I spent the entire day of Friday 12/14 in a meeting. I kept getting text messages asking what I thought of 'the news', though I had no idea what they were referring to. When I finally came out from the meeting and saw what happened I was deeply saddened and my thoughts and prayers went out to the families and friends of those lost. It's a tragic episode, one which has played out far too often in the past few months here in the US.
I'm pleased with the limited time Maggie's has spent on the topic. By the end of Friday evening, I was done with the news. It isn't news. It's an emotional outpouring which began to grate on me, and even this morning as I left for work, I was annoyed that major outlets continue to spend far too much time on this tragedy. Without any useful information, it's been over-analyzed in the course of the week.
I can't and won't let emotion sway my beliefs. My views on life are backed up with analysis and thought, not an emotional reaction to one or two events.
This is important to me because the meetings I have been in are about leadership. One primary approach to leadership is that style less important than behavior. If your behavior in emotional and stressful situations is different from how you behave normally, it undermines your credibility and ability to process information rationally. This is why the voices we hear on the black boxes of aircraft facing emergencies are usually calm and matter-of-fact. These people were chosen to be in their position for a particular reason...
We saw similar behavior in Sandy Hook, with at least one teacher calmly hiding her children, and directing the gunman to another room when he asked where the children were. The teacher did not survive, but her leadership and calm dedication to the task of defending her students is heroic.
I'd take this concept a step further and say after an event, if your ability to think rationally is altered by an emotional situation, then you are still allowing that event to impact your credibility. This isn't to say change isn't good, and we shouldn't review stressful events to see how to make things better or safer. But if I alter my opinions simply because of the emotional impact of an event, then I am not logically applying my capabilities.
One question which was raised during the media response on that Friday disturbed me. It was a comment I've since heard from a variety of sources. A reporter, a person in the street, all manner of people asking a question which is easy to ask but nowhere near logical. "Don't these events lead you to question your belief in God?"
Well, no. Not in the sense that because people were killed God can't exist. In fact, I'd say the heroic efforts of the emergency workers and the teachers who acted to save lives were enough to prove God does exist in more people than the one committing this atrocity. Even so, it's the wrong question to be asking.
These kinds of events don't happen because God 'lets' them happen, or doesn't protect those killed or injured. God doesn't set out make things happen or prevent them. God offers us choices in life, and our choices lead to particular outcomes and consequences. The shooter, disturbed as he may have been, acted in a fashion which rejected God's teachings, indicating a void in his life. God is 'everywhere', but when we choose to ignore His presence, we create a hole in our lives, and this can lead to very horrible outcomes.
Harry Fosdick had a quote, which I first saw here on Maggie's. "God is not a cosmic bellboy for whom we can press a button and get things." God doesn't protect us with some magic shield that bullets will bounce off of, simply because we ask Him to provide one. God doesn't magically turn someone who rejected Him into an instant believer simply because we wish it to be so. This isn't the nature of God.
He is, however, there for everyone who chooses to be with Him, for those who ask his support and guidance in difficult times. I'm sure there are many in our nation who have turned to Him over the weekend, some questioning "Why?" - a question which will never be answered. Others asking for strength and wisdom to deal with the difficulties they are facing.
We're not always going to be provided with answers. But I do know we can be provided with the strength of belief, the power of calm, which can only come with a firm grasp of the nature of God.
I'll add that while I believe in God, I know many others do not. I also do not practice any particular religion, though I was raised Catholic. I didn't write this to atheists or Buddhists as a means of saying "hey, you can't experience what believers do."
We all have the ability to live good lives with or without a strong belief in God. In many ways, it's the moral code and behaviors which support it which are important.
I'm also not setting out to 'prove' God's existence, that's a choice I have made. But you simply can't understand the nature of God if you believe these events disprove His existence. If you believe this, you're not making a choice about the value of believing in God. You're judging those who have made a choice to believe.
