Bobby Darin…

On the 22nd of November, 1963, the then President of the United States of America, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was brutally slain, while travelling in an open car in Dallas Texas. Such is how many history books record the event, and what large numbers of primary school students commit to memory. The assassination of JFK was one of those moments of the 20th Century, such as the moon landing, which remains indelibly imprinted on the minds of all those old enough to have experienced them.

JFK moments before he died

Yet behind each historical event lies a real person who now belongs to the annals of time; locked away in some dusty history book. One of the first people to have been made aware of the assassination of JFK, was the then Attorney General, Robert Francis Kennedy. Robert Kennedy had been informed for two reasons: first, he was the chief law enforcer of the nation; second, he was the late President's younger brother. In his role as Attorney General he passed on the information to all those in his chain of command; in his role as brother, he consoled his family.

Robert Francis Kennedy had grown up in the shadow of his older brother, a position he apparently enjoyed, as he looked upon JFK as a hero, and role model. A man who would live his entire life with a profound speech impediment, Robert Kennedy was proud of being JFK's understudy. This was all to change on November, 1963. For many years afterward, the younger Kennedy, sorrowful and wounded in spirit, questioned the meaning of his brother's life and death, and his own purpose on this earth. By decade's end, Robert Kennedy had re-formed himself, and sought to attack head on, the pivotal social issues of his day. Once again however, events would turn.

On the evening of April the 4th 1968, Kennedy, on a flight to quell a riot in poverty stricken Indianapolis, was given the message that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had been killed. Waiting for him at the airport were 5,000 black men and women, oblivious to this news, having stood in the rain for many hours. As if inspired, and drawing on his own experiences, Kennedy told the crowd on his arrival, among other things: "I have bad news for you, for all of our fellow citizens, and people who love peace all over the world, and that is that Martin Luther King was shot and killed tonight … For those of you who are black and are tempted to be filled with hatred and distrust at the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I can only say that I feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling. I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man … My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He wrote: 'In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God'." Kennedy concluded: "Let us dedicate to ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world".

Mass Card for Robert Francis Kennedy

The spiritual maturity of Robert Kennedy's speech is worthy of closer examination. There is in the Senator's words a steady acceptance of Providence, in that the individual should not be slave to, nor confounded by events, there is more than just a tinge of St. Paul's well-known phrase: "We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose". (Romans 8: 28, NRSV) Yet similarly, there is no despairing notion that we accept all that occurs unreservedly, but that we must also take our place to resolve any evil, by "making gentle the life of this world". Earlier in history Sir Francis Bacon had written on a similar theme that we must be people of action, for: "In this theatre of man's life, it is reserved only for God and for the angels to be lookers on".

Artist's impression of Meister Eckhart

The Dominican mystic, Meister Eckhart, taught in his sermons, that the beginning of the spiritual life, is that point where one can say fully "Yes" to God. Drawing on the teaching of Christ in the Lord's Prayer, Eckhart imparted to his audience the notion that the spiritually mature individual is he or she who is able to say: "Thy will be done". It was this dilemma which Robert Kennedy had had to face, that one must be able to persevere despite the events which seek to tear at body, heart and soul. Providence does guide, but we through our actions help determine the speed of the Providential outcome. As Eckhart intimated, we co-create with God, and are not trapped pawns on a chess board.

Within the depths of his own personal Gesthemane during the United States Civil War, Abraham Lincoln wrote as to the necessity for the individual to be spiritually aware and resilient in this world. Lincoln penned: "I do the very best I know how — the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right, what is said against me won't amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference". Only a matter of days after the surrender by Lee at Appamatox Court House, Lincoln was to die at the hands of an assassin. Was this an example of a futile life?

Teilhard de Chardin

In history, each one of us are as relay racers; only one ever sees the finish line, sees the point of completion, yet each participant is vital to their particular moment, to their certain age, in their sphere of opportunity; integral to the consummation of the goal. In poetic words Teilhard de Chardin reminds us: "Give our Lord the benefit of believing that His hand is leading you, and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete...".

In our constant strivings may we never know despair, but realize the consolation of Christ's teaching: "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. And even the hairs of your head are all counted. So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows". (Matthew 10: 29-31, NRSV)

The human life is one touched by joy and suffering, and the latter many times, can teach us lessons, perhaps not immediately, perhaps not ever appreciated or wished for, but lessons nonetheless. Let us understand our common natures, and seek to see which baton we take up, and in what position we shall hand it forward; for such is the Divine purpose of our strivings.

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©2007 Dr Andrew Thomas Kania

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