California Wildfires, Hurricane Ida, Smoky Skies, Kabul Afghanistan

This week I have been preoccupied with thoughts about the ongoing wildfires in the Western United States. There seems to be no end in sight. Indeed, those fires may not end until winter weather finally snuffs them out with snow and cold. Our air quality index in Utah is bumping up against the dangerously high levels of toxicity every day, and has for months. We used to be concerned about air quality in the winter with temperature inversions, but now air quality is a year-round issue. The suffering of those on the frontlines of those fires is inestimable, and is the subject of our daily prayers for their safety and deliverance. The first responders who have been battling those wildfires deserve our faith and prayers on behalf of those who suffer most. 

On the very anniversary of Hurricane Katrina that so devastated New Orleans sixteen years ago, Hurricane Ida, a category 4 storm pounded into the Gulf Coast last week in another devastating natural disaster that defies description. I am agonized over those who are left behind in the wake of the destruction. It is said the storm's severity may grow worse than it was in Katrina. 

The smoky skies we are living through here in Utah are bad enough, but pale in significance compared to the other natural disasters we are witnessing. Some days the normally bright blue skies are so shrouded in smoke it is impossible to make out the outlines of the mountain tops that surround us. The winter inversions are normally confined to the bowl of the valleys in an around Salt Lake City, but this smoke has permeated even our elevated position in the Uintas. 

The smoke is the perfect metaphor for the conditions in the world when it comes to discerning between truth and error. So pervasive is this smoke that it obscures the vision, burns the eyes, and gets right down into your lungs. The ever-declining moral standards are clearly defined. 

An evidence of the debauchery can been observed in the appointment of a self-avowed atheist as the new head chief chaplain to Harvard University. Observing this obvious decline in what is happening to universities around the country, Elder Jeffrey R. Holland addressed the issue at BYU Education Week, and has been sorely taken to task on the social media platforms for daring to plead with faculty and administration at the institution to remain true to their charge and their unique place in the education world. Imagine a religiously based institution daring to stand up for itself in today's toxic and smoky world. How dare Elder Holland for suggesting it! What is he thinking? Doesn't he know it's time to capitulate to growing secular pressure and cave in? Well, in fact, Elder Holland was courageous and he was right. You can have all the free speech your little heart desires out there in the world, but when it comes to going too far and violating time, manner and place restrictions with your free speech targeted against the Church, be advised that religious minorities have long-held protections against such bullying and attacks and you will be met with appropriate responses with all the loving kindness and patience the Church's leaders can muster.

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland at BYU

The tragedy that has unfolded in Afghanistan recently is yet another example of wickedness and evil in the world. The evacuation of US troops, Afghan civilians and American citizens has been horrible to observe as the Taliban moved into Kabul unopposed and began slaughtering the innocents at will, forcing our military to leave behind all the equipment they had used seeking to maintain some degree of order in the country. When the Russians invaded Afghanistan years ago, they learned it was a country that could not be governed except by the local Taliban chieftains. Now, presumably, we have learned the same sad lesson. That war in Afghanistan has been protracted into twenty plus years of occupation, and now suddenly the administration of Biden-Harris has declared it was time to leave. It's the longest war in which America has ever been involved. Those who have lost loved ones there may well be asking, "What was it all for?" 

In the midst of chaos we have now pulled out. Americans are weary of war. It is that very chaos in public opinion that produced the violence and the unintended consequences we have witnessed. When asked about it, President Biden took full responsibility for his decisions. We will have to see if the electorate holds him accountable. Politicians from both parties, however, have plenty of innocent blood on their hands. In the meantime we have much for which to be grateful if we are out of harm's way because of those who fight in the frontlines to preserve our freedoms. 

We have much to be grateful for, but we can also pray for those who are doing their best to relieve the suffering of others not so fortunate.