October 9, 2013 WBAS Topics Prayer, WBAS Cat Prayers & Reflections, REL Topic- Virtues/Values, REL Asset - Prayer Card
By: Kathy Hendricks
I caught just a single line wafting out of the radio – something about God weeping at the unkindness of ravens. It stopped me in my tracks. The ravens in our neighborhood seem all the more prevalent now that their more delicate cousins have flown southward. Their caterwauling pierces the quiet that usually surrounds our homes, and clusters of them picking apart roadkill fly away just slightly ahead of oncoming cars. Earlier this summer I was on the lookout for them as they chased away smaller birds from a feeder hanging outside an upstairs window. Categorizing them as unkind is an understatement.
Perhaps the song caught my attention because it also seems to describe the ravenous nature of humankind. These days, that dark side is on display far too often. Incivility has risen to new levels as political compromise and honest debate fade into oblivion. The hideous comments posted to news articles and denigration of public figures could qualify as an Olympic sport. Fear of one another results in the stockpiling of guns, and demonizing the poor for their own fate draws adulation for both pundits and politicians. It is more than enough to make God weep.
This isn’t the whole of humanity, however, and I am trying to keep that in mind. It helps, then, to read about someone who was the soul of kindness. Pope John XXIII, whose feast day (October 11) falls on the same date as my wedding anniversary, is often referred to as “the Good Pope.” It is a testament to his affable nature and his generous heart. Anecdotes about him abound, including how he snuck out of the Vatican at night to walk around the streets of Rome. He visited sick children in the hospital and embraced those in reformatory school with loving acceptance. His famous “moonlight speech” on the opening night of the Second Vatican Council was delivered impromptu from his apartment window to the crowds below. He told them to go home and hug and kiss their children.
At our best, we humans do what Good Pope John advised all those years ago: “And so, let us continue to love each other, to look out for each other along the way: to welcome whoever comes close to us, and set aside whatever difficulty it might bring.” If ever there were words to make God smile, it would be those. So, I am on the lookout today, not for ravenous behavior but for the small and random acts of kindness that do prevail among us. I think it’s what the smiling Pope would do as well.
Bright Ideas
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Learn more about the life of Pope John XXIII and download activities for your class or family.
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Download my Prayer for a Soul of Kindness and share it in your parish or home.