Magazine letter for March 2023
The earthquake in Turkey and North Syria has stopped us in our tracks. So many of the worries and concerns we have suddenly seem so small in comparison to the plight of the many people who have lost everything and who just don’t know where to start to bury their dead, let alone begin the process of rebuilding their lives.
It has been heart warming to see the response of rescue workers and medical teams from around the world, risking life and limb to save as many of the survivors as could be saved. On the other hand, it is sad to see that many of the buildings were substandard due to corruption in the enforcement of construction regulations. The news that criminals are setting up websites collecting money for non-existent earthquake relief charities is shocking, though it shouldn’t be a surprise.
People have a wide dichotomy of responses to human tragedy. Some see it as an opportunity to help, others an opportunity to profit. I am sure it was ever thus.
Doing the right thing has been our challenge since human beings first began to exist; virtually every culture that has ever been has understood that the standard for behaviour is the Golden Rule, ‘don’t do to others what you do not want them to do to you.’
Good though the Golden Rule is it was not good enough for Jesus; for him, refraining from harming another was only half as far as we should go. “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.” (Matt 7.12). Instead of thinking, how can I avoid being hurtful, we must ask, what would I want someone to do for me? That is so difficult that we don’t often manage to put it into practice. But when we do, like those rescuers and medics, then in some way, big or small, lives are changed, hopes are renewed, and we are all the happier for it.
If the Golden Rule requires us to think beyond our own self-interest, then Jesus’ version requires a much deeper readiness to personal sacrifice. But just imagine a world where more people made that kind of sacrifice more often.
William