If you listen, you can hear it.
Agonizing screams.
Haunting groans.
Heaving sighs.
And the whys are easily answered.

Once again Rachel is weeping for her children.
As in ancient times,
she refuses to be comforted.
And for good reason.
Her heart is broken in a million shards of sorrow.
There is brutality and bloodshed.
There is pain and suffering.
There are unprecedented atrocities.
The stench of death dominates the domain of Jacob’s descendants.

In the “City of Peace,”
there is no peace.
In a nation that once flowed with milk and honey,
there is bitterness and hate.
The Promised Land is a region of broken promises.
Sibling rivalry is taking a deadly ungodly toll.

Yes, the sons of Abraham are fighting each other as before.
And this dysfunctional family will likely destroy itself
unless peace-loving people
look for creative ways to broker a settlement.

For a place to which all of Abraham’s progeny lay claim,
let us pray.
Let us pray for the peace of Jerusalem.