Where is God in Iraq today? Where is God when prisoners are tortured and killed?
Aleteia, a worldwide Catholic news network, recently shared a story that the niece of a nun learned that "Two nuns, two orphan girls and a little boy" were taken hostage by ISIS.
Where is God? How can God allow this? She questioned. The answer came to her as she visited the "House of Terror" museum in Budapest that housed a former Nazi headquarters and a later Communist secret police torture chamber.
The place was a "scene of terror, torture and executions. Once the iron doors shut behind me, a wave of anguish and despair started to engulf me," the niece writes.
She was guided through various cells with descriptions of the methods of torture and the hanging ceremony. She was shown pictures of the victims. Finally she cried out, "Where is God?"
In her own words the niece continues, "The question that I always tried to keep at the back of my mindsuddenly became a burning question. It was at that moment that I heard a gentle voice whispering a clear answer: 'I wasthere! No one entered that cell without my accompanying them. I still bear the marks of the cross.'
"I remember being filled then with so much peace and gratitude to my Godwho himself experienced the deepest pain and fear that can ever grip a human heart. Jesus is not only the one who has suffered most; he also knows what it means to see the pain in the eyes of loved ones whose silent pain can sometimes be harder to bear than one's own physical suffering.
"Only he could fathom the pain that was piercing his Mother's heart while she watched her only and innocent child being crucified. Only He can fathom the pain of seeing his beloved Christian brothers and sisters tortured and executed today."
The niece goes on to reflect on how her family has coped with the agony often imposed on them by the politics of war torn Iraq. "My paternal grandmother saw her house destroyed twice. [This] same intelligent and courageous woman, when she saw our home in rubbles, eulogized over it and shed tears for 15 minutes, after which she stood up and said, 'All the material things are mere dirt of our hands, Blessed be God for ever!'
"Thanks to my family's great faith, however, which I could literally touch with my own hands, I could always trace the defaced and vague marks left behind by the Good God as a sign of his presence.
"The question 'Where is God?' is, at best, an unfair question and begs another question: 'Where is man?' Our personal way of the cross is meant to teach us that in the midst of all the suffering, the glory of God the Father is shown and the splendour of the risen Son is manifested because where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is Freedom, there is peace!"
It is our job, dear reader, to pray for peace as we have never prayed before. We pray that love may replace hatred and that the peace of Christ may reign. And let us learn to take ownership and instead of asking Where is God? we learn to ask Where is man?
