SCULPTURE: Lament by Connie Butler
While I was hanging up pajamas at the store, the television above the entrance to the fitting rooms was tuned to CNN. Anchors spouted various polling percentages of disapproval of Obama’s healthcare reform. When I returned to pull robes off the rack, the talk was about who the reform was helping and how repeal would contribute to the deficit.
“We are the only nation in the West that doesn’t have healthcare for its citizens,” a co-worker lamented. “I just don’t GET these people.!”
My heart sank.
Breaking news later: a shooting in a LA high school; an earthquake in Pakistan.
Local news: a naked man, scratched and bleeding, had approached a home and begged the residents to let him in. Understandably, they were hesitant and called police. When they arrived, they could find no trace of the man. He was later found dead. Pictures of a tattoo were to be broadcast later in the hopes that someone would be able to identify him.
I ate dinner out this evening and read an alternative paper as I enjoyed Lebanese cuisine. The new governor, inheriting a financial crisis (as so many are), wants to cut services and benefits. No new taxes. I sighed. Working with poverty programs for years, I know some of those who will suffer most. Teaching for more years, I know that cutting frenzy reaches classrooms, too. How can we keep deluding ourselves that we can run a city, state, or country, without increased revenue?
Somewhere I read that Illinois governor is considering new taxes. The rest of the governors are “still in denial.”
My heart fell lower still.
Checking email at home I noticed an AP article about a letter from the Vatican to Irish bishops sent in 1997 warning them not to report all suspected child abuse cases to the police. My heart sank lower yet. When will the hierarchy admit their collusion in this horrendous scandal? When can I believe what I hear coming out of Rome? I am sickened and angered again by what feels like betrayal.
My heart is on the ground.
Oh God, how long? How long must we wait?
There is nothing I can do
to move these souls,
to bring justice,
to wash the stink from the land.
Oh God, how long?
I have no answers
and little hope,
Yet somewhere
in my heart
you have planted faith
and I am hanging on
to its solid branches
with all my resolve.
I am weak and sinful,
but I trust in your Word:
You will not abandon
the peoples of the earth.
Still, I wonder
How long?
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