Regarding the latest earthquake in Anatolia, which is neither the first nor the last

I remember… memories can be acts, dreams, illusions engraved in the human memory, and triggering in us emotions, sensations, crises… grooved with sorrows, nostalgia, joys…

I was young… everyone starts out small. Even Jesus was small, a baby in the manger cherished by the Virgin Mary and his earthly father Joseph. This is Him, the Redeemer, the Savior of the world, the Light of the Spirit, the eternal Source of Life, Justice, and Truth. When we were young, we were enchanted by stories about our planet Earth.

We were told that our planet is alive, its age calculated in billions of years (around 4.6), and is considered as a speck of dust on the edge of our galaxy, the Milky Way – a galaxy containing billions of stars, nebulae – and in the universe, there are billions of galaxies. What can be said of intergalactic spaces, a more complex concept for our little childish minds, where there is the visible observable universe and the unknown invisible one!

And that in many existing mythologies – Greek, Roman, Phoenician, African, Indian… It’s Hera, the Roman Juno, wife of Zeus, the Roman Jupiter, who, while breastfeeding, had a stream of milk come out of her breast and spread across the cosmos, forming the Milky Way…

So many stories! For children and future academics, researchers, scholars, creators, artists, poets, and so on…

We are also told that the planet is trembling and that earthquakes have immense power, destroying entire cities and leaving victims, misfortunes, and tears. That we cannot predict in advance, neither the location, the date, or the strength of an earthquake. And that in Lebanon, throughout different historical periods, there have been several earthquakes, in 1550 destroying Beirut completely, and in the Beqaa, in the South, etc…

We grew up and even got older, but the cases remain the same: earthquakes, tsunamis, wars, explosions, bombings, terrorism, the deaths of children under bombardment in Cana, Lebanon, the events of September 11th, France, Spain, Lebanon, the deadly explosion at the port of Beirut… and many others. All these events can paralyze me, and stir emotions in me for days. By nature, I experience each event as if it were in my own home, my own neighborhood, and it upsets me.

Recently, the earthquake in Turkey-Syria deeply shook me, as if I were one of its victims myself.

I sat in front of the TV screen, living among the unfortunate people who were anguished, wounded, and buried by the thousands. I eagerly awaited the brave and courageous volunteers who, through their heroic interventions, managed to save children from the rubble, with the help of dogs with a keen sense of smell. I prayed to God and the Holy Virgin for miracles. Buildings with all their occupants crushed under the debris, from time to time, an unharmed baby, an old person, or an anonymous individual was rescued, and it was cries of joy that erupted among the crowd gathered in that breathtaking cold. I love helping poor people, the unfortunate ones; I consider them as lost brothers, crushed by falling stones, unable to think about their sad fate, and killed in mere seconds, while many others suffered a long agony in the cold darkness. Humans were swept away and carried off by a mass of concrete, becoming dust before being able to cry for help. Many couldn’t even repent, or ask for forgiveness or divine mercy.

God! Give Justice and Mercy, even for sinners, even for our own enemies. In our interactions, the currency of love must be paid against hate and resentment. We must see events differently and say with Einstein, “God does not play dice” in this divine and immense creation. Earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, etc…. are part of the grand vastness of Creation. I will say, “Thy Will be done, my God,” and let love, our only love, replace hate, vengeance, terrorism, crime, massacres, discrimination, horror… let goodness, beauty, charity, justice, forgiveness… spread among humans.

Joseph Matar 2023
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