“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven” (Eccl 3:1). So begins the best-known passage in the Book of Ecclesiastes. Among the litany of appointed times is “a time to keep silence, and a time to speak” (3:7). For many today, especially people of color, the addition of George Floyd’s name to the lengthy roll of black victims of police brutality means the time for silence has passed. Now is a time to speak.
Winds buffet poor souls to and fro, whipping them out of control as they cling to one another in a desperate attempt to avoid contact with any of the other people hurtling through the storm. Believe it or not, this is not an artistic description of our hearts and minds during the last three months; it’s Dante’s imaginative rendering of the first circle of hell. Yet after the past several months, it sounds relatable.