I refer to John Guillaumier’s letter ‘Where was God?’ (The Sunday Times of Malta, November 16). Humanly speaking he has some very valid points. Yet I feel there are others which we may have forgotten.

In the Napoleonic Wars (1803-1814) there were hundreds of thousands of military and civilian casualties in Europe as a result of the French Revolution and its lengthy after-math affecting almost every European country.

In the First World War (1914-1918) there were some 20 million casualties, while in the Second World War (1939-1945) there were 60 million. Peace followed only at a very high price.

Human history has seen periods of building, of destruction, and of rebuilding. Human nature is indeed frail and sinful, followed or accompanied by grace and renewal.

During His Passion and Death on the Cross, even Christ exclaimed: “Oh God, why have You abandoned me?”

There are continually situations where the devil is at play and at war with mankind. He is the great destroyer of personalities, friendships, societies and nations. We are sometimes under his terrible and long lasting sway. He is neither to be over estimated, nor to be under estimated. Pope Francis mentions him and his fallen angels frequently.

The Pope has seen his dreadful fruits in his native Argentina with the thousands of ‘desaparecidos’ or disappeared people under a vengeful and brutal regime.

So, in this at times tragic human condition we have been told to pray and to fast by the Blessed Virgin at Fatima in 1917, and at Medjugorje from 1981 until today. Prayer and fasting can take various forms: meditation and recitation of prayers, fasting from excessive and even normal food intake, from drink and alcohol, from our human passions and especially from violence and lust in all their forms.

St Paul wrote to his Corinthian brethren in 2:10: “I am writing this to you now in the hope that I won’t need to scold and punish when I come; for I want to use the Lord’s authority which he has given me, not to punish you but to make you strong”.

So, besides asking “Where was God?” we could often ask “Where were we?” Were we on the right track or were we lost in a desert of darkness? Have we been following the light or not?

This also applies nowadays to Iraq, Syria, Libya and Eastern Ukraine.

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