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LESSONS FROM KATRINA
John T. Crestwell, Jr.
October 16th , 2005

Sharon does not mind me saying that she is not  here today because she is recovering from a Tubal Ligation.  For those of you who are not familiar, this means the Crestwell’s won’t be having any more babies (Amen).   I love children but as they say, “Three’s enough!”   Now, some of you are going to tease me and say, “Why didn’t you go in, it’s much easier for men…”  All I can say is, “I don’t want to go there—okay?”

The new procedure is amazing because they go in through your navel and there is no scar just some soreness.   Medical science is advancing at a rapid pace indeed!  Our choice to cut the reproductive process is a classic example of an instance when humans DO have control over a situation.  This is also another case where science helps to control a natural process that would wind up producing child after child after child in a normal situation…  There are some things we can control and other things that scientific genius helps us to control.

But in many, many other instances, we are at the mercy of Gaia—Mother Earth.  I remember saying to a friend, “There is certain randomness in life.  You know, stuff happens” (I didn’t say stuff to him-- Amen).  He didn’t like that.  He said to me, “John, something has to be in control.  Something has to watch us. Something has to protect us.”

This is a long term theological debate.  I’ve mentioned the term before, “theodicy” – God’s justice.  God is in control.  God watches over me and helps me overcome the bad times…  And no matter how bad things get, God will have the last word because “unmerited suffering is redemptive” in the end.  When it’s all said and done, God’s “justice will roll down like waters and God’s righteousness will flow like a mighty stream!”  This is powerful stuff when you believe it.  It carries many of us through some very difficult mountains in life.

Except when really, really bad things happen and we don’t know where God is.  Heaven is silent.  Those of you who are theists might cry out in fear, “Why hast thou forsaken me!”  “Where are you God?”

There are millions in the world asking these very questions and millions in America too after Hurricane Katrina.  She hit as a category 5 and wreaked havoc upon the earth.  Of course she formed because of many factors, wind, hot air, cold air, etc… She formed without an agenda.  She formed the way a fetus forms, the way a flower blooms, the way suns in the universe evolve.  Katrina was nothing more than the elements and in a morbidly beautiful kind of way she came together and without an agenda began to teach humanity many lessons.  Well, I know I learned from her.  She spoke to me from the earth, sea and sky and spoke to me as a god speaking from the heavens.  I want to share a few of her lessons with you…

Katrina Lesson 1—YOU ARE NOT IN CONTROL

As much as we can control a few things on this earth, humans are not in control.  This is why our ancient forbears, Homo erectus, the Homo sapiens and the Homo sapiens sapiens would eventually, as they evolved, create mythologies about God or the gods to help them grapple with this insecurity of not being in control.   This is why we build houses to protect us from the elements—including other humans.  And we seem to hoard resources.  It is our very primitive fear of having a lack of control you see!  So we struggle in this life to find and hold on to things that give us meaning; and for some, we believe things that may not be accurate because reality is scary and so we create terms like “theodicy” (which may or may not be true—I don’t know) but we create them basically so we can sleep at night and function during the day.  For if life were random how would we live?  That’s another sermon…

Katrina Lesson 2—WE ARE NOT MASTERS OF THE EARTH

Black Elk and Daniel Quinn in his book Ishmael said it best, “Humans are not master of the earth; the earth is our master (repeat).  Somewhere in this evolutionary process we forgot this.  Could our highly developed consciousness really have us believe that we have dominion over all?  Do we really believe this?  The fact is, if we destroy the very environment we live in and cannot breathe this air we breathe right now, or if we blow each other up with bombs because we are acting out an eschatological (end times) mythology from ancient books, then guess what?  The earth will still be here.  As long as the sun shines, the earth will be here.  But the earth does not need human beings to survive.  Human beings need the earth to survive.  So you tell me, who is the master?

Could it be that we as humans have very big egos in thinking we are the be all and end all of existence?

Katrina Lesson 3-- I AM A STONE’S THROW FROM HAVING NOTHING

I sort of already knew this because I look at my checkbook every week (hello).  Katrina devastated the rich and poor.  Although we saw many, many poor affected, the storm was no respecter of persons.  Folk with wealth, lost all they had –although they will replace it.  The picture in my mind here are the images of all the people.  Just a week prior many of these folk were drinking latte’s, reading the Wall Street Journal, shopping at the mall, driving fancy cars, living the life; and a week later they are in shock as they sit on the wreckage of their homes, picking through the pieces.  And some well-off folk looted too it wasn’t just the poor (say Amen Chalice).  You know something? WE ARE ALL just like they are, whether the victims were Black, White, Hispanic or Asian.  We are all a catastrophe away from being homeless.  That’s scary and I don’t mean to scare you this morning but it is true.  And so as it is said, “There go I but for the grace of God”, but you could also say, “There go I but by the luck of the draw”.  And so, if life is that fleeting and random somehow we need to get our priorities as a country together which brings me to lesson 4.

Katrina Lesson 4-- THE PRIORITIES OF THIS NATION ARE SCREWED UP

I know you will agree with me when I say that this country let us all down during the aftermath of Katrina.  Perhaps it is our fault for putting our hope of safety and security in the Governments hands?  But to me, it seemed we can get to Iraq much faster than we got to New Orleans.  Correct me if I am wrong but didn’t it seem like people suffered way to long before local and federal help arrived?   Did you not feel as if you were watching the news of another country?  I said to myself: “This can’t be America?”  This could not be our country that has spent billions in Homeland Security to make us REALLL safe!  You know, I’ve got a funny story… I called the Prince George’s County Homeland Security Office for my radio show before the Hurricane and don’t you know no one answered the phone and the voicemail said, “This voicemail has not been set up.”  That tells the entire story!!  The Homeland Security in this country “has not been set up” effectively either.  Something is wrong in this nation when it comes to prioritizing people over products; it always seems to me the product comes first.  But Louis Farrakhan said it well at the Millions More Movement Saturday….  That in our constitution, it says that if the government leaders are not implementing laws and systems that are “for the people and by the people”—things that lift people up, then as a US citizen, we have the right to replace the incompetent folk—remove them from office and place new leaders in charge who represent the will of the people”.  It’s right there in the constitution.  Go read it. Easier said than done….  But this moves me to Katrina lesson #5.

THE ONLY THING I CAN CONTROL ARE MY HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS!

I could spend my life trying to gather as many goodies as I can; to get the most toys; work tirelessly to have the most money hoping that all of this will make me feel in control and safe.  I could spend time raping the earth of its natural vitality for personal wealth not knowing how this could affect my children’s ability to live on this planet in the future.  I could be a busy little bee, working Monday through Friday so I can find or purchase things to hold on to.  Things that give me meaning and purpose.  All of this comes and goes… 

But what does not come and go is my “sameness” with other human beings.  As long as there are humans a part of me lives…  When I see you, I see myself.   If I know myself at the core of who I am—If I am honest with myself, I know I am as virtuous and vicious as the next person…  I’m not better than you.  But, if I know myself, then I know all human beings.  We all want the same things out of life basically.  And if I know this then I can create something much more lasting than a material possession.  I can create mutuality in the human spirit that will live on long after I’m gone.  I can create a just society that my children will benefit from. 

Look at the billions raised for the victims of Katrina.  People from the president to a pauper for once, saw human beings—not as Black or White but as suffering people.  We saw ourselves didn’t we—a stone’s throw away from where they were...  And we realized we could not say that we were “blessed” because that was the wrong word, implying that others are cursed. No, no.  WE SAW OURSELVES.  Amen to that.  Thank you Katrina for helping us to see ourselves!  Life victimizes all at some point!  But we share that mutuality with others and it is because of that, that I know that Mother Earth, not human beings, teaches the ultimate lessons of sharing and caring.   She sends the rain and the winds and the fires and all the elements and they remind us that life is short!  Why am I not living today?  Why am I not doing something significant for others?  Why am I wasting time hating, hoarding resources, fighting wars, dropping bombs on people, religiously persecuting folk; hating people because of their sexuality? Why am I wasting time Mother Earth, allowing poverty and mis-education to exist?  If all I have are my human relationships and “we are all connected in mystery and miracle to each other” then why am I wasting time Mother Earth listening to the profits in my pocket and not the prophets you send generation after generation who show us how to make straight the path for justice?  Why are we not listening?  Mother Earth teach me! 

Gaia “teach me stillness as the grasses are stilled with light.  Earth teach me caring as parents who secure their young.  Earth teach me limitation as the ant which crawls on the ground.  Earth teach me resignation as the leaves which die in the fall.  Mother Earth, teach me to forget myself as melted snow forgets its life.”  

All I can do and be is tied up in what I can do for others!  And I know this if I know myself!  DO YOU KNOW YOURSELF?

“We did not weave the web of life; we are merely a strand in it” and so let us find a way to harmoniously blend, knowing that we are a part of the interdependent web of all existence.  We are not masters of the earth, the earth is our master!  Might we learn once and for all from Katrina that we are tied inextricably in a single garment of destiny and what affects one, affects all!  Dr. King thank you for those words…

Maybe I’m crazy.  Maybe I’m a dreamer…  But I really, really believe that the peace human beings want can be had.   But the peace we want must be the peace we create!  And so, I believe in the Beloved Community, I believe we can create, as Jack Johnson, County Executive says, “Livable Communities” for all.  I believe it in the depths of my soul and that’s why I’m not afraid to say that if we don’t change the story of how human beings are perceived we cannot change reality.  At present the human is seen historically as evil, destructive, God forsaken, and above nature.  This is wrong.  As we know there are two natures— I am both virtuous and vicious, but I choose each day which path I will serve.  It’s my choice.  And if I have a choice I can become more virtuous than vicious, if I really work at it! 

We cannot put an end to the catastrophes that will come.  Death and destruction will always be with us—as it is a part of the web, but humans being inhumane to one another, this I believe we can overcome!  We have been given a gift of higher consciousness and let this gift be used as a way to lift people up and not tear them down.  Let it be used to find ways to “study war no more.”  Let our great minds be gifts and not curses.  We have the power.  But it will start when we change the mythological construction of this system that says humans are bad biologically and above other species.  Our consciousness may be higher but our destiny is the same as Gaia.   We’ve got to wake up and see that WE ARE NATURE!  Nature is not “out there” or “over there” it is right here, in this place, all around us. Nature is me; it is you; it is all that is within Mother Earth.  You can call that the Spirit of God if you wish but whatever you want to conceptualize it as, know that you are a product of it.  You are a “spark in nature’s burning.”

And so, let us be a shelter for each other because “In every life a day will come beneath an angry sky, the earthly things we build will fall and we will question why. Then heaven whispers in our hearts and we are moved to see our neighbor has become a friend and friends a family.  Love can build a house that stands forever, stronger than a wall of steel or stone.    We will be a shelter for each other in the storm, and when we come together, we’ll be home.”

AMEN.

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