A lesson for Disaster by Michael Cheiron, HP
March 20th, 2010 | 
Author: Bide within the Law you must, in perfect Love and perfect Trust.
Live you must and let to live, fairly take and fairly give.
The Wiccan Rede
Television is a very popular pastime, it is also America’s babysitter. Television is America’s prime source of entertainment and news. I believe the news media (an official sounding name for entertainment) has desensitized us to the horrors of the world. I can always meditate more effectively when I have not been watching much or any television. You’re right I don’t like television very much, but I do watch it albeit selectively.
When a fiend of mine lost a family member recently, it hurt me at a very deep level. On the other hand when thousands of people lost their lives in the Haitian earthquake, It touched me at a far lesser level, after all I didn’t know these people or even know anyone else that knew them. Think about this, one person vs. thousands. I sent a check to “Feed the Hungry” to help the people of Haiti and moved on with my life. I should have been more concerned. The only reason I knew of the Haitian situation was the news media that plays up every tragedy, ad nauseam.
So why am I telling you something that most of you already know? Because of something that happened the other day when I was watching a news broadcast about the earthquake in Chile. They showed a video of a Roman Catholic church that had been destroyed by the quake and I experienced a deep sadness. At first I couldn’t explain this. I asked myself, isn’t this a symbol of the same Roman Catholics that lead the Crusades, held the Inquisition and held the belief for many hundreds of years that only men had souls. Isn’t this the symbol of the invaders that came from Europe to conquer, spread disease and outright killed native peoples of other lands and forcefully converted them to a male dominant monotheistic religion (theirs). The same Roman Catholics that – oh I could go on (ad nauseam), but I won’t.
Then I got to thinking about why I it touched my heart to see this symbol of Catholicism destroyed. After giving it much thought and meditating on the question, I came to the following conclusion.
First and foremost, this was the meeting place of the local people who would congregate there to worship their god. It was not the palace or temple of the wrongdoers of hundreds of years ago. It was a special place in the hearts and minds of the people that had lost so much in the aftermath of the quake. The people of today should not be held accountable for the misdeeds of their ancestors. Secondly it was a beautiful piece of architecture. The stained glass windows were awesome and had probably been in that church for many, many years. It was a piece of art and we should all mourn the loss of great art. In a way it was also symbolic of the tragedy that befell these people. It was also a statement about the lack of respect Gaea shows to mankind and their symbols. Of course, it is a two way street, as the human race has chosen to disrespect Gaea in favor of selfish gain.
My point is, however, that we should remember to show respect to our fellow human beings, their beliefs and to our mother Earth. It is easy to fall into the trap of showing less compassion and even disrespect to the peoples of other religions and beliefs. We as Wiccans want to be accepted and allowed to have our rituals and ceremonies unmolested by others. However, we cannot expect that to happen if we do not go the extra mile to show that we are above that. It should not take a tragic event to open our eyes to the need for mutual compassion and tolerance. As Rodney King said “why can’t we all just get along”.
I challenge you, therefore, to feel the pain and suffering of our Earth mother and of our brothers and sisters irrespective of their beliefs. We should do this even when they are unable to do the same fore us. After all, are we not all one people walking our path as we have been taught or as we feel led? It is time for all of us to take a fresh look at how we feel and respond to all living things. May you find and create many blessings, much compassion and tolerance on you path.
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