I was watching two segments of the news the other day. What I watched was a raw human emotion—grief.
The first was a father who lost his son in Seattle and how no one talked to him about it. The second was an 8-year-old girl who lost her life in Atlanta. Both were children. Both were someone’s child. Both sets of parents felt as if no one cared. But you couldn’t watch them and no feel their pain.
The Office Reading we read was about Absalom—David’s son who turned against his father. People who took an oath to protect his son were the same people who ended killing him.
Again and again, David made inquiries about the fate of his son. When he is finally told—in a kingdom that perceived Absalom death as a victory; to David, his son’s death crushed him, even to the point of saying that he wished her would have died instead. He wept because Absalom was his son. That was the same boy David played with when Absalom was little. He consoled his son with a skinned knee, taught him how to fight. That was his flesh and blood.
People are tired and annoyed. What’s going on today is a reminder that these are kids. Adult bodies—yes, but the mind of kids. It’s sad because no matter whIch was you slice it, they are lost. And yet—they are someone’s child. On both sides that are doing harm—it’s being done to someone’s child. At some point, at the beginning of their lives they were held by someone who loved them.
Which now brings me to Saint Augustine…
”My friends, we must grieve over these as over our brothers….”
“And so, dear brothers, we entreat you on their behalf, in the name of the very source of our love, by whose milk we are nourished, and whose bread is our strength, in the name of Christ our Lord and his gentle love. For it is time now for us to show them great love and abundant compassion by praying to God for them.”
Let your prayers and sacrifices today be offered for their souls—the departed who was caught up in all of this mess, and those living who are doing this.
Pray to convert them to Christ.
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