Prayers in a Tornado Washington, Ill

Washington, Ill. 

I sat gripped at my TV watching the replay of a man filming a tornado headed straight for his house--and in the background, you could hear his voice reciting the Lord's Prayer.  One force explodes outward. The power of prayer turns inward and holds us together.  Both were in each other's path.  The man survived to give the filming to CNN. 

But no sooner did the tape stop--then the commentator said, "And now we switch to other news for the day--does birth control cause blindness?"  Really!!!!!  Have we so lost our feeling for the tragic loss of life and the devastation of community that we can switch to birth control?  Annie Dillard has said that we as a people have become like Mohawks losing their fear of the heights where the Spirit soars.  Do we have a feel for the sacred--or is news just news upon news? 

Not to lose the main point--that in the very worst of times, when "the center cannot hold," as Matthew Arnold said in The Second Coming--we find prayer left at the center where the Spirit soars and lifts us above the bitterest of loss.