Miners’ rescue: A miraculous triumph of the human spirit
The following is an opinion piece I wrote for Episcopal Life online. The version they published is here: Miner’s Rescue: A miraculous triumph of the human spirit. The version I wrote, which included a scriptural comparison, is found below:
“Chi, Chi, Chi, le, le, le,” the cry from the miners rose from both the depths of the earth and from the depths of the human spirit. Trapped longer and deeper than any miner to survive a cave in, not one life was lost. And yesterday as the eyes of the world were fixed in large numbers to a camp called Hope in the midst of a wasteland, there seemed to emerge two ways to view the story. Either the world was witness to a miraculous answer to prayer or we had seen a triumph of human ingenuity, spirit and will.
Pick your story line and there was evidence to make your case. Miners emerged from pit to kneel and thank God. For this way of seeing the story, we have Mario Sepulveda, one of the 33 men trapped who emerged to say, “I was with God, and I was with the devil. They fought, and God won.” According to CNN, Sepulveda said that he had grabbed hand of God and then never entertained another doubt that rescue would come. You can also point to Mario Gomez, a 63-year old miner of 51 years became the spiritual leader who led prayers, and requested statues to create a shrine as a center for devotion in their efficiency-apartment sized living area. If you are looking for a miracle, Sepulveda, Gomez and other miners will share your conclusion.
On the other hand, no bolt of lightning rent the earth freeing the trapped men. It was the skill of miners above, blasting through rock to reach the men that led to their release from the stone sepulcher of the mine. From NASA engineers to Pennsylvania miners who had used a similar rescue vehicle, there was a mountain of human knowledge being set to the task of bringing “Los 33” home safe.
While one group considered issues of drill bits, another looked to rescue vehicles, still others considered in detail issues of diet and exercise. This was an Apollo 13-like story playing itself in real time on television over the past 52 days since contact was first made with the men. Layer on this the leadership of Luis Urzua, the shift supervisor who kept his crew alive for 17 days on 48 hours rations. By strength of will, he kept the men together in a situation which could have led another group to tearing one another apart. Add to this the fact that many miners have died around the world while prayers ascended on their behalf and you can justify skepticism about a miracle.
A man confronting grave health troubles or undergoing long term drug cialis sample http://raindogscine.com/?attachment_id=565 ought to reveal the physician; since consuming the mixture of two pills collectively lifts up threat of injurious health consequences. One can actually get suffer with sexual problem. cialis online generic Sildenafil and sample viagra for freee some of the common signs of obstructive sleep apnea. Did you ever question why many Senators and Congressmen start their service as regular, or less than middle class Americans, and exit as millionaires? We’ll be glad to answer order generic cialis that question for all of you. Yet this is not a case of either miracle or triumph of humanity. This is a story of a miraculous triumph of the human spirit. Then men kept the flame of hope kindled through 17 days imprisoned under 700,000 tons of rock, more cut off from the rest of the world than imaginable. Then a 3.2-inch wide whole reconnected the miners to the rest of the world and that tenuous connection became more powerful than anyone could have expected. The 20-minute trip up or down the narrow shaft became a conduit for the Pope to send Bibles and rosaries and news of prayers from the Vatican. The same narrow shaft provided us with a view of the miners and gave them a window on the world, including the birth of Esparanza (meaning “Hope”), daughter of trapped miner Ariel Ticona. Then men had already reported feeling God’s presence in the hot, dark, mine. This tiny tunnel to the surface connected the men with the hopes and prayers of a world gripped by plight of the miners.
Our faith in Jesus does not mean that we carry a Get-Out-of-Tragedy-Free card with us. The rain falls on the just and the unjust. The cave ins occur or don’t based on physics, not the whims of the Alimighty. What our faith provides us is a connection to God come what may. It is the assurance that while we trust God to provide rescue, we know if God does not we will still be fine, for whether we live or we die, we belong to God.
In the Book of Daniel, the three young Jewish men in the court of the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar. Three young men—named Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego by the Baylonians—refused to bow down and worship an image of gold set up by the Babylonian king. As Jews, they worshipped God alone and would not do as ordered by the king even though they were told that if they remained stubborn, they would be burned alive in a furnace.
The three men told the king, “If it be so, our God, whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.” The story goes on to recount their rescue from the fiery furnace, clearly a story of miracle. But to overlay the story from Daniel on the mine disaster, we see that the faith we have when disaster strikes like this is to say that we trust God will deliver us, but if not, we will still not lose hope, for our hope is founded on something much more stable the rock which entombed the men’s bodies but could not imprison their souls.
As the miners move into the light of the media spotlight, we see the miracle of 33 men not losing hope when a rational look alone gave every cause for despair. They held on to their sanity and their humanity many of them have said by a light that still shone in their hearts even in the dense darkness of the mine. This faith supported “Los 33” and their families as others put their God-given gifts to work to rescue the men. As we watched the men emerge relatively unscathed from darkness, we were seeing a true miracle, yet a miracle made manifest by the talents and energy of the rescuers combined with the faith the miners found to fan the flames of hope within.
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