The Rotary Club of Jacksonville gathered Monday at the Omni Downtown to remember one of its own members, Episcopal School of Jacksonville Head of School Dale Regan, who was shot and killed March 6 in her office at the campus by a teacher she had fired earlier in the day.
Congregation Ahaveth Chesed Senior Rabbi Joshua Lief was called on by his fellow club members to share his insight and advice about how to hold onto faith when confronted with a terrible tragedy.
“Why do bad things happen to good people?” is the question, said Lief.
That question stems from people’s concept of God. In the Judeo-Christian context, there is one God who is in charge of everything, said Lief.
In the Book of Genesis, he said, the name given to God is in the plural and “God” is always written in the plural in Hebrew.
Lief said the Gnostic idea was that there were two Gods: a good God in charge of all things spiritual and a bad God in charge of all things physical.
“We talk about God in terms of omnipotence, being all powerful, and in terms of omnipresent, but omnibenevolent does not usually make that list,” Lief said.
He referenced the concept of Satan, a rival deity with a wager with God over the souls of all humanity. While God inspired people to be good and do good deeds, Satan tempts people to be bad and do bad.
Lief also referenced the concept of justice in the Bible, that it shall be pursued.
“Justice is elusive and fleeting. We live in a world that is not fair,” said Lief.
The Bible, he said, suggests that life is random and capricious.
“It’s not that there is a good God and a bad God. God is the infinite potential that fuels our finite actuality,” Lief said.
“God empowers and guides us to try to do something good,” he said.
An example is an act of charity. When someone does a good deed, for example giving food to a hungry person, it makes the person feel good because he or she changed the world.
“There is one less hungry person, so the world is a slightly better place,” said Lief.
As for God intervening, “lightning bolts do not strike down formerly employed Spanish teachers with AK-47s. God could stop bad things, but that’s not his job. It is our job to make the world better by our choices and our actions,” he said.
Lief said Regan’s life purpose in teaching children was to make them appreciate doing good deeds so they could be part of making the world a better place.
“We are trusted by God to make the world a better place. We must remain steadfast in our commitment to justice and peace. If we wish the future to be better than the past, it is truly in our hands,” Lief said.
356-2466