Lent 3c = GOE Set 5

And I don't like it.

Set 5, if you will recall, was the Theory and Practice of Ministry section with the 32 year-old hospice patient wondering if she had enough faith. The stories of destruction in 1 Corinthians and Luke's gospel are eerily familiar. What is the cause of calamity on earth. Why do bad things happen?

I know these are questions I'm going to have to answer. I know, however, that these are questions that I am struggling with presently. These are questions, which much like my answer to the cancer patient, I'm not 100% happy with. I don't like Paul's answer; that the people of Moses' generation were an example. I don't really like Jesus' answer; that you must repent or perish because it sounds like a) if I repent I won't parish and b) death is punishment for specific actions.

I know that the wages of sin is death. I know that death wasn't in the plan from the get-go. But I guess, I'm more of the mind that death is the result of Sin; that corporate entity that is inherent in all human systems since the fall rather than sins; those things which 'from time to time we most grievously have committed.' Still, this all sounds like my answer to the woman in tears, which my GOE readers most certainly didn't like. Maybe I'll have to change the answer I give others, but for me, this is what works.