In the Face of Disaster

Today's events are staggeringly awful. The violence of those energies unleashed underneath Japan will continue to devastate lives for many years whilst we, hopefully, are merely overwhelmed by images and stories that have the power to threaten only our notions of security. The lives, families, homes and work places of those directly affected are imperilled. For the rest of us, watching, we are forced to confront the tenuous illusion of permanence we afford our own daily affairs, our own loved-ones.

But despite all this, I cannot help being heartened. Natural disasters like this strike with little warning and devastating consequences. But the response, the wave of compassion that travels all over the world, is perhaps even more awe-inspiring and should reassure us that nothing, not even something as awful as this, is wholly bad.

Resources are dispatched; organisations are mobilised; the brain power of scientist and engineers are employed; governments and charities race to assist. Suddenly, and with great resolve, our own mighty forces of help and healing are unleashed. It's an amazing thing, proof of the achievements our civilisation is capable of when shocked into action.

It's a stark contrast to how we approach the slow-burning man-made calamities of poverty, preventable diseases, war, tyranny and ecological threats, all of which blight generations of lives but somehow seem less shocking to us, simply because they are ongoing.

That is for tomorrow. Today we again we find ourselves shown how small our world is, how connected and interdependent our communities are.