It Is Beyond Comprehension
The pictures from the Gulf Coast remain beyond comprehension. It keeps getting worse in New Orleans.

• People spending days trapped on roofs or in attics with high heat and humidity- and no way to get in touch with anyone.
• The hotel with all its windows blown out bore a startling resemblance to the Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
• An oil rig wedged under a bridge.
• A casino picked up and moved.
• Stories that sound like they are from Erik Larson's book on the Galveston hurricane devastation on 1900.
• A row of Red Cross vehicles waiting to serve- but unable to go very far.
• Almost a deja vu to the tsunami pictures last Christmas.

Back in June, 1972 my wife and I were stranded in north central Pennsylvania after Hurricane/Tropical Storm Agnes dumped rivers of water and the Susquehanna River roared through downtown 10 feet above flood stage. That was beyond comprehension- a 1000-year flood.

And all most of us can do - all that most people in New Orleans can do - is sit and watch and keep from despair. The physical reconstruction will take a long time. So will the psychological. The post-traumatic stress will be rampant for years.

May God's comfort and strength be a light in whatever darkness may have fallen across the Gulf Coast tonight.