We have all heard it said that everyone has their own "higher power." I believe that in every heart there is a beckoning voice, reminding each of us always to be love and act with love. But we do not always -- because we do not have to -- either hear this voice or attend to it. In the case of some people, the turning away from love has become so constant and habitual as to make them, in the words of A COURSE IN MIRACLES, "temporarily inaccessible to the power of the Atonement." We have obviously witnessed this week the behavior of such people.

This is a time when we are challenged to view the world through a deeply spiritual lens. There is a dimension of pure holiness and pure love which is God itself, and that dimension is our ultimate Reality. The world as we know it is a kind of mass hallucination, and while, within this dimension, tragedies do occur, they neither reflect nor modify the ultimate truth of who we are. That is why those who died in this tragic situation, lost their bodies but they did not die. While the body is destructible, the spirit is not.

Therefore, when we ask "Where was God in all this?", the answer is that He was and is right here, keeping every soul safe in the palm of His hands. He did not cause these events, nor did He will them. This tragedy reflects choices made by those who had turned their hearts from love. He heals the world not by interfering with the effects of our lovelessness, but by calling us back to love.