Friends,
The events of the last week have been challenging ones for Old South. Although Boston was spared the worst effects of Hurricane Sandy, our building was damaged by high winds and our magnificent multi-colored roof lost some of its slate. Thankfully, no one was hurt, and the damage can be measured in mere dollars.
The same cannot be said for New York, New Jersey, and other parts of New England. For them, Sandy proved to be a terrifically destructive storm, causing loss of life and property destruction that is still increasing. Sandy: a hurricane that combined with other powerful storm cells, new names have had to be invented to describe what occurred on Monday the 29th;Frankenstorm, Superstorm and others. Sandy dropped amounts of water in New York City and New Jersey that would have been unthinkable to our great-grandparents’ generation. Sandy seems to me to be the most recent reminder of the immediate and destructive effects of global climate change. Just as Hurricane Katrina’s ferocity took people by surprise, Sandy has taken us by surprise and it is once again time for our society as a whole to rethink how we prepare for and respond to weather disasters.
What is the church’s role in that response? I believe our response must be twofold: generosity and faithfulness.
Compassion for our neighbors is a bedrock value of Christianity and so we are called by our faith to be generous in the face of the suffering of our neighbors. Exactly how Old South should respond to Sandy is a decision properly made by our membership, and a great place to start that conversation is with the Christian Service and Outreach Committee. Ruth Ricker is the chair of the Christian Service and Outreach Committee and I provide staff support for that committee. There are some established ways we respond to disasters like Sandy (special offerings at Sunday worship, gifting a portion of our operating budget, holding special events and others). I invite you all to think widely and creatively about ways that Old South might respond—it is by the ideas and passions of our members that a Congregational Church like Old South acts in the world.
I also believe that the church is called to faithfulness. If Sandy’s destructiveness was increased by global climate change, as it seems it was, then Sandy will not be the last of its kind. There is a natural tendency for our attention to jump from one disaster to the next; with each new record-breaking storm we risk forgetting the last record-breaking storm. As Christians we are called to faithfulness, to keeping faith with those whose suffering is no longer foremost in peoples’ minds. Following the destruction in New Orleans wrought by hurricane Katrina, Old South began a many years-long effort to rebuild, culminating in our effort this year to entirely rebuild one family’s home. The personal relationships we build with those affected is a critical part of how we as Christians provide compassion to victims of disaster. These relationships take years and provide ample blessing for both our congregation and those we serve. Because of our continued faithfulness to New Orleans, we can confidently begin a relationship with those influenced by Sandy. What we do as a church is much more than sending a check. Disaster relief is serious, years-long work. So it is precisely when a new disaster has struck that we must resist the urge to disconnect from other long-term relief work.
Blessings in the name of God, our shelter in the stormy blast.