Insight, Meditations and Reflections

As the media bring us gruesome stories of the earthquake in China, the cyclone in Myanmar, the loss of lives in conflicts around the world, it's possible for many of us to become desensitized. I have noticed that I myself I feel apathy towards sufferings of others in the news.

When we reflect on these events, however, their full force can hit us like a hammer.

It is at such times that I hear myself asking and playing within my mind the following words like a broken record, "Where is God in all this?"Where is God in the lost lives? The crippled lives? Broken lives?

These questions expand my mind beyond the immediate disasters. Where is God in the injustice we witness every day? In the inhumanities we inflict on each other? In our systematic destruction of Mother Earth, polluting her, driving to extinction more species of wildlife every passing year?

Where is God in the terminal illness of innocent children? Where is God in the infidelities, betrayals and disappointments of friends, family members and loved ones? Where is God in our frustrations, in our confusion, in our despair?

And as I think on these things, slowly, quietly, taking them into the silence within, my mind shuts down. I slip into the silence. There, stillness tells me that these questions are koans we must each answer for ourselves. And so I have learned to respond to these questions.

The answers live within you. Where is God in the hurt of the world? Where is God in the suffering of those around you? Where is God in your own pain?