In Mathew 16:3, Jesus rebukes the Pharisees and Sadducees for being able to predict the weather by reading the skies but missing the “signs of the times.”

Looking at today’s times, we might see:

• • The neck-gaiter mask worn by ICE agents as a sign of national injustice
  • Workers using black duct tape to cover up directory listings for the US Agency for International Development (USAID) offices as a sign of our lack of national compassion
  • Workers carving the name “Trump” into the façade of the Kennedy Performing Arts Center as a sign of attempted mind control over the arts, the medium intended to challenge us to think and feel in new ways
  • Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, in a blue bunny hat and proudly wearing his Spiderman backpack while he waits to be carted away by an ICE agent as a sign of unmatched official cruelty in the name of our government
  • Truth Social posts about the threatened barbaric fate of Iranian civilization as a sign of the depraved depths to which we have sunk in our inhumane rhetoric and thought about our brothers and sisters
  • Thousands this past Sunday, waving American flags and wearing scriptural-themed tee-shirts at the National Mall Rededication of America to Christianity, as a sign of religion and faith being perverted to support agendas of intolerance and division
  • And then just yesterday, a mass murder scene of police cars, crime tape, and crying families and friends at a place of worship—this time a mosque, though in the past synagogues and churches—as a sign of the latent hatred and racism in our body politic being vomited forth once again

I am optimistic, but not naïve. Only by persevering can we bring hope from despair and light from darkness. In a few short months, we will have an opportunity to demonstrate what we value when we vote in the mid-term elections. We can use the ballot box decisively to reassert that we are a society that believes in truth, compassion, tolerance, and respect for each person, even as we do the admittedly difficult work of seeking the common good.

In today’s world, it is all too easy to get distracted, and it is tempting to retreat. That is the greatest danger – that we will shrink from the effort to turn things around in the face of the power of an unleashed state apparatus with no conscience and the lure of so many other glittering things: our devices with their endless entertainment options, our social media posts of the “good” life, our sports obsessions, our fascination with the rich and the famous, and our pursuit of outsized personal wealth and economic leverage.

Then it will be much too late, and the effort to return to those values which ennoble each of us and our common life together will be enormous. Already, too much damage has been done to our collective conscience and our vision of becoming a better version of ourselves.

On the eve of our 250th anniversary as a nation, we must remember that liberty is not an opportunity to do as we will but as we ought.

The First Letter of Peter (3:15) instructs us wisely:

“Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope, but do it with gentleness and reverence, keeping your conscience clear, so that, when you are maligned, those who defame your good conduct in Christ may themselves be put to shame.”

In this light, as The Weekly Word takes a summer break from its every-Tuesday publishing schedule until immediately after Labor Day, we ask you to write to us with your thoughts. Tell us what signs you see – promising and hopeful; despairing and dark.

Tell us what you think needs to be done. Tell us how you find hope and sustenance. 

As your comments arrive, we will compile, synthesize, and share. We must feed each other in the model of Jesus, the prophets, and the wise men and women of our faith traditions.

For Summer Prayer, we offer this “Non-Traditional Blessing”. Online research indicates that it is known by different names and that its authorship is uncertain.  The one that seems most likely is below, and the most likely author is a humble Benedictine nun, Sister Ruth Maples Fox. Reportedly, she wrote this in 1985 for a student group. Sister died in 2023.

A Non-Traditional Blessing

MAY GOD BLESS YOU with discomfort,
at easy answers, half-truths,
and superficial relationships
so that you may live
deep within your heart.

MAY GOD BLESS YOU with anger
at injustice, oppression,
and exploitation of people,
so that you may work for
justice, freedom and peace.

MAY GOD BLESS YOU with tears,
to shed for those who suffer pain,
rejection, hunger, and war,
so that you may reach out your hand
to comfort them and
to turn their pain to joy.

AND MAY GOD BLESS YOU with enough foolishness
to believe that you can
make a difference in the world,
so that you can do
what others claim cannot be done,
to bring justice and kindness
to all our children and the poor.

Amen

[i] Pope John XXIII’s 1961 Encyclical Mater et Magistra (Mother and Teacher) popularized this term.  An accompanying concept also emerged in Catholic Social Thought known as “See, Judge, Act.”  Both concepts, however, date farther back than the Pope’s Encyclical.  Taken together and in brief, after reading the signs of the times a faith-filled person is then compelled to judge what may be warranted by the circumstances and next act on that discernment.

Tom Dwyer is the President and Executive Director of A Faith That Does Justice. He writes and speaks frequently about the imperatives of faith-filled social justice in building the common good and guiding our responses to political questions.