Sunday, 31 August 2025

On August Assumptions

 

Where do you stand right now? What do you assume to be true (does that word still have meaning?). What do you assume to yourself:  responsibility, authority, guilt? What to assume in August?

It has this double significance, you see. There’s assuming the faith of certain sources, a very ancient understanding. There’s assuming the trust that others should have in you. Do you trust yourself, though?

Looking around the world is a painful process, with the earth itself unstable, unable to be comprehended. Earth, air, fire, and water corrupted to unknowable ways. Human agency, deployed in wars, invasions, crimes, and fraud.  We stand in Dante’s dark wood, facing the assaults of violence and greed.

Can we assume that anyone will bail us out? Must we assume the task ourselves? What is called for? To cease oppressing — everyone — to stop assuming we know what’s best everywhere. To bring about the liberation of the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind. Even to find the right words — often no words — to preach good news to the weak, among whom we are included. So read Jesus, in a time of Imperial domination, when the truth is not in us.

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