월요일, 3월 15, 2004
the madrid bombings have been a source of great concern, even here in far-off durham. in about 5 minutes' time there will be a 3 minute silence observed for the lives it has claimed, all the families it has ruined, and how many hearts it broke.

and all this because some people got up on the wrong side of the bed that morning.

ok, the 11am 3 minute silence caught me right after i typed that sentence, thereby delaying the post by a bit. it's amazing how most people around me were ignorant of it, and continued their daily routine. i suppose the lives that have been shattered by the bombings will never really be able to be picked up again, but there's always hope that things will start to look up.

i don't think i can ever start to comprehend why things like that happen. in fact, no one who hasn't lived through it ever can. it's not anyone's place to condemn anything, or to judge between right and wrong, or even to shift the blame onto anyone, that would be too judgmental. what i don't get is why people think that by committing such heinous crimes, they can achieve something. even if they manage to get away with it in their time on earth, how can they even sleep at night knowing that they've done something to wreck the lives of so many innocent people.

it's not about what God would do or what He should do to stop things like that from happening, God's too compassionate and full of love for everyone on earth no matter what they've done. it's about what burgeons in the minds of these people who choose to think that maybe, just maybe, God will like what they've done, or to gain some political standing, or even just because. of course there's more to it, i can't generalise, but that's sure what it looks like to everyone standing on the outside.

when i look at all the things God has created, and notice all that beauty that is around us, i can't imagine why man would want to destroy everything, His creations, just so they could make a point. and a fairly unseeming point it is too. i just can't seem to get my head round that notion. there is more to life than just that little myopic world we confine ourselves to, and sometimes we never get to see outside of it because we choose not to, eventhough it is there for the taking.