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God, Spirituality, and the Tsunami

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The December 26th tsunami devastated hundreds of thousands of lives and billions of dollars worth of property. For many of us, it has threatened to undermine the foundations of our spiritual beliefs.

In Madras, India thousands had gathered on a beach to celebrate a Mass in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary when the waves struck. Those who survived had the task of digging the bodies of victims out of the sand. One man fell to his knees and cried out, “Where is God?”

The answer to that question varies. For some, it is cut and dried. Ultra fundamentalists in many religions point to the wrath of God who is punishing us for our sins. According to Pastor Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas, for example, the tsunami was an adumbration of the wrath of God, a harbinger of things to come: that Great Day of Judgment.

We who resonate with power-of-positive-thinking/co-creation-with-God spirituality may gasp and shake our heads at this brutal “victims are being punished for sins” point of view. These two spiritual paths are poles apart in many ways. Yet, the corrective adage for “positive/co-creation” spirituality might well be “those who live in glass houses should not throw stones.” Examine some of those positive/co-creation beliefs and you will often find the dangerous, unloving seeds of blaming-the-victim.

For example, the Sai Baba websites (www.sathyasai.org and www.saibaba.org) are curiously quiet about the tsunami. So are the Abraham site (www.abraham-hicks.com), the Ramtha site (www.ramtha.com), and the Kryon site (www.kryon.com). No pearls of wisdom or comfort have been posted. The spiritual thought that underlies these and many other positive/co-creation sites is illustrated by the following quotes from Sai Baba and Abraham:

Sai Baba has not made a statement about the current tsunami disaster. However, he has written and discussed the topic in the past. For example, in 1992, Sai Baba stated, “Many natural calamities are entirely due to man’s behavior. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, wars, floods and famines and other calamities are the result of grave disorders in Nature. These disorders are traceable to man’s conduct.”

Abraham is a group of nonphysical teachers who channel their message of Joy and Deliberate Creation through Esther Hicks. One of Abraham’s main teachings is: You are a creator; you create with your every thought. You often create by default, for you are getting what you are giving your attention to wanted or unwanted but you know by how it feels if what you are getting (creating) is what you are wanting or if it is not what you are wanting. (Where is your attention focused?)

The key similarity between these views and fundamentalist religious beliefs is that “God” is not at fault, we are. Both leave us grappling with either a tendency to blame the victim (as sinner, as not positive/co-creator enough) or a crippling guilt about how we can be good or positive enough—or a combination of the two. To me, at least, none of these options is spiritually satisfying.

So, how do we answer the question, “Where is God”—or spirituality—in the face of disasters like the Tsunami? First, the question is not new. The psalms of lamentation in the Hebrew bible illustrate this fact. A discussion of German media reactions to the tsunami at Dialog International, a German-American opinion site (http://dialoginternational.typepad.com) reminds us that a similar discussion took place in 1753 when a great earthquake in Lisbon killed more than 60,000. That particular disaster preoccupied Kant, and even registered with the six-year old Goethe who wrote about it in “Dichtung und Wahrheit.”

Religious views of the tsunami have garnered a lot of press in the U.S., too. In “The tsunami and God’s role in it,” San Francisco Chronicle journalist Joan Ryan (www.sfgate.com) interviews various clerics. The comments tread a middle of the road path that strives to comfort the victims, and, at the same time, recognize the power of God:

Islam: Hasem Bazian, a lecturer on Islam at UC Berkeley, quoted the prophet Hadith: “If God loves a servant, he sends tribulation upon him,” echoing the story of Job from the Old Testament and similar parables from other religions. “In Islam,” he stated, “all those who die in a natural catastrophe die in a state of martyrdom. They are not held accountable for their sins in life; they are given passage directly into paradise. For those left behind, he said, a tragedy of this scope is a reminder of God’s power and our own mortality.”

Sikh: Onkar Bindar, a retired professor, is a trustee at a Sikh temple in Sacramento. “Nobody knows what is the reason,” he said. “Nobody can question Him. But it is not random. There is a purpose.”

Catholic/Baptist: Both shared a similar view. Monsignor Harry Schlitt of the San Francisco Roman Catholic Archdiocese stated that there is a purpose and only God knows what it is. He rejects any notion that the purpose is punishment for sins and points out that “once tossed out of Eden, humankind has lived in an imperfect world with evil and earthquakes, pain and grief.” The Rev. Amos Brown of Third Baptist Church in San Francisco said the tsunami is not an expression of God any more than famine or war or street violence. What we should be asking in the wake of any tragedy, “ he states, “ isn’t “Where is God?” but “Where are we?”

Hindu: Chief priest Ananth Subramania-Batter at the Shiva Murugan Temple in Concord said Hindus believe that every person has a predestined date of death. He said the souls of those who died in southern Asia are still alive and will be reborn, perhaps again as a human, perhaps an animal or insect. It depends on the person’s karma, determined by how he or she lived in this life.

A Jewish view was discussed at the Aish HaTorah (AISH), a non-profit, apolitical, international network of Jewish educational centers (www.aish.com). In “The Tsunami and God,” Rabbi Benjamin Blech points out that survivors are already called modern-day Noahs (i.e., the boy who clung for two days to a coconut tree is today’s version of the biblical ark). He rejects, however, the tendency of some to assert their knowledge of divine intent as clearly as if God spoke to them “face-to-face” as He did with Moses. He cautions us to beware of false prophets who find it necessary to defame those who suffer in order to preserve the idea of divine righteousness. He points out that there are many answers to the theological dilemma of why bad things happen to good people including the idea that challenges are opportunities for spiritual growth and the mystical emphasis on the insignificance of events on this earth compared to the quality of the afterlife. Our primary question in the wake of this tragedy, according to Blech, should not be, “Why did it happen?” but rather, “What can I do to help?”

For the Buddhist view, I visited the BeliefNet site (www.beliefnet.com). The question is asked, “Was it Karma?” The answer from Buddhist scholar Robert Thurman is yes. The answer from Rodger Kamenetz , internationally known for his work in Jewish-Buddhist dialogue and author of The Jew in the Lotus, is no. Thurman believes that karma was involved, but cautions about using karma as a way to blame others. Instead he urges the victims to use karma as a way of growing stronger and expiating previous things that they have done to the world that were negative. Kamenetz turns to both Judaism and Buddhism for solace, as he meditates on God’s role in the tsunami tragedy. “I can’t accept the answer suggested by the Buddhist idea of group karma, that whatever happens to a group is somehow the result of a previous action of that group, either in this life or in a previous life,” he states. Instead, Kamenetz sees God in the response, in the human hearts of those who are feeling and responding to this, the families and neighbors of the victims, and the rest of us, the bystanders, and us, too.

Another view is that of the eco-justice ministries. At Eco-Justice Notes, the E-mail Newsletter of Eco-Justice Ministries (www.eco-justice.org/E-041231.asp), Peter Sawtell discusses this viewpoint in his essay, “Earthquake, Tsunami and God.” He points out that an eco-justice perspective gets in the way of simple answers, and calls us into a very difficult place of tension. Eco-justice rejects any simple division between the human and the natural and sees God revealed in the natural order that is affirmed as “good.” In the eco-justice view, the intentions of God, and the workings of nature, are not all about humans. The whole universe is not centered on our experience. The Earth existed long before humans came on the scene, and it will be here long after we’re gone. As we ponder the meaning of this event, we must do so in light of the entire history of this planet, and in the context of the entire web of life.

Personally, it is Kamenetz view that I find most resonant. This view is echoed by Marianne Williamson and Lama Surya Das, author of Awakening the Buddha Within: Tibetan Wisdom for the Modern World.

Williamson, in her essay “Where’s the Miracle in a Tsunami?” (www.mwblog.com/journal/archives/2005/01/wheres_the_mira.php), states that, “With the tsunami, we were suddenly jolted back to our right minds—where the ultimately meaningless preoccupations that normally dominate our lives were pushed to the background where they belong.” She points out that the heartbreak of the tsunami opened our emotional floodgates, as true, authentic compassion became the routine rather than the exceptional response to human suffering. “The tsunami made us get it,” she says. “And in that, there was a gift.”

Lama Surya Das states that it seems uncompassionate to use on the victims of a natural disaster the whip of theories such as the law of karma—a profound concept that is in any case mostly misunderstood, and often misapplied. He points out that, “The historical teacher named Buddha himself said one would have to be omniscient to understand all the interwoven causes, circumstances and conditions at play in any single event.” The main thing, according to Surya, is, “that we learn from experience, and this helps us to wise up and to open our hearts and minds and self-centered grasping, which changes everything, at least for us and those around us.”

And with that learning should come the compassion that allows us to reach out and help others, not only the victims of great tragedies like the tsunami, but also those who need our help and our compassion in our own communities and families.

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Mary Montgomery-Clifford is a certified web author and developer. Her company, Montgomery Media Enterprises ("Freelancing with Finesse!"), specializes in public relations, events, promotions, writing project and web authoring, development and publicity. Ms. Montgomery-Clifford has a Master's Degree in religious studies from Chicago Theological Seminary (CTS) in June 2002 and is working on a Ph.D. with a focus on the new scholarship of Unlimited Love and the Other Regarding Virtues in the Fall of 2002. She is also in the process of completing the Morris Pratt Institute Course on Modern Spiritualism. Contact her via e-mail at Monty764@aol.com, by phone at 773-235-8821 or at her web site at www.montymedia.com.

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