Eamonn Fitzgerald's Rainy Day

In the immediate aftermath of the South-East Asian tsunami, the first thing that struck me was how quickly the calamity dwarfed what appeared to be major concerns — terrorism, Iraq, the Ukraine and all the other "crises" that headline our daily news diet. So many people died in one day; many more than in _____ and even more than in ______ (Fill in the details yourself). It was a humbling experience, especially for all who felt that they were, that we are, the Masters of the Universe. The necessary lesson such vast loss of life hammers home is that we will all disappear one day, maybe not in one day like the victims of last week's killer waves, but vanish we surely will.

Such thoughts, not in the least morbid, by the way, bring to mind this passage from the Gospel of Luke:

13:1 Now there were some present at the same time who told him about the Galileans, whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices.
13:2 Jesus answered them, "Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered such things?
13:3 I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all perish in the same way.
13:4 Or those eighteen, on whom the tower in Siloam fell, and killed them; do you think that they were worse offenders than all the men who dwell in Jerusalem? 13:5 I tell you, no, but, unless you repent, you will all perish in the same way."

In other words, this disaster should prompt us, the spectators, the survivors, to think about how we live our lives. Whether we will to so is an issue for another day. Meanwhile, Suhit Anantula and a team of volunteers have set up The South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami Blog, and over at Wikipedia, a whole lot of bloggers have been contributing to the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake page, supplying valuable tsunami information and pointing visitors to where they can donate to help the victims.