Scattered Thoughts on the Killing of a Killer, Redux

In the aftermath of this week, I decided to revisit my thoughts on the killing of Osama bin Laden. My thinking has changed slightly over the past two years, and I have edited a few parts of this post to reflect that.

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On September 11, 2001, I was told of the attacks more than six hours after the fact. Within a year and a half, I was watching my father depart home for the impending war in Iraq. I watched and prayed the night the attack was launched. I welcomed my father back as his unit marched past the memorials dedicated to those who had given their lives for the freedom of another nation. I remember waking up one Sunday morning to hear that Saddam Hussein had been captured and I watched the night they announced his execution.

Nearly two years ago, as I slept before an exam, I was awoken by a text message informing me of the death of Osama bin Laden.

This week, I watched the attack and resulting manhunt in Boston unfold almost in real time. After Newtown, Aurora, and so much violence.

These events are the stories I will tell my children; these trying and terrifying times that have shown the best and worst in humanity are what I will remember, just as my parents remember watching the unfolding of Vietnam, the moon landing, and the assassination of JFK. Just as my grandparents remember the Korean War, VJ and VE Days, D-Day, and Pearl Harbor.

Unfortunately, I must recognize that the death of Osama bin Laden will not bring a sudden end to the fighting in Afghanistan. Killing and capturing the perpetrators of the the Boston attacks will not end the cycles of violence that led to such bloodshed, panic, and chaos.

These events are not our V Days.

In light of this, how do we respond to a death? A human death, even if it was that of a man committed to violence and the triumph of Chaos. Surely, it will bring some closure to those who have lost loved ones in the attacks perpetrated by al Qaeda and the war in Afghanistan. The survivors of the Boston Marathon bombing are undoubtedly comforted; surely, all of Boston is able to sleep a little easier tonight -- if only slightly. For this, we can be grateful, and we can pray with those who still, and will always, mourn. May they find peace.

But even more assuredly, the loss of human life is tragic.

Poets often say best what needs to be said, and so I turn to the great English priest and poet, John Donne, as quoted by my friend Josh:
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.

 And now, let us turn to the Good News, that the the glorious Resurrection, of Christ our Lord, Jesus of Nazareth, will bring us all the closure that we so desperately need in the that eternal Kingdom where violence has no place. Hear the Gospel, as preached by Donne:
Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so.
For those, whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy picture be,
Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.
Thou'rt slave to Fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,
And better than thy stroke why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And Death shall be no more. Death, thou shalt die.

Kyrie eleison.
Forgive us all, for we know not what we do.
Lord of Peace, remember us as you come into your Kingdom.

Rock on.

Eschatology in Les Mis

Some time ago, I was fortunate enough to see Les Misérables at the Fox Theater. As wonderful as the theater (an old movie palace done up in a breath-taking Arabesque style) is, as amazing as the set design was, and as moving as the performance itself was, there is one thing that I cannot shake: the finale.

As the story draws to a close, we are shown a dying Jean ValJean as he is led to Heaven by Fantine and Éponine as all of the characters who died over the course of the narrative return to the stage to sing once more, "Do you hear the people sing?

This time, though, the lyrics are not about a political revolution. Instead, they sing of a world "beyond the barricade" where "the wretched of the earth" will find a "flame that never dies." It was one of the most beautiful moments I have ever seen on stage.

Taken in and of itself, this scene is a unique presentation of the eschatological hope in the Peaceable Kingdom. What makes the scene so moving, though, is just how awful the events leading up to it had been; Les Mis follows only behind the works of Shakespeare and the Greek tragedians in killing off as many characters in as many heart-wrenching ways as possible. Much like the early Church's expectation of Christ's imminent parousia in the context of Roman persecution, the events of the student revolution leave little hope for a happy ending. And yet we hear the people sing, though they are lost in the valley of the night. Their voices ascend as they are climbing to the light.

The darkest night will end.
Amen.

Rock on.

Danse Macabre and the Beauty of the Resurrection

When I lived in Germany, my parents took me to some of the most famous cathedrals of western Europe - Notre-Dame de Paris, Koelner Dom, and St. Peter's Basilica to name a few. Many of the late gothic cathedrals featured scenes of the final judgment above the doors, and skulls and skeletons were common inside the sanctuary. It was this dark imagery that kept my elementary-schooler self entertained (it was also at this point that I loved Vincent van Gogh because he cut off his ear). I can proudly say that I now find the beauty of these cathedrals outside of their grotesque nature, but the scenes have stayed with me over the past ten to fourteen years.

One of the more interesting things about both judgment scenes ad the medieval "danse macabre" is its reflection of the basic aspect of life: All are alike in death. Kings, bishops, and peasants - all will die. The lifecycle - birth and death - is perhaps the one thing that unites all of humanity. It is the one thing that you cannot forget. God tells Ezekiel to go before the King of Tyre and say,

Will you then say, 'I am a god,'
in the presence of those who will kill you?
You will be but a man, not a god,
in the hands of those who slay you. - Ezekiel 28:9*

No matter how important you are, no matter what you do, you will die. It is part of being human. No matter how famous or plain you are, you are still all too human.

It is in this, the most basic aspect of life, then, that we see something truly extraordinary in the person of Christ - something that allows him to, in the hands of those who slay him, say "I am." As a man, Jesus both was born and died, but not under normal circumstances, for Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit, thereby born of a virgin, and was resurrected from the dead. And it is in these two exceptional claims that we see something interesting about Christ - he is most obviously human, if he can be born and killed, but he is so much more. The biological laws, in the end, fail to constrain his divinity.

And it is by clinging to the risen Christ, Son of the Living God, that when it comes time for us to dance with Death, that we can go willingly and secure in the faith that we to will be risen by the One who beat Death. It is by accepting Christ's victory over the physical that Death no longer becomes an end to be feared, but instead is a beginning to be embraced. It is security in the goodness of God that allows us to celebrate at a funeral. it is the knowledge that a better world is on the other side that gives us the courage to follow the example of our Lord and willingly lay down our lives for those around us.

But most of all, it is this very trait that separates Christ from the rest of us, but that allows us to draw close to him.

Rock on.

*Perhaps it is a sign of my short attention span and tendency to ramble, but this post was inspired by reading Ezekiel 27 and 28.

Photo: From Hans Holbein the Younger's woodcut series The Dance of Death. Retrieved on Wikimedia Commons.