becomes a little more compassionate and tender in moments like this. The event is a call to profound fidelity to tender human lives without yielding to difficulties and obstacles. The multitude of people that gather in temples, mosques and churches because of this event does so not out of despair, but in a sense of solidarity and fellow-feeling, that what struck them is also ours, in different degrees and varied forms.

Starting with the concrete needs of the grief-stricken, this event is telling us to go beyond the duty of charity. The call to love is telling us to base our action on an analysis of the people's situation and needs. Work on behalf of the needy is not done, or should not be done, in order to channel idle energies or to give away unwanted food and clothing, or to give recruited personnel something to do. They are done because the people in places like Bhuj have needs and it is urgent that we attend to them adequately, and at once.

Such care is part of a family affair. Concern for effective action at a moment like this is a statement of loving the other as other -- a nishkama karma. We are one human family in many personal realisations. Here is a chance to discover our humanness. To make a tragic event an occasion of personal gain or to draw some political mileage out of this would be a sin against humanity. But sinful social structures do exist and must be named!

Some people have lost their huts, so that they receive better houses. Others lost palatial mansions so that they may build more modest ones. Is this not a call for an egalitarian society? Isn't this a call for a move away from a position of absolute inequality to original equality? So that the society starts anew, fresh, young, egalitarian and acceptable? Isn't this the occasion to give food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, clothing to the naked, homes to the homeless, solace to the grief-stricken? Make a sister or brother of a stranger? Isn't this a wonderful occasion to do things for the Lord, by doing it for the other?

Encountering God at the very heart of the earthquake enables us to sustain our true relationship with God and with one another. For the earthquake did not discriminate on the basis of caste or religion. Rich and poor do not matter for this horrendous visitor. All were treated equally! The might of such a tragedy manifests both human fragility as well as an occasion for human generosity. God will assuredly conquer. That is the basis of our hope for the future of humanity. But it is when we connect with each other that God can work through us.

The writer is principal, Vidyajyoti Theological Seminary, Delhi.