Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from July, 2025

As the Concrete Dries

"It was so confusing. I feel like I wasn't enough to keep him here, you know?" "What would you say to them?" "But, the sparrow still falls." "It will be in the past for the rest of time." "I don't understand... how do people do it? I don't know how." "The concrete is still drying." - I grew up always scared and fascinated by floods. I remember running out of my house and down to the creek to watch as the waters rose from a trickle to a menacing stream. I still have a piece of pavement from the road, in fact. This was when I could watch as water finally reentered my homeland after our long droughts. I couldn't have imagined that one like this would hit my home, though. Children are dead. Parents are dead. Animals are dead. There are still more. Old friends help with rescue efforts. Family helps with clean up. I lay stranded in mind and spirit by the weight of it all. What good is a God that lets a sparrow fall, ...

Revisiting "A Survivor from Warsaw"

On this July 4th, I am disillusioned, like so many others in this country. I am disillusioned by the abductions that are happening all around us and right before our eyes. I am disillusioned by the unwillingness of those in power to fight back against such evil, and moreover, I am disillusioned by those who advocate for this evil. I've tried to think of something to write amidst this, perhaps related to this holiday or the faith that I hold so dear. But, nothing I can write today would compare to the Schoenberg's cantata, "A Survivor from Warsaw." So, in this post, I give you the lyrics of his powerful piece. I encourage you to read them along as you listen to it, and I pray that you and I may fully hear him. - I cannot remember everything. I must have been unconscious most of the time. I remember only the grandiose moment when they all started to sing, as if prearranged, the old prayer they had neglected for so many years - the forgotten creed! But I have no recollec...