Our good friend and neighbor, Barbara, is enjoying a three-week visit by her daughter and daughter-in-law and her two grandchildren. They all love the lake, and our grandson, Cole, loves having them here. We have a water blanket for them that we tie to the edge of the dock. They run the length of the dock and jump on it. They are lathered in sunscreen and play with glee. Although Cole is taking a swimming lesson class, he still wears a lifesaving vest. Finally, there is an endless supply of snacks such as chips, scoops, Pirate’s Booty, fruit snacks, pure organic fruit bars, but chilled and cut-up watermelon is the favorite. All the activities, accompanied by the laughter and creative playmaking, are a joy to behold.
I am watching them this afternoon mindful of the fact that in a week’s time Barbara’s family will be traveling to Pennsylvania for their yearly Christian family camp vacation at Deer Valley Y.M.C.A. Camp. I pray that they will not be vulnerable to any type of harm at this time while my heart is heavy with grief over the ferocious flooding that took place on the Guadalupe River in Texas Hill Country, washing away Christian camps there. This morning’s headline from the New York Times read:
Hope Fades for Finding Survivors as Death Toll Passes 100
Twenty-seven of those victims were children from the Mystic Camp. Parents are in an agonizing wait for reports on their missing daughters. Others are grieving a loss so deep, words cannot begin to express the level of sadness and sorrow. The nation mourns with them.
Lois and I still listen to the soundtrack for the Broadway musical, “Hamilton.” My favorite song is the poignant “It’s Quiet Uptown,” a song that describes Alexander Hamilton and his wife Eliza’s grief over the death of their son, Philip.
[ANGELICA]
There are moments that the words don’t reach
There is suffering too terrible to name
You hold our child as tight as you can
And push away the unimaginable
The moments when you’re in so deep
It feels easier to just swim down
[ANGELICA/ENSEMBLE]
The Hamiltons move uptown
And learn to live with the unimaginabl
Indeed, there are moments of suffering that are too terrible to name, experiences that words cannot reach, those we want to push away because of their unimaginable pain. The parents of those children swept away by the roaring Guadalupe River know this pain and join the generations of parents who have wept for their children victims of tragic, cruel and evil circumstances of all types.
Biblical parents know this pain as well, and it often carries a universal dimension, so great is the grief. Jeremiah 31: 15-16 NRSVU has moved generations to ponder the unimaginable:
15 Thus says the Lord:
A voice is heard in Ramah,
lamentation and bitter weeping.
Rachel is weeping for her children;
she refuses to be comforted for her children,
because they are no more.
And our own Christmas narrative is not without the evil heart bearing down without mercy on the innocent children.
The Escape to Egypt
13 Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” 14 Then Joseph[h] got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt 15 and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, “Out of Egypt I have called my son.”
The Massacre of the Infants
16 When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the magi,[i] he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the magi.[j] 17 Then what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:
18 “A voice was heard in Ramah,
wailing and loud lamentation,
Rachel weeping for her children;
she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.”
The Rachels of every age, who push away the unimaginable while they weep for their children, still refuse to be consoled because they are no more.
The desperate plight of children in our world is its greatest shame and most urgent challenge.
At the beginning of each year, UNICEF looks ahead to the risks that children are likely to face, and suggests ways to reduce the potential harm. The latest report, Prospects for Children 2024: Cooperation in a Fragmented World, paints a picture of a short-term future characterized by continued conflict and economic uncertainty. Here is a breakdown of the main trends to look out for.
Ongoing violence and war
The prospects of conflict, says the report, will be driven by escalating competition among world powers, threatening the rights and lives of children. (As the ruthless Bibi Netanyahu meets with the empathy-void President Trump, it is urgently important to pay attention to the plight of children in Gaza. Yesterday, The New Yorker published a piece titled:
The War On Gaza’s Children
Without safe access to food, water or medical care, survival has become a daily gamble for the region’s youngest residents.
By Isaac Chotiner, July 7, 2025)
The children of Gaza are crying out, mourning the deaths and the injuries of thousands upon thousands who suffer amid the rubble, which was once their homes, hospitals, and schools! Rachel is still weeping for her children.
Slow economic growth
Turgid economic growth is undermining years of progress on child poverty reduction, making it difficult for young people to access global job markets. If international trade is stymied by distrust and tit-for-tat tariffs, food prices could increase, and child nutrition could suffer. The way to safeguard children, says the report, is economic solidarity, market collaboration, and investment in future skills.
A lack of international collaboration
The report expresses concern that a fragmented multilateral system is not delivering on key issues for children. This can limit efforts to address grave violations of child rights; hinder global efforts to address risks, including the climate crisis; and inhibit the collective action needed to prevent and end conflicts. The multilateral system has a chance to reset its course in 2024 through stronger collective action, global governance, and financing reforms.
Inequities in developing countries
Developing economies still face fiscal structural inequities. This means that resources, opportunities, and power are not distributed equally, limiting a country’s ability to invest in children. As a result, many citizens are reliant on remittances to cover their health and education costs. New technologies and reforms to lending could offer hope for a more egalitarian future.
Democracy under threat
Dozens of elections will take place in 2024, and global democracy will face unprecedented risks, presented by disinformation and political violence, threatening the rights and services of children. Children and young people can be particularly vulnerable to this violence, which may result in death, physical or emotional harm, disruption of public services, and school closures. Young people are expressing dissatisfaction in democracy, but they are channeling their energy into constructive civic action, and online activism.
The climate crisis
A fast-tracked transition to green energy is reshaping critical minerals and labour markets, which brings significant benefits to children and young people, but also poses risks as they are potentially exposed to, for example, harmful labour practices in mining communities. The green transition also alters their prospects for jobs in the green economy, and it is challenging governments to address needs in education and skills training. But, if managed responsibly, cooperatively and justly, this transition can be a positive for children.
El Niño, mosquito-borne diseases and water scarcity will also threaten children’s health and well-being, and drive food insecurity, increased risk of child food poverty and forced migration. Greater cross-border collaboration on the management of environmental risks and technological innovation can mitigate the negative impacts.
Regulation of Artificial Intelligence
Finally, the potential impacts of unchecked technologies, including AI, are reigniting fear and concern for children’s well-being. Emerging policies and regulation, if child-centered and designed responsibly, can provide opportunities and minimize negative impacts.
Our country and our world are filled with too many moments that the words don’t reach and the suffering is too terrible to name. In these moments, parents push away the unimaginable. In these moments I am reminded of the poignant poetic power of Elizabeth Barrett Browning in The Cry of Children:
Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers,
Ere the sorrow comes with years?
They are leaning their young heads against their mothers, —
And that cannot stop their tears.
The young lambs are bleating in the meadows;
The young birds are chirping in the nest;
The young fawns are playing with the shadows;
The young flowers are blowing toward the west—
But the young, young children, O my brothers,
They are weeping bitterly !
They are weeping in the playtime of the others,
In the country of the free.
Do you question the young children in the sorrow,
Why their tears are falling so?
The old man may weep for his to-morrow
Which is lost in Long Ago —
The old tree is leafless in the forest —
The old year is ending in the frost —
The old wound, if stricken, is the sorest —
The old hope is hardest to be lost:
But the young, young children, O my brothers,
Do you ask them why they stand
Weeping sore before the bosoms of their mothers,
In our happy Fatherland?
They look up with their pale and sunken faces,
And their looks are sad to see,
Is it likely God, with angels singing round Him,
Hears our weeping any more?
Is it likely that anyone hears their weeping these days? I hope so and may we never learn to live with the unimaginable and not hear the cry of children.