PASTOR DAVE’S MUSINGS FROM THE HEARTLAND

January 10, 2024

SINGERS OF LIFE

Saturday, January 8^th, the nation was enthralled by the shooting that took place in front of the Safeway store in Tucson, Arizona at a public meeting being held by Representative Gabrielle Giffords.  At first it was reported that the representative had died.  The new information emerged that she was in surgery in critical condition.  Slowly the details of incident began to become clearer: six dead and thirteen wounded.

Saturday and Sunday were devoted to discovering who had perpetrated the heinous act.  Had he acted alone?  What motivated him?  What information was there about his background and previous history?

Wednesday evening there was a public service which was held at the University of Arizona.  The focus had moved from the shooter to the victims and their families.  The audience was made up of a few of the victims, the families and friends of those who had been shot, the men and women who had responded so quickly to the emergency, public officials, citizens, and students and faculty of the university.  What had been advertised as a memorial service at times seemed to some to be a pep rally.  By all accounts it was a wonderful celebration of the lives of those who had died and of those who so courageously rose to the situation.

The service Wednesday brought to mind an incident that Loren Eisley describes in his book The Immense Journey.  He had fallen asleep against a stump near the edge of a glade.  He is awoken by a commotion taking place in the clearing.  A raven has snatched a nestling from its nest.  What had awoken Eiseley was the crises of the distressed parents.

Slowly the birds of the forest gathered, joining with the parents in their grief.  None dare approach the black bird of death that still held the nestling in its beak.  It was then that Eiseley had an experience of a lifetime.

“The sighing died.  It was then I saw the judgment.  It was the judgment of life against death.  I will never see it again so forcefully presented.  I will never hear it again in notes so tragically prolonged.  For in the midst of protest, they forgot the violence.”

“There, in that clearing, the crystal note of a sparrow lifted hesitantly in the hush.  And finally, after painful fluttering, another took the song, and then another, the song passing from one bird to another, doubtfully at first, as though some evil thing were being slowly forgotten.”

“Till suddenly they took heart and sang from many throats joyously together as birds are known to sing.  They sang because life is sweet and sunlight beautiful.  They sang under the brooking shadow of the raven.  In simple truth they had forgotten the raven, for they were the singers of life, and not of death.”

(This article was originally published January 23, 2011.  Comments may be sent to davidh15503@embarqmail.com.)