Morning reflections.

Tuesday am...sitting in the cafeteria reading the SJ mercury news. Depressed and aching at all the sorrow in the world.
A two year old killed by a train.
A man, nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize four times while on death row, now begging for clemency from 'the Terminator.'
Iraq.
Corrupt and deceitful politicians who will never see a battlefield themselves. Completely detached and distant from the depth of pain and astounding levels of human suffering.
Did you know that whales and dolphins, some of God's most beautiful and peaceful creatures, are dying from the amount of noise pollution being emitted in the oceans from our military and oil exploits???
So much sorrow.
Like a sponge, i soak it up-and just feel it for awhile...for it seems like so few do.

We are killing whales and dolphins with the sounds of our hatred.

Destruction begets destruction, and i am weeping. God, your heart must be breaking.
I look up from where i am sitting and see a bunch of posters lining the windows, advertising events and clubs and such. I see one that is announcing the screening of the movie, "Saved" and then i see that it is being put on by the GSA (gay-straight alliance) of Chabot.
Gaaahhh! How my heart aches within me- Jesus what have we done to your church??? How we are failing the world around us!! There is such desperate need for restoration. For Christians to remember (or learn in the first place) what the HECK you are (and were) about.
The anawim of today's society are the very people that Christians exclude and try to shame.

God is in the piss and dung. -J.D. Salinger

God is in the Castro.
God is in the drug house, the prostitution ring, the porn studio. God is in the tax collector's office, the Magdalena's quarters. He is in every place that is uncomfortable, scary, and putrid. Every place that no "God-fearing" Christian would go.
When you see the homeless man on the street, so filthy that his skin is stained black, do you look into his eyes and see the most beautiful, valuable, PRECIOUS person to the heart of God??
What about the prostitute?
What about the flamboyant gay man?
What about the butch lesbian?
What about the hustler? The beggar? The addict?
Do we recognize the beauty in everyone? Do we see that God is madly in love with each and every person we encounter??