Wednesday Week 27 Year I

Sometimes God has no right to be merciful! If God wasn’t so damned merciful the world would be a much better place. Why does God let us get away with so much? How is that we can murder each other and nothing happens? That we can torture the innocent, deprive the poor, and defile the planet … and still wake up each morning to eat our corn flakes and worry about classes?
How much mercy would we be willing to give up in exchange for a little more justice? Because, of course, you and I don’t commit the murder or perform the torture. That’s other people. And as for the poor and the planet … well we do our share of damage but it’s a mighty small one compared to what multinationals and governments and rich folks get up to. So why not trade a little of God’s mercy for a little more justice. We’d not notice it much anyway. We haven’t that much to be afraid of. We’d pick up the benefits and the bad guys would pick up the tab. Wouldn’t a little fear be a fair price?
So why doesn’t God run the world the way I would? I offer my advice but God never listens. When a guy is dragged behind a truck for being black I pray and I tell God to get it right. When a guy is hung up to die on a fence post for being gay I pray and I tell God to get it right.
But of course I never hear back! I shouting into the void and only hear the echo of my own anger. ’Cause God knows I’m right.
But once in a while, beneath the din of my own right-ness, the silence behind me speaks. It’s a quiet voice and it’s uncertain, fragile, tentative. It asks me for forgiveness. God asking me to forgive her for not being the God I fear.