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Tragedy, Contingency, and a Deeper Sense of God

All of the tragedies that I recount here are but dramatic examples of a general truth about the nature of things, a truth that we all know in our bones but that we choose, typically, to cover-up or overlook.

Passengers from the cruise ship Grand Princess arriving with protective face masks are seen on the tarmac at Oakland International Airport in California March 11, 2020. (CNS photo/Kate Munsch, Reuters)

I have lived in Santa Barbara, California for the past four years. In that brief time, my neighbors and I have experienced a number of real tragedies. Just over two years ago, the terrible Thomas Fire broke out in my pastoral region, in the vicinity of Thomas Aquinas College (hence the name). For a frightening month it made its devastating way from Santa Paula through Ventura, Carpenteria, Montecito, and eventually commenced to devour the foliage on the hills just north of my home. As I was standing one Saturday morning on my front lawn, staring uneasily at the flames, a retired fire captain stopped his car and yelled out the window, “Bishop, what are you still doing here? Embers are flying everywhere; this whole neighborhood could go up.”

We were all relieved when, just days later, rains finally came and doused the flames. But that welcome rain became, in short compass, a deluge, prompting a mudslide in the fire-ravaged hills above Montecito. Twenty-five people were swept to their deaths. In November of that same year, 2018, a disturbed man walked into a crowded restaurant and bar called the Borderline, located in Thousand Oaks, in the far eastern end of my pastoral region. He opened fire at random and killed thirteen people, including a brave police officer who tried to stop him. On Labor Day this past September, thirty-five people, sleeping below-decks in a diving boat moored just off the coast of Santa Barbara, were burned to death as fire roared through their cramped quarters.

I have thought of all of these tragedies as we Santa Barbarans, along with the entire country, are dealing now with the coronavirus crisis. I think it is fair to say that, at the turn of the year, no one saw this coming. No one would have predicted that tens of thousands would be infected by a dangerous pathogen, that thousands would die, that we would be shut in our homes, that the economy would go into meltdown. What seemed just a short time ago a fairly stable state of affairs medically, politically, and economically has been turned upside down.

Now, I don’t rehearse all of this negativity to depress you! I do so to make a theological point.

All of the tragedies that I’ve recounted are but dramatic examples of a general truth about the nature of things, a truth that we all know in our bones but that we choose, typically, to cover-up or overlook. I’m talking about the radical contingencyof the world, to give it its properly philosophical designation. This means, to state it simply, that everything in our experience is unstable; it comes into being and its passes out of being. Think of every plant, every animal, every insect, every cloud, indeed of every mountain, planet, or solar system, if we allow for a sufficient passage of time: they all come to be and will eventually fade away. And though we habitually divert ourselves from accepting it, this contingency principle applies to each of us. Whenever we get really sick, or a good friend dies, or a weird virus threatens the general population, this truth manages to break through our defenses. Teilhard de Chardin, a theologian-scientist from the last century, said that he acquired a keen sense of his own mortality when, as a boy of three, he saw a lock of his newly cut hair fall into fire and burn up in a split second.

Why shouldn’t this perception simply lead to existential despair, a Sartrean sense of the meaningless of life? Thomas Aquinas has the answer. The great medieval scholastic said that the contingency of a thing tells us that it doesn’t contain within itself the reason for its own existence. This is why we naturally and spontaneously look for the cause of a contingent state of affairs: Why did that cloud come to be? What is keeping that insect alive? Why am I writing this article? But if that cause is itself contingent, then we have to look for its cause. And if that cause is contingent, our search must go on. What we cannot do is endlessly appeal to contingent causes of contingent states of affairs. And thus we must come, finally, to some cause that is not itself caused and which in turn causes contingent things to be. And this, Aquinas says, is what people mean when they use the word “God.”

Critics of religion sometimes say that priests and ministers present themselves at moments of sickness and tragedy—in hospitals, nursing homes, and funeral parlors—because they are providing a pathetic crutch to those who can’t deal with the sadness of life. But this is hopelessly superficial. Religious leaders do indeed go to those places, precisely because it is there that people experience their contingency with particular acuteness and such experiences open the mind and the heart to God. When we are shaken, we seek by a very healthy instinct for that which is ultimately stable.

At the end of World War II and in the wake of September 11th, churches were filled across our country, and I would be willing to bet, when the coronavirus passes, they will be filled again. I would urge you to read this phenomenon not merely psychologically but metaphysically: tragedy sparks an awareness of contingency, and an awareness of contingency gives rise to a deeper sense of God.


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About Bishop Robert Barron 205 Articles
Bishop Robert Barron has been the bishop of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester in Minnesota since 2022. He is the founder of www.WordonFire.org, a nonprofit global media apostolate that seeks to draw people into—or back to—the Catholic faith.

4 Comments

  1. Well said Bishop Barron. I would like to share my personal experience, which further solidifies your narrative. My mother, who just passed away two years ago at the age of 99, told me a story when I was about 20. I am now 66. She said she had met my dad in November, 1941. When Pearl Harbor was attacked on Dec. 7, 1941, my future dad was called into service with the U.S. Army Air Corps. He left for training in January, 1942. Later that year, he was deployed to Europe. My mom said that there was a church in downtown St. Paul called the Church of St. Louis, which is still there and recently celebrated its’ 150th anniversary. During the war, they offered a Novena every Monday night at 7:00 PM. My mom said that she went to that Novena every Monday night during the war, and it was packed, standing room only, with girlfriends, wives, parents, etc. of the soldiers who were fighting for freedom, that they would return home safely. In April, 1945 my dad was discharged and returned home. My mother and him got married one month later. She said her and my dad continued to go to that Novena, until it was discontinued shortly after the war ended. However, they continued that Novena at 12:10 every Monday, in which she attended until about nine years ago when she couldn’t drive anymore. I had asked her why she continued to attend even after the war ended. After all, my dad had made it home safely. She said that she had promised God that if His mercy allowed my dad to return home safely, that she would be eternally grateful to Him and she wanted to thank him by continuing that Novena. In other words, she wanted to continue thanking God for answering her prayers when the outcome was unknown, and not abandoning God after her prayers were answered. She used to say “There is nothing more powerful than the miracle of prayer.” Those words stuck with me and I have been going to that Monday 12:10 Novena, and even daily Mass there when my work schedule permits. I am so thankful for the gift of my mother, and father, for sharing their experience and being such a great example that, like them, I pray to God especially during a crisis in my life, but also to thank Him for always being at my side. And my prayers are always answered, according to His will. Thank you for listening to my story. God Bless!

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