There is Hope after Hopelessness

A reflection by Br. Stephen Mari La Ja, OP

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I felt a pain in my heart as I saw how Typhoon Yolanda ravaged the Visayas. I tried to resist the pain but I could not. Suddenly, I felt a responsibility to help the victims. What I could not do financially, I did prayerfully. I prayed for them. I tried my best to help them in my simple way.
I read about a politician who said after visiting Tacloban “God must be somewhere else.” The typhoon victims probably had the same question. I thought, should these people ask this question to me, what would my answer be? There is a world after this. Ours is only a transitory world. I think, those people who asked about God’s presence in that catastrophic event were those who had less faith in God and forgot that there is a life after death.
In situations like this, we have the opportunity to help others, instead of blaming God, the churches and the government. We can pull our resources together and make a change, a way to overcome the difficulties.
Everything happens for a reason. Every situation, good or bad, has lessons that have to be learned. Typhoon Yolanda taught us that there are things in this world that are beyond our human control. But typhoon Yolanda taught us also that faith can give us hope in a hopeless situation.

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Photo credit: Reuters / Romeo Ranoco
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LOOKING AT JESUS LOOKING AT US

The reading about the multiplication of the loaves re­veals a lot about Jesus and how he looks at us. Matthews says in the beginning, “When Jesus heard of the death of John the Baptist, he set out by boat for a secluded place” (Mat 14:13, NAB). The verse is significant as it tells the reason why Jesus left the crowds. John was his cousin and when he heard that he had been beheaded by Herod, he “went to a lonely place by himself” (GNB). He must have been saddened when he heard about the death of John, and he wanted to be alone with his dis­ciples, but the people followed him. And “he had compassion on them.” He forgot his own needs, his own sadness and “he healed their sick.” Paul in the second reading asks, “Who can separate us from the love of Christ?” (Rom 8:35). Nothing, not “trials or an­guish, or persecution, or hun­ger…” 

Even now, Jesus looks at us with compassion, looking to heal our wounds and satisfy our hunger. But we are also asked to do something: to go with him into a secluded place where he can heal us. The people walked for miles and endured hunger in order to listen to him. How far are we ready to go in search of Jesus and his miracles in our lives? We are all called to be like Jesus. How far are we willing to forget our own sadness and needs in order to listen to others with compassion? Perhaps it is in this willingness to forget ourselves that the miracle of Jesus in our own lives can be found.