8:37 AM I was up too late last night, waiting for DB to get home from work. He came in about 7:45 and we went to dinner, then he went back to work. I watched some dumb television, waiting, but when he still wasn't home at 1:00 a.m., I finally went to bed. My eyes are bit tired this a.m., after reading small print all day then TV half the night! But DB is still asleep; I hope he sleeps until 10.

Scattered Thoughts Scattered Thoughts God gets a bad rap these days. You hear it on the media and in bits and pieces of conversations in public places. For people who don't know the Bible very well, or whose memories of the Bible stories go back to childhood, or who take every word in the Bible as literal, it must be hard to understand where He was on September 11. Preachers all over the world are trying to explain this to nervous people in the pews. I hear, "How could God let this happen?" And then there are the idiots who blame the tragedy on AIDS, or Gays, or whatever else their bigoted minds can focus on. They think God visited this terrible event on us to punish us. I think of Rabbi Kushner's book, "When Bad Things Happen to Good People". I wish I could remember enough to quote him, because he was so eloquent in that book. "I lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help," Kushner wrote, quoting Psalm 121. That's where God was and is and ever shall be. He was there calming people, comforting people, leading them to safety, holding up the towers until many, many were able to escape. He was with the rescue workers and the co-workers who aided their friends. He was there with the thousands of citizens who ran to help at ground zero and with the millions who clogged the internet with donations of money. He was there with the children in Oklahoma who sent teddy bears to the fire fighters, and the school children in the little city near here who sent letters to the people of New York. Whenever someone said, "God help me", he was there. Whenever someone said, "God, help them," he was there. He is still there in the love, money, goods that pour into NY, even in the dog biscuits the bakery in Little City sent to the rescue dogs. And he will be there for the families who grieve, if they ask him to be. It is obvious to me that he was NOT there in the hearts of the suicide bombers, nor the instigators, planners and perpetrators of this and other tragedies. In their hearts, hate and rage reign, not the God of Hope. This was a manmade horror, not a God made horror. Evil is abroad in the hearts and minds of some people. Evil in the form of a fanatic religion that doesn't even resemble the great religion from which it takes its name. My Old Testament professor is an eloquent man. As he picks apart Genesis, showing us how to determine the message, he shines with his love of Yahweh, the Creator-God. He helps us to see how the major message of Genesis is God's reaching out to humankind to build a relationship. He is always there, if we turn to him. He has spent thousands of years trying to reach our hearts. But we stumble along, in our inept human way, forgetting him, and calling to him only when we are in trouble. I know that if I had been directly affected by this tragedy, I would have been crying for a miracle, also. And miracles DO happen. The fact that anyone lived through that terrible day is itself a miracle. However, I also believe that God works his miracles through US, and that we are the ones who will make miracles happen in his name. That also means we have the means to make changes that will reduce the hate and anger in the world. And that is where the rub is, I think. God didn't cause this to happen, especially to punish us. But, we have to look at humankind's responsibility in this and every tragedy brought about by hate and our God-given free will. As we work to eradicate the terrorists, at the same time, we have to work to eradicate the reasons for such hate, exercising that free will with love and compassion. And that's where God will be; wherever we are trying to serve the poor, comfort the lonely, feed the hungry, bind up the wounds, sharing our good fortune and enormous plenty with the have nots of the world.

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