On Patience

In my sad experience, everything takes at least six months. Losing weight, learning a new piano piece, getting the roof fixed. Just about anything takes longer than you think. Patience is a virtue, also a necessity. Yet sometimes patience interferes with mercy.

            The saying ‘justice delayed is justice denied’ refers to situations where patience is applied to the wrong subject: to the oppressed rather than the oppressor. The strong want patience, while the weak need mercy now. In the matter of debts, for example, whether third world debts or welfare debts, extending patience to the debtor is merciful in the creditor. The Lord’s prayer can read ‘forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors’ and yes, this means money.

            Paul believes a God of patience requires our patience towards one another, not demanding too much speed. Some people may never be very speedy, too. But can we be too patient with sincerely unjust convictions? That domestic violence is a husband’s right, for example, or same-sex couples should be denied marriage? Should the weak show patience with power and privilege?

            The Lord is plenteous in mercy. When in doubt, find mercy. Showing patience with injustice is only confusion

On Barriers

As I passed by Princes Bridge the other day, I saw brightly coloured traffic barriers lining the walkway: to separate cyclists from the cars, or cars from the pedestrians? Signs of the times, perhaps? They changed the sober Victorian architecture to something resembling a building site.

            Signs of change. I was reminded of the stone viewing tower in Beckett Park, visited soon after arriving here. It was built in 1937 to commemorate Victoria’s centenary, and my guide remembered Empire Day bonfires there. The park was then an outlier, but when I saw it the district was dense with subdivisions: the passage of time is also the passage of space.

            The park is refurbished; the bridge streams with traffic; everything is as it seems to be. The past, though, is different than it seems to be. Many things have changed for the better, some for the worse. Change seems incremental, but wears us out from day to day.

            The Lord of heaven and earth will change them like clothing, says the psalmist. They change now as we speak. The Lord looks upon the earth, to hear the pleas of the prisoners. Do we need more, or less, of barriers?