There was a posting the other day on Facebook and it read, “The Federal Government is not worthy of our trust.” Sooooo, what is worthy of our trust?

Every system and institution that this country has come to rely upon is broken, damaged and dysfunctional on a whole lot of levels. I think I could count on one hand the number of people who would question this assertion. I don’t even think those “1%ers” that we used to hear so much about feel they are really on solid ground anymore.

As Dominicans, we know that looking at the signs of the times helps us to create our ministries and break open the Word more effectively. Today the signs we are seeing are beyond anything we might have ever expected in this “powerful” country. It has become more and more apparent that that “power” has been derived from some pretty disgraceful actions in the cause of expansion and wealth to a few.

I believe that, at least for Dominicans, we must advocate for human dignity if nothing else. If we can be successful in that advocacy, more and more systems will be impacted, broken down and repaired, not with band aids but with solid Gospel teaching. Most of us born before the 60s have leaned heavily on the Judeo portion of our Judeo-Christian foundation. So eye for an eye is the acceptable way to treat anyone who has offended us in some way. The Christian portion is hard to actualize because it seems so weak: love your neighbor, turn the other cheek; that just doesn’t do it for us. We are powerful and those kinds of actions make us look weak. And besides, look what happened to Jesus when he tried to live like that. He died!

Are a lot of us stuck on Good Friday and wallow in the suffering Jesus? We can prove the death, but how do we prove the Resurrection? That’s on us. We can prove it. Our actions could be all the proof that someone needs to believe there is hope; there is possibility; there is life in the midst of all the brokenness.