Chaos

Musing with a couple of cups of BishopBlend™ …

The world is noisy lately. Revolutions happen. Inevitably Revolutions seem to increase both good and bad things happening in society. People who we call “crazy” because we cannot imagine “why?” they would do it, decide to take innocent lives.

Parents do terrible things to their children. We try to understand, “why?” because we cannot imagine ourselves doing the same things. Tragic accidents or illnesses snuff out the life of our children of promise, and we don’t understand, “why?”.

When things like this happen our minds grasp at tying to find an explanation. It is our paltry attempt at making ourselves feel safe in a world full of chaos. We grasp at restoring the illusion of safety. When we offer our illusions to those who are in the midst of the chaos, we are surprised that they take no comfort from our illusions.

There are no easy answers, and as uncomfortable as it is to acknowledge, our world is full of chaos, some of it self inflicted, some of it imposed from without.

Into this chaos, Christ comes to heal our infirmities and show us a way of offering this world back to Him as our priestly office. While we cannot control the chaos from without, and we cannot will the chaos from within to be still, yet Christ shows us a way through repentance to heal that chaos in ourselves. But it is hard. There is no prepackaged formula for repentance. There is much more to repentance than saying, “OK, I’ll repent.” While much of me is tired of the chaos and its price on my life, there is part of me that delights in chaos. It requires me to know myself and to be watchful over the invitations to chaos in my life. This is a part of me that most needs God’s healing.

The world’s chaos can be healed as well. This is something we must do together, as a community. And I can start healing the world’s chaos by looking into and allowing God to heal my own chaos. As St. Seraphim famously said: Acquire a spirit of peace and thousands around you will be saved. So, my project for world peace must begin with me.

May the Lord God have mercy on us all.